Joseph Waddington, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation
134A Taylor Education Building
rjwaddington@nulluky.edu
(859) 257-8666
Dr. Joseph Waddington is an associate professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation in the College of Education and the Martin School of Public Policy and Administration (by courtesy). He joined the University of Kentucky faculty in 2015 after serving as a postdoctoral research associate with the University of Notre Dame Institute for Educational Initiatives. Dr. Waddington earned a Ph.D. in Educational Studies and a M.A. in Statistics from the University of Michigan and a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Notre Dame.
Dr. Waddington’s primary line of research focuses on the variation in impacts of K-12 school choice programs and policies, including charter schools and private school voucher programs, using quasi-experimental research methods. Along with colleagues at UK, the University of Notre Dame, the University of Washington-Bothell, and NORC at the University of Chicago, he has received over $1.5 million in funding from the Spencer Foundation and the Institute for Education Sciences (U.S. Department of Education) to support this research. Dr. Waddington has published research on school choice in the peer-reviewed journals Education Finance and Policy, Educational Researcher, Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, Journal of School Choice, and Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences. He also has a book with colleagues titled School Choice at the Crossroads: Research Perspectives (Routledge, 2019). His research has been cited in several prominent media outlets, including the Chicago Tribune, Education Week, the Los Angeles Times, Politico, National Public Radio, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post.
Dr. Waddington regularly teaches courses across the quantitative research methods spectrum, including introductory statistics courses (EPE/EDP 557 and 558), an intermediate course on research design and regression analysis (EPE/EDP 660), and an advanced course on causal and quasi-experimental research methods (EPE/EDP 711).
Research categories: Statistics, Policy, Charter Schools, Research Methods, Quantitative and Psychometric Methods, School Choice