Patricia Burch

I am a professor at the USC Rossier School of Education and a Co- Faculty Director of the USC EdPolicy Hub.  I received a Ph.D. in Education and M.A. in Sociology from Stanford University. I have over twenty-five years of experience studying large scale reforms aimed at improving equity in large urban school systems including after school programs, teacher quality, shared leadership and instructional improvement. I use mixed methods to study the design, implementation and effects of policies aimed at improving access to high quality instruction for urban public-school students.  In this work, I focus specifically on how schools are shaped by broader social and economic dynamics including education markets. I am the author of five highly regarded books (one on mixed methods research in program and policy evaluation) and over 40 peer reviewed articles and chapters. I am a former editor of the internationally known Journal of Education Policy and currently serve on the board of AERA Open. My editorials on educational issues have appeared in Hechinger Report, EdSource, Education Week, the 74 million among other media.   

My expertise is in educational privatization, organizational and institutional theory and comparative policy. My central conceptual contribution to the study of education privatization is how market forces become structurally embedded within public education through what I term “hidden markets.” Moving beyond debates about overt privatization, my work reveals that privatization now operates less through explicit ideological shifts and more through the technical and contractual integration of private actors into the everyday infrastructure of schooling. By mapping these systemic interconnections, I reframe privatization as a post-neoliberal phenomenon—one that reconfigures governance, accountability, and equity not by removing the public sector, but by reshaping its operations through ongoing partnerships with commercial entities. This perspective challenges researchers and practitioners to recognize and critically engage with the subtle, infrastructural ways in which market logic shapes educational experience and opportunity.

Presently, I am conducting several collaborative research projects focused on infrastructural interdependencies between markets and education in multiple policy areas: artificial intelligence, out of school time, alternative schools and juvenile justice. 

USC Mentoring Award 2018

• Policy and Politics in Urban Education
• Organizations, Institutions and Educational Equity
• Research Methods

• Burch, P. (in press). Ed. System failure: Policy problems in the school to prison pipeline. New York: Routledge. Critical Social Thought Series
• Engel, L. and Burch, P. (2021), Policy sociology in the contemporary global era: Continued importance and pressing methodological considerations. Education Researcher. First published April 26, 2021
• Burch, P. (2021). Hidden markets: The new education privatization. New York: Routledge. Critical Social Thought Series. 2nd Edition
• Burch, P. (2020). Federal policy and the push to privatize education. Phi Delta Kappan. Published line September 21, 2020.
• Burch, P. & Crowson, R.L. (2020). Local Schooling and Organizational Change: New Insights from the Perspective of Institutional Theory, Peabody Journal of Education, 95:4, 331- 335, DOI: 10.1080/0161956X.2020.1800171
• Burch, P. Bingham, A.J, & *Miglani, N (2020) Combining Institutional and Distributed Frameworks in Studies of School Leadership, Peabody Journal of Education, 95:4, 408- 422, DOI: 10.1080/0161956X.2020.1800176
• Burch, P. and Miglani, N (2018). Tecchnocentrism and social fields in the India EdTech Movement: Formation, Reproduction, and Resistance. Journal of Education Policy, 33-5, 590-616.
• Bingham, A. and Burch, P. (2018). Navigating Middle of the Road Reforms through Collaborative Community. Democracy and Education , 25(2), Article 1.
• Burch, P., Good, A and Heinrich, C. (July 2015) Improving Access to, Quality, and the Effectiveness of Digital Tutoring in K–12 Education Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, first published online July 27, 2015.
• Burch, P and Good, A. (2014). Equal Scrutiny: Privatization and Accountability in Digital Education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.
• Burch, P. & Heinrich, C.J. (2016). Mixed Methods for Policy Research and Program Evaluation. SAGE Publications, Inc.
• Burch, P. (2009). Hidden Markets: The New Education Privatization. New York: Routledge. The Critical Social Thought Series.
• *Spillane, J. & Burch, P. (2007). The institutional environment and instructional practice: Changing patterns of guidance and control in public education. In H.D. Meyer & B. Rowan (Eds.), The New Institutionalism in Education. (pp. 87-102). Albany: SUNY Press.
• Burch, P. (2010). After the fall: Education contracting in the wake of the US and global financial crises. Journal of Education Policy. 26, 33-38.
• Burch, P. (2010). The bigger picture: Institutional perspectives on interim assessment technologies. Peabody Journal of Education, 85(2), 147-162
• Burch, P. (2007). The professionalization of instructional leadership in the United States: Competing values and current tensions. Journal of Education Policy, (22)2, 195-214.
• Burch, P. (2007). Educational policy and practice from the perspective of institutional theory: Crafting a wider lens. Educational Researcher, 36(2), 84-95.
• Burch, P., Steinberg, M., & Donovan, J. (2007). Supplemental educational services and NCLB: Policy assumptions, market practices, emerging issues. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 29(2), 115-133.
• Burch, P. (2006). The new educational privatization: Educational contracting and high stakes accountability. Teachers College Record, 108 (12), 2582-2610.
• Burch, P., Donovan, J., & Steinberg M. (October 2006). The new landscape of educational privatization in the era of NCLB: Markets, supplemental education services and No Child Left Behind. Phi Delta Kappan, 88(2), 86-90.
• Burch, P. & Spillane, J. (2005). How subjects matter in district office practice: Instructionally relevant policy in urban school district redesign. Journal of Educational Change, 6 (1), 51-76.
• Burch, P. & Spillane, J. (2003, May). Elementary school leadership strategies and subject matter: Reforming mathematics and literacy instruction. The Elementary School Journal, 103(5), 519-535.
• Spillane, J., Diamond, J., Hallett, T., Halverson, R., & Burch, P. (2002). Managing in the middle: School leaders and the enactment of accountability policy. Educational Policy, 16(5), 731-762.
• Policy Briefs
• Understanding Supplementary Educational Services (SES): A Guide for Parents and Guardians Rodolfo Acosta, Patricia Burch, Annalee Good, Mary Stewart, Carolyn Heinrich & Christi Kirschbaum Comprendiendo los Servicios de Educación Suplementaria (SES): Un guía para padres y guardianes Rodolfo Acosta, Patricia Burch, Annalee Good, Mary Stewart, Carolyn Heinrich & Christi Kirschbaum
• The Implementation and Effectiveness of Supplemental Educational Services A Review and Recommendations for Program Improvement Carolyn Heinrich, University of Texas-Austin; Patricia Burch, University of Wisconsin-Madison”
• Equal Access to Quality in Federally Mandated Tutoring: Preliminary Findings of a Multisite Study of Supplemental Educational Services (SES) Authors: Patricia Burch, Carolyn Heinrich, Annalee Good, and Mary Stewart

am a professor at the USC Rossier School of Education and a Co- Faculty Director of the USC EdPolicy Hub.  I received a Ph.D. in Education and M.A. in Sociology from Stanford University. I have over twenty-five years of experience studying large scale reforms aimed at improving equity in large urban school systems including after school programs, teacher quality, shared leadership and instructional improvement. I use mixed methods to study the design, implementation and effects of policies aimed at improving access to high quality instruction for urban public-school students.  In this work, I focus specifically on how schools are shaped by broader social and economic dynamics including education markets. I am the author of five highly regarded books (one on mixed methods research in program and policy evaluation) and over 40 peer reviewed articles and chapters. I am a former editor of the internationally known Journal of Education Policy and currently serve on the board of AERA Open. My editorials on educational issues have appeared in Hechinger Report, EdSource, Education Week, the 74 million among other media.   

My expertise is in educational privatization, organizational and institutional theory and comparative policy. My central conceptual contribution to the study of education privatization is how market forces become structurally embedded within public education through what I term “hidden markets.” Moving beyond debates about overt privatization, my work reveals that privatization now operates less through explicit ideological shifts and more through the technical and contractual integration of private actors into the everyday infrastructure of schooling. By mapping these systemic interconnections, I reframe privatization as a post-neoliberal phenomenon—one that reconfigures governance, accountability, and equity not by removing the public sector, but by reshaping its operations through ongoing partnerships with commercial entities. This perspective challenges researchers and practitioners to recognize and critically engage with the subtle, infrastructural ways in which market logic shapes educational experience and opportunity.

Presently, I am conducting several collaborative research projects focused on infrastructural interdependencies between markets and education in multiple policy areas: artificial intelligence, out of school time, alternative schools and juvenile justice.