W. Steven Barnett, PhD
Board of Governors Professor and Director of the National Institute for Early Education Research, Rutgers University
W. Steven Barnett is a Board of Governors Professor and Director of the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) at Rutgers University. Dr. Barnett is a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association and a member of the National Academy of Education. He advises national governments, international agencies, and foundations of early care and education policy, research, and evaluation. Dr. Barnett is co-editor of the International Journal of Child Care and Education Policy and a member of the Editorial Board of Early Childhood Research Quarterly. He earned his Ph.D. in economics at the University of Michigan, and his research applies economic analysis to issues of early care and education policy and practice.
Dr. Barnett’s research includes studies of the effectiveness and economics of early care and education including the well-known benefit-cost analyses of the Perry Preschool and Abecedarian programs. He has also studied the impacts of program duration and intensity, dual language models, curriculum, alternative staffing structures, professional development, and parental engagement.
