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SLU School of Education and St. Louis Public Schools Team Up in Unique Partnership

The Saint Louis University School of Education has partnered with St. Louis Public Schools (SLPS) to establish a University-District partnership focused on the analysis of educational data to support educators and school leaders. 

Through the partnership, the SLU School of Education created positions for a small team of postdoctoral researchers who are hired by Saint Louis University and who support the data needs of the St. Louis Public Schools. The partnership began in the summer of 2019.

This research practitioner partnership enhances the capacity of both institutions. The postdoctoral fellows will not only bring their own expertise in their data work with the school district, but they will also benefit from the guidance of faculty in the SLU School of Education and staff in the new PRiME Education Policy Research Center at SLU. The SLU School of Education will certainly benefit from the work of these postdoctoral fellows and from the enhanced relationship with St. Louis Public Schools.

I am grateful that Dr. Adams and his colleagues in SLPS have been willing to trust SLU and our researchers to engage in important research work for the district. Moreover, I am thrilled that this partnership has drawn the interest of very talented researchers to apply for these postdoctoral fellowships. I am confident that this initiative will benefit both SLU and SLPS, while providing unique opportunities for our postdoctoral fellows."

Gary Ritter, Ph.D., Dean of School of Education


For SLPS, the postdoctoral fellows will focus on increasing the data and analytic capabilities of the district. To do so, their responsibilities include evaluating student- and school-level data to respond to analytic needs of the district, designing and implementing surveys of SLPS students, parents, and staff, executing research projects which ascertain the impacts of educational initiatives and programs, effectively presenting the research findings to stakeholders, and aiding the district staff in writing grant proposals.

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PRiME Center leadership team Evan Rhinesmith, Ph.D., Director of Research and Evaluation, and Stacey Preis, Ph.D., Director of Outreach, with School of Education dean Gary Ritter, Ph.D. Photo by Ellen Hutti.


Overall, this partnership will allow the St. Louis Public Schools to ask and answer questions related to school and student data far more efficiently than before. And, this partnership will allow faculty and researchers in the SLU School of Education to engage in research projects that are more directly relevant to the needs of students and educators in the local public schools.