Anastasi Lecture 2014

Henry Braun, Boisi Professor of Education and Public Policy, Boston College

Tuesday, October 21, 2014, at 5:30 p.m.
12th Floor Lounge, Lowenstein Center at 113 W. 60th Street, Lincoln Center Campus

America has always seen itself as a Land of Opportunity. Over the last four decades, a torrent of data on growing inequality, have led many to doubt that view of our nation. Inequality of opportunity may be both the most fundamental and the most amenable to public and private action. Gross differences in opportunity have consequential implications for intra- and inter-generational mobility, the national economy, civil society and the democratic polity. I will offer a framework for understanding the complex dynamics driving differences in opportunity from birth to adulthood, and how those differences interact with the changing labor market to determine adult outcomes and offer some thoughts on how we can close the opportunity gap.

Henry Braun is the Boisi Professor of Education and Public Policy and Director of the Center for the Study of Testing, Evaluation, and Education Policy at Boston College. From 1979 to 2006 he worked at the Educational Testing Service where he served as vice-president for research management and held the title of distinguished presidential appointee. He is a co-recipient of the
1986 Palmer O. Johnson Award of the AERA and a co-recipient of the NCME’s 1999 Award for Outstanding Technical Contribution to Educational Measurement.