I seek to advance opportunity among children and families through rigorous empirical research. In its historical mission and ongoing activities, the Urban Institute is the perfect place to do this work.
Erica Greenberg is a senior fellow and PK–12 team lead in the Center on Education Data and Policy at the Urban Institute. Her research spans early childhood and K–12 education with a focus on public prekindergarten. She also investigates the causes, consequences, and measurement of educational inequality.
Greenberg’s current projects examine the implementation and impact of innovative policies in Washington, DC. She is principal investigator of the DC Prekindergarten Study, which leverages a centralized admissions lottery to measure the efficacy of public preschool at scale. She is also coprincipal investigator of the DC Child Care Policy Research Partnership, which evaluates implementation of the Early Childhood Educator Pay Equity Fund and enhanced quality rating and improvement system. Recent national projects center the early care and education workforce, segregation in early education programs, and the COVID-19 pandemic’s effects on early childhood systems and families with young children. Greenberg values dissemination and has shared findings through agency briefings, peer-reviewed journals, and media outlets such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, Education Week, and NPR.
Before joining Urban, Greenberg was an intern in the US Department of Education Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development and a prekindergarten teacher in Washington, DC.
Greenberg holds a BA from Yale University. She received her MA in political science and her PhD in education policy from Stanford University.
