Suzanne Bonamici, a U.S. Representative from Oregon’s 1st Congressional District, met with leaders and senior researchers from the University of Oregon College of Education (COE) on Nov. 1 to discuss the impact of federal funding on the college’s far-reaching educational research. Much of its funding is awarded by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), the U.S. Department of Education’s research arm.

President Michael Gottfredson; Kimberly Espy, vice president for research and innovation and dean of the graduate school; and COE Interim Dean Mia Tuan were among the roundtable attendees, which included representatives from some of the college’s 19 research and outreach units. Collectively, their work impacts school districts in every state of the union, comprising some 20,000 schools, and in at least 18 countries.

Espy introduced to the researchers gathered around the table as “some of our most outstanding scholars on this campus.”

Bonamici refers to herself as a “double duck,” having earned both a bachelor’s (journalism, 1980) and J.D. (1983) from UO. She serves on both the House Education & Workforce Committee and House Science Committee.

As a member of the House Education and Workforce Committee, Bonamici is among those considering the reauthorization of the IES through the Education Sciences Reform Act. The act, originally passed in 2002, created the IES. Since 2004 its National Center for Special Education Research has funneled more than $40 million in funding to Oregon, the most of any state.

UO enjoys a long legacy of innovation in educational systems and supports, particularly in the area of special education, which means the stakes are high for the COE. Roughly $30 million in federal funding (all sources) comes through the COE’s research units each year, the most per tenured faculty member of any college of education in the United States – a fact President Gottfredson was quick to mention in his brief remarks.

The researchers shared some real-world examples of how sequestration and the recent government shutdown has affected their work, and by extension, the lives of children whom it affects. Beth Stormshak, associate vice president for RIGE and a professor in the COE’s department of Counseling Psychology and Human Services who also runs the Prevention Science Institute, said one of their IES grants-in-limbo would have helped fund family-based interventions for 10 schools in the Clackamas (Ore.) School District. The recent shutdown delayed consideration of the grant.

Professor Rob Horner from the Department of Special Education and Clinical Sciences said the real problem isn’t conducting research so much as implementing it.

He told Bonamici, “One of the challenges we have in Oregon, and across the nation, is we are investing a huge amount of money doing things that we actually know are not very effective … both in discipline and literacy.”

Horner’s overall message to the congresswoman was, “you don’t get the academic gains unless you also create an effective culture.”

Rep. Bonamici said she appreciated the COE’s perspective on federal funding, particularly in the ammunition it gives her to champion educational research.

“… what gives me hope about this type of funding is that there’s a lot of talk about accountability … what you’re doing gives us the ability to say, ‘We need the money because it’s going to work, and here’s why it’s going to work, and here’s how it’s going to work,’” she said. “Without that piece, it’s harder to say we need to increase education funding, because people will say, ‘We don’t know if it’s a wise investment because we don’t have the data.’ That’s what you’re doing.”

On Thursday, the congresswoman visited Durham Elementary in Tigard, Ore., a Title I school with whom the COE works closely. While there she noticed posters with “expectations for behavior,” part of the Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports framework developed by Horner’s Educational and Community Supports unit.

“I saw it, and I commented on it,” joked Bonamici. “I said we could use one of these in Congress.”

- by the UO College of Education