Allan Odden

Allan Odden is Professor Emeritus of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at the University of Wisconsin-Madison's School of Education, where he served as Professor from 1993 to 2011. He earned his Ph.D. in 1975 and M.A. in 1971 from Columbia University, M.Div. from Union Theological Seminary in 1969, and B.S. in aerospace engineering magna cum laude from Brown University in 1965. His career began as a mathematics teacher and curriculum developer at Benjamin Franklin High School in New York City's East Harlem from 1967 to 1972. He then held leadership roles at the Education Commission of the States from 1975 to 1984, including Director of the Education Finance Center, and at the University of Southern California from 1984 to 1993 as Professor and Director of Policy Analysis for California Education. Odden is co-director emeritus of the Consortium for Policy Research in Education and director emeritus of Strategic Management of Human Capital in Education.

Odden's research focuses on education finance, school-based financing and resource allocation, teacher compensation, strategic management of human capital, educational policy implementation, and productivity in education. He has authored or co-authored over 250 journal articles, book chapters, and reports, as well as 35 books, including School Finance: A Policy Perspective (5th ed., McGraw-Hill, 2014, with L. Picus), Strategic Management of Human Capital in Education (Routledge, 2011), 10 Strategies for Doubling Student Performance (Corwin, 2009), and Improving Student Learning When Budgets Are Tight (Corwin, 2012). He received the Distinguished Service Award from the American Education Finance Association in 1998, served as its president from 1979 to 1980, and was a Visiting Scholar at Stanford's Hoover Institution in 1997. Odden has conducted school finance adequacy studies for states such as Wyoming, Wisconsin, Texas, New Jersey, Kentucky, and others; served on the National Research Council's Committee on Education Finance, Equity, Adequacy, and Productivity; and acted as Special Court Master in New Jersey's Abbott v. Burke school finance litigation. His work has influenced education policy at federal, state, and international levels.

Professional Email: arodden@wisc.edu