Jonathan A. Supovitz Associate Professor Senior Researcher, Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE)   jons@gse.upenn.edu

Professional Biography
Dr. Supovitz conducts research on how education organizations use different forms of evidence to inquire about the quality and effect of their systems to support the improvement of teaching and learning in schools. Dr. Supovitz also leads the evidence-based leadership strand of Penn’s mid-career leadership program and teaches courses on how current and future leaders can develop an inquiry frame of thinking about continuous improvement and the skills necessary to compile, analyze, and act upon various forms of evidence.

While studying policy analysis at Duke University, Dr. Supovitz first focused on education leadership and policy. Before earning his doctorate at Harvard's Graduate School of Education, he gained middle and high school teaching experience in Queretaro, Mexico, and Boston, Massachusetts. His dissertation at Harvard focused on the classroom and accountability uses of portfolio assessment in an urban school district. Upon completing his degree, Dr. Supovitz worked as a research associate at Horizon Research, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where he directed the evaluation of the New Jersey Statewide Systemic Initiative and evaluated the effectiveness of electronic “netcourses” for teacher enhancement. He joined the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) in 1997 as a senior researcher and the faculty at the University of Pennsylvania in 2005.

Dr. Supovitz is an accomplished mixed-method researcher and evaluator, employing both quantitative and qualitative techniques to best answer the questions of interest. He has published findings from a number of educational studies, including multiple studies of programmatic effectiveness; examinations of the relationship between teacher professional development, teaching practice, and student achievement; studies of educational leadership; efforts to develop communities of instructional practice in schools; an examination of the equitability of different forms of student assessment; and the use of technology for evaluative data collection. His current work focuses on how districts develop a coherent vision of instructional improvement and devise systems to support instructional focus in schools, and how organizations build a culture of inquiry that supports sustained organizational learning and improvement.

Research Interests and Current Projects
Dr. Supovitz is the principal investigator or co-principal investigator of several research and evaluation projects at CPRE. These include the national evaluation of the America 's Choice comprehensive school reform design; a study of high school strategies for instructional improvement; and a study of district improvement efforts. He is currently planning a randomized experiment of the implementation and scale-up of a formative assessment intervention.

Courses Taught
EDUC 545: The Evolution of Assessment: Classroom and Policy Uses
Mid-career Doctorate in Educational Leadership Program: Introduction to Evidence-Based Leadership
Mid-career Doctorate in Educational Leadership Program: Critically Consuming Educational Research

Selected Publications
Supovitz, J.A. (2007). The Case for District-Based Reform: Leading, Building, and Sustaining School Improvement. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.

Supovitz, J.A., & May, H. (2004). A study of the links between implementation and effectiveness of the America 's Choice comprehensive school reform design. Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk, 9 (4), 389-419.

Supovitz, J.A. & Klein, V. (2003). Mapping a course for improved student learning: How innovative schools systematically use student performance data to guide improvement. Philadelphia: Consortium for Policy Research in Education.

Supovitz, J.A. (2003). Evidence of the influence of the National Science Education Standards on the professional development system. In What is the influence of the National Science Education Standards? Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

Supovitz, J.A. (2002). Developing communities of instructional practice. Teachers College Record 104 (8), 1591-1626.

Supovitz, J.A. & Poglinco, S.M. (2001). Instructional leadership in standards-based reform. Philadelphia: Consortium for Policy Research in Education.

Supovitz, J.A. (2001). Translating teaching practice into improved student achievement. In S. Fuhrman (Ed.), National Society for the Study of Education Yearbook. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Supovitz, J.A., Mayer, D., & Kahle, J.B. (2000). The longitudinal impact of inquiry-based professional development on teaching practice. Educational Policy, 14 (3), 331–356.

Supovitz, J.A. & Brennan, R.T. (1997). Mirror, mirror on the wall, which is the fairest test of all? An examination of the equitability of portfolio assessment relative to standardized tests. Harvard Educational Review, 67 (3), 472–506.