(L-to-r) Joshua Goodman, Anthony Abraham Jack, and David Chard

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Three BU Wheelock Faculty Named Top Educational Policy Influencers

BU Wheelock faculty David Chard, Joshua Goodman, and Anthony Abraham Jack were recently named among the top 200 most influential university-based scholars in educational policy and practice.

Chard, Goodman, and Jack were recognized in the 2025 Edu-Scholar Public Influence rankings, which are released annually on the Education Week blog, Rick Hess Straight Up. Hess is a noted scholar and director of educational policy at the American Enterprise Institute. He and his team calculate the rankings based on a set of criteria that evaluate scholars’ influence on academic scholarship and public debate.

“We’re proud to see these three outstanding scholars recognized for their achievements,” says Dean Penny Bishop. “This honor both reflects their significant contributions to their fields and underscores the impact of our academic community.”

Chard, a professor of special education who served as BU Wheelock’s dean until June 2024, was ranked at 103. Goodman, an associate professor of education and economics who is also a faculty affiliate of the Wheelock Educational Policy Institute, was ranked at 108.

Jack, who holds appointments as both associate professor of higher education leadership and as faculty director of the Newbury Center, was ranked at 150. He is also the author of the recent book, Class Dismissed: When Colleges Ignore Inequality and Students Pay the Price.

“It is an honor to be named with engaged scholars who are investing in not only curating knowledge, but also sharing it with the larger community,” says Jack. “Our future success as a nation, and the world for that matter, depends on academics talking to more than just those who have the same training and same degrees they do.”