Professor
Diane and MacDonald Becket Professor in Educational Policy and Director, Center on Educational
Ph.D., Northwestern University

E-Mail: wohlstet@usc.edu
Phone: (213) 740-3450
Office: WPH 901B
Expert Directory: http://www.usc.edu/uscnews/experts/1163.html

Priscilla Wohlstetter is the Diane and MacDonald Becket Professor in Educational Policy at the University of Southern California's Rossier School of Education, where she also directs USC's Center on Educational Governance. Dr. Wohlstetter holds joint courtesy appointments in the College (Political Science Department), the School of Architecture, and the School of Policy, Planning and Development. She teaches courses on the laws and politics of education, educational innovations, and accountability in public education.

Her research explores the policy and politics of K-12 urban education, as well as the relationship between school governance and improved school performance. She has served as principal investigator for numerous national and international studies focusing on urban reform. She currently co-directs the National Resource Center for Charter School Finance and Governance, a project funded by the U.S. Department of Education, which includes studies of parent engagement in urban charters and a ground-breaking study of charter management organizations, focused on replicating success. She also helped to establish a working collaborative with four school districts and the Weingart Foundation to improve student achievement in urban schools and school systems. Finally, in partnership with the charter community, she developed a state accountability system for California charter schools (Charter School Indicators-USC) which reports both academic and financial performance. Her publications include numerous articles on federal and state education policies, local governance, public-private partnerships, educational innovations, and the use of data-driven decision making to improve school performance. Recent books include Taking Account of Charter Schools, Federalism Reconsidered: The Case of the No Child Left Behind Act, and Organizing for High-Performance.

She is a member of the advisory board of the National Charter School Research Project at the Center for Reinventing Public Education, and served recently on the Los Angeles Unified School Board's Committee on Charters and Innovation, which reviews all initial and renewal petitions to LAUSD, the largest district authorizer in the United States.

Prior to her tenure at USC, Wohlstetter had a post-doctoral fellowship at RAND. She received her masters in education and social policy from Harvard Graduate School of Education, and her Ph.D. in public policy from Northwestern University.