Feb. 09, 2015
Alexander Nedd
[email protected]
Marcus Winters, assistant professor in the College of Education, not only helps enrich the thoughts and lives of students at UCCS, but has applied these concepts to a broader range nationally.
Winters was recognized by the 2015 RHSU Edu Scholar Public Influence rankings, placed 181out of 200 recipients.
Winters’ work focuses on improving education throughout the school system in the United States without having to over-utilize economic resources.
“I appreciate what [RHSU] is doing,” Winters said. “[They] recognize leaders that are contributing not only to the academic literature but also to the broader policy conversation as a whole.”
Winters has worked at UCCS for four years. He is an economist and teaches statistic courses in the Ph.D. program as well as economics of education. His research on public education focuses on K-12 school levels.
“I study the impact of educational interventions on student academic performance,” he explained.
Winters’ work has yielded findings such as the how the average spending on a child by public schools with inflation has more than doubled over the past quarter decade, and yet educational outcomes have stalled. Winters wants to change that.
“My main areas [of study] are school of choice, school of accountability and things related to teacher quality,” Winters said.
“I study the impact of charter schools, student achievement within public school systems, how wide the variation of teacher quality is, which play a huge role in the conversation here in Colorado but also other places across the nation.”
Winters began working on education policy after receiving his undergraduate degree. His work has been published in a variety of journals across the nation.
This semester, he hopes to further his research and publish his latest findings.
“I’m working on school accountability policies,” Winters said. “I’m really interested in policies that use retention as part of a test based system, I’m also very interested in teacher pensions. I think those are undervalued and underappreciated and it doesn’t get very much media attention.”
Winters works with others from around the nation on his findings, including co-author Joshua Cowen from Michigan State University who has published similar work.