Curriculum Vitae – February 2024

Download full cv here:

1. Professional experience
2. Education
3. Research
4. Grants
5. Fellowships and awards
6. Invited presentations and conferences
7. Teaching experience
8. Affiliations
9. Professional activities
10. Jobs before academics

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Associate Professor (with tenure), Department of Economics, UC Irvine, 2016-present
Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, UC Irvine, 2013-2016
Assistant Professor, Department of Policy and Management, Cornell University, 2011-2013
Visiting Assistant Professor, Princeton University, 2009-2011
Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, University of Florida, 2005-2011

Visiting Faculty Research Fellow, NBER, Fall 2008
Visiting Research Fellow, Center for Labor Economics, U.C. Berkeley, 2003-2005

EDUCATION

Nuffield College, Oxford, D.Phil. Economics, 2002. Advisor: Steve Nickell
Nuffield College, Oxford, M.Phil. Economics, 1997. Advisor: Steve Nickell
Newcastle University, BA Economics, 1994

FIELDS OF INTEREST
Economics of Education, Labor Economics, Public Economics

RESEARCH

Selected work in progress

“How Do Parents Choose Schools? Academics, Non-Academics and Peers”, with Paco Martorell and Matt Wiswall.

“The Impact of Attending Popular Schools: Quasi-Experimental Evidence from Lotteries and Equity Priorities”, with Paco Martorell and Paul Yoo.

“An Efficiency Case for Equity-Based School Priorities”, with Steve Coate. Revisions requested. Journal of Public Economics.

“Exploiting Discontinuities in Secondary School Attendance to Evaluate Value Added”, with Jack Britton and Ines Lee. Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) Working Paper, September 2023. Associated policy report: “Unveiling School Effectiveness: Progress 8, parental choices and closing the achievement gap”. Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) Report R273.

Publications/forthcoming (see “Research” page for links)

“School Quality and the Return to Schooling in Britain: New Evidence from a Large-Scale Compulsory Schooling Reform”, Journal of Public Economics, 223, Pages 104902.

“Using Goals to Motivate College Students: Theory and Evidence from Field Experiments” (with David Gill, Victoria Prowse and Mark Rush),
Review of Economics and Statistics, 102(4): 648-663. October 2020.

“Peer Preferences, School Competition and the Effects of Public School Choice” (with Levon Barsegyhan and Stephen Coate),
American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 11(4) 124-158. November 2019.

“The Long-Run Effects of Attending an Elite School: Evidence from the United Kingdom” (with Emilia del Bono),
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 8(1) 150-176, January 2016.

“The Signaling Value of a High School Diploma” (with Paco Martorell),
Journal of Political Economy, 122(2) 282-318, April 2014.

“The Effect of Education on Adult Health and Mortality: Evidence from Britain” (with Heather Royer),
American Economic Review, 103(6) 2087-2120, October 2013.

“Do Recessions Keep Students in School? The Impact of Youth Unemployment on Enrolment in Post-Compulsory Education in England”.
Economica, 78 (311), 523-545, July 2011.

“Selective Schools and Academic Achievement”,
The B. E. Journal of Economic Analysis and Policy: Vol 10.: Iss. 1 (Advances), Article 9, 2010.

“The Performance and Competitive Effects of School Autonomy”,
Journal of Political Economy, 117(4), 745-783, August 2009.

Book Chapters/Book Reviews/Invited Papers

“The Impacts of Tougher Education Standards: Evidence from Florida” (with Ed See),
Economics of Education Review, 30(6), 1123-1135, December 2011.

“Education and the Age Profile of Literacy into Adulthood” (with Elizabeth Cascio and Nora Gordon),
Journal of Economic Perspectives, 22(3), 47-70, Summer 2008.

Review of “Improving School-to-Work Transitions”. Edited by David Neumark.
The Journal of Economic Literature, June 2009.

“Qualifications”. With G. Conlon and F. Galindo-Rueda. In Machin (ed.) ‘What’s the Good of Education? The Economics of Education in the United Kingdom’, Princeton University Press, 2005.

GRANTS

WT Grant Foundation, “A Lever for More Equitable Access to Schools: Evidence from San Francisco”, PI with co-PIs Adriana Villavicencio and Matt Wiswall. Award Number 190500. $519,868.

Nuffield Foundation grant “Using Catchment Areas to Estimate School Effectiveness”, co-P.P. with P.I. Jack Britton. Award EDO/43726 GBP233,525

National Institutes of Health (NIH) RO1 grant “The Intergenerational Transmission of Education”. co-P.I. with P.I. David Figlio and co-P.I.s Paco Martorell and Heather Royer. Award Number R01HD054637-01A1, $993,208.

Institutes of Educational Sciences (US Department of Education) grant “The Impact of High School Exit Exams”. P.I. with co-P.I. Paco Martorell. Award Number R305R060096, $367,081.

FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS

2015-2016 UC Irvine Faculty Mentoring Award (one of five awarded across the university by the Associated Graduate Students at UC Irvine)
Excellence in Refereeing Award, Journal of the European Economic Association, 2003.
Excellence in Refereeing award, American Economic Review, 2012.
Excellence in Refereeing award, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2011.
National Academy of Education/Spencer Post-Doctoral Research Fellow 2007-2008
European Economic Association Young Economist Award, August 2005.

INVITED PRESENTATIONS AND CONFERENCES

2022: Bristol Workshop on Education Markets (Bristol University).
2021: UC Riverside, Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), London. Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, University of Florida.2020: AEA “New Research on School Choice”, Georgia State University, UC Irvine Labor-Public.
2020: AEA “New Research on School Choice”, Georgia State University, UC Irvine Labor-Public.
2019: UC Irvine, Paris School of Economics, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

2018: Duke University, UC Merced, UC Santa Cruz, Teachers College, Columbia University. 
2017: TUE seminar, UC Irvine, Economics of Education conference, U Toronto.
2016: RAND, University of Denver, Federal Reserve Bank of New York
2015: University of Michigan, UC Irvine, UC Berkeley, Health Economics Research Network (five universities in Germany: Duisberg-Essen, Paderborn, Dusseldorf, Wuppertal and Bochum), University of Gothenberg, Uppsala University, IZA, Tinbergen Institute, UC Riverside.
2014: UC Irvine, University of Florida, University of Southern California, Stockholm University, Bristol University.
2013: UC Irvine, RAND Corporation.

2012: Stanford School of Education, SUNY Binghamton, Rochester, Cornell PAM, APPAM conference.
2011: Cornell PAM, U Florida, Office for National Statistics (UK), World Bank conference on school autonomy (Mexico City), Princeton Labor Seminar, Princeton Labor Lunch, NY Federal Reserve, CLSRN 2011 Summer School and Research Workshop, Ivalua conference on evaluation in education (Barcelona).
2010: Princeton Labor, Columbia Applied Micro, Harvard Labor, Brown Applied Micro, U Florida, Rutgers, U Pompeu Fabra, UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara, Institute of Education, London, SOLE, NBER Summer Institute, Bristol University.
2009: Teachers College, NYC Department of Education, Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), University of Florida, Florida Department of Education, Princeton Labor Lunch, National University of Singapore, Northwestern University, University of Toronto Applied Micro, Bristol University, LSE Economics of Education.
2008: University of Florida, National Academy of Education/Spencer Post-Doctoral Fellows Retreat, American Education Finance Association Meetings, Royal Holloway, UC Irvine, UC Riverside, APPAM, Dartmouth Applied Micro.
2007: MIT Public Finance, APPAM conference, McGill University, NBER Summer Institute, Bocconi/IGIER MILLS workshop, Bristol University, Institute of Education, Lancaster University, UC Berkeley Labor Lunch, NBER Spring Education Meetings, SOLE, NYU.
2006: Invited speaker, United Way workshop “Focus on Early Education” (Gainesville, FL), University of British Columbia, University of Florida, UC Berkeley Lunch, RAND.
2005: Bristol University, Madrid Education Quality Conference (co-organized by CEMFI and UCL), Columbia University Applied Micro, Oxford University Labor, European Society for the Study of Labor Economics (ESSLE) conference, European Economic Association (EEA) conference, NBER Summer Institute, University of Florida, University of Rochester, University of Toronto, McGill University, LSE.

TEACHING EXPERIENCE

Graduate

Labor Economics: UCI (Fall 2014, Fall 2016, Fall 2018, Winter 2021, Winter 2024)
Advanced Methods for Applied Microeconomics: UCI (Spring 2016, Fall 2017, Fall 2019, Winter 2022).
Empirical Methods for Applied Microeconomics: UCI (various), Cornell (Spring 2012, Spring 2013); U Florida (Spring 2009, 2011).
Econometric Methods and Models (core graduate econometrics course). U Florida (Spring 2008).

Master of Public Policy

Microceconomics for Public Policy: UCI (various)

Undergraduate

Economics of Education: UCI (various), Princeton (Spring 2011), U Florida (various)
Labor Economics: Princeton (Fall 2009).
Multiple Regression Analysis: Cornell (Spring 2013).

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES AND AFFILIATIONS

Editor: American Economic Journal: Applied Economics (Editorial Board), Journal of Human Resources (Associate Editor), Journal of the European Economic Association (Associate Editor)

Referee: American Economic Review, American Economic Journals, BEP Economic Analysis and Policy, Demography, Econometrica, Economica, Economic Journal, Journal of Human Resources, Journal of Labor Economics, Journal of Political Economy, Journal of Population Economics, Journal of Public Economics, Journal of Urban Economics, Labour, NSF, Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Review of Economics and Statistics, Review of Economic Studies.

Affiliations: Research Associate, NBER; Research Fellow, IZA; International Research Fellow, Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), London.

JOBS BEFORE ACADEMICS

Researcher for Ruth Kelly MP, former UK Treasury Minister and Education Secretary, 1998-2000.
Research Officer, Social Market Foundation (independent think-tank), 1997-1998.

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