Donald J. Peurach
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Location
Room 3115
610 E. University Ave.
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1259
Donald J. Peurach is Professor of Educational Policy, Leadership, and Innovation in the University of Michigan’s School of Education. He is also a Faculty Lead for the EdHub for Community and Professional Learning, Co-Director of the Improvement Scholars Network, Senior Fellow of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, a Faculty Associate in the Center for Positive Organizations in the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, and a Senior Research Specialist at the Consortium for Policy Research in Education at the University of Pennsylvania.
Peurach’s research, teaching, and outreach focus on the organization, management, and improvement of instruction in education systems, with a particular focus on network-based continuous improvement. Among the aims of his research is to understand the production, use, and management practical knowledge as distributed among classrooms, communities, schools, and systems in complex, dynamic policy environments.
- With support from the Spencer Foundation and the National Science Foundation, Peurach is collaborating with researchers from the University of Michigan and Northwestern University to study efforts to redesign classrooms, school, districts, and networks to function synergistically as instructionally focused education systems.
- As the Co-Director of the Improvement Scholars Network and a Senior Fellow of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Peurach is collaborating with researchers and educational professionals to organize, expand, and advance the community of scholars engaged in the practice and study of improvement research and network-based continuous improvement. He is also collaborating with researchers at Vanderbilt University, the University of Pittsburgh, and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in measuring and supporting the development of improvement networks as scientific-professional learning communities.
- Across both of the preceding, Peurach raises and examines cross-cutting issues of leadership, organization, and policy central to large-scale efforts to advance educational access, quality, and equity in the US and other national contexts, especially for students who have been historically marginalized both in public schools and in broader society.
Peurach is the co-editor of The Foundational Handbook on Improvement Research in Education (Rowman & Littlefield, 2022). He is also the author of Seeing Complexity in Public Education: Problems, Possibilities, and Success for All (2011, Oxford University Press) and co-author of Improvement by Design: The Promise of Better Schools (2014, University of Chicago Press). Peurach's perspectives and research have been featured in commentaries, press reports, and op-ed pieces, as well as in blogs from Education Week, the Huffington Post, the William T. Grant Foundation, and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
Peurach is the lead designer of Transforming Education in an Interconnected World: a four-course, open access professional learning series on the Coursera platform that introduces systems transformation and collaborative, continuous improvement to a global audience. The Transforming Education series was developed in the UM EdHub for Community and Professional Learning in collaboration with the UM Center for Academic Innovation and the Improvement Scholars Network. The series draws inspiration from a series of reports on transforming education for holistic student development (with support from the Brookings Institution’s Center for Universal Education) and insights from studies of transforming systems for ambitious instruction (with support from the Spencer Foundation and the National Science Foundation).
In 2024, Peurach’s contribution to the promotional video for Transforming Education in an Interconnected World was nominated for an Emmy Award in Program Promotion by the Michigan Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. In 2020, Peurach was recognized as one of 10 global finalists for the edX Prize for Exceptional Contributions to Online Teaching and Learning for his work on the Leading Educational Innovation and Improvement MicroMasters program.
In 2025, Peurach was recognized with the inaugural Field Building Award from the Improvement Science Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association. Peurach has also been recognized with Outstanding Reviewer Awards by Educational Researcher (2017 and 2024), AERA Open (2020), and Educational Administration Quarterly (2016). In 2013, Peurach received the Marsal Family School of Education's Evan G. and Helen G. Pattishall Junior Faculty Research Award. In 2011, he received the Paula Silver Case Award from the University Council of Educational Administration for the most outstanding case published in the 2010 volume of the Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership.
Prior to joining the Marsal Family School of Education as a faculty member in 2011, Peurach served as an assistant professor at Michigan State University and at Eastern Michigan University. He also served as a researcher on U-M's Study of Instructional Improvement. Before pursuing an academic career, Peurach was a high school mathematics teacher and, before that, a systems analyst in manufacturing, health care, and higher education.
Peurach holds a BA in computer science from Wayne State University, an MPP from the Ford School of Public Policy at U-M, and a PhD in Educational Studies from the Marsal Family School of Education at U-M.
Intellectual Clusters
Selected Publications
Peurach, D.J. (2011). New York, New York: Oxford University Press.
Cohen, D. K., Peurach, D. J., Glazer, J. L., Gates, K., & Goldin, S. (2013). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
"Governments, markets, and instruction: Considerations for cross-national research."
Peurach, D. J., Cohen, D. K., & Spillane, J. S. (2019). Journal of Educational Administration. DOI 10.1108/JEA-09-2018-0172.
"From mass schooling to educational systems: Changing patterns in the organization and management of instruction."
Peurach, D. J., Cohen, D. K., Yurkofsky, M., & Spillane, J. P. (2019). Review of Research in Education, 43(1-38).
"The dilemmas of educational reform."
Cohen, D. K., Spillane, J. P., & Peurach, D. J. (2018). Educational Researcher, 47 (3), 204-212.
"Innovating at the nexus of impact and improvement: Leading educational improvement networks."
Peurach, D. J. (2016). Educational Researcher, 45 (7), 421-429.
Peurach, D. J. & Glazer, J. L. (2016). Journal of Education for Students Placed At Risk, 21 (1), 1-9.
Peurach, D. J., Glazer, J. L., & Lenhoff, S. W. (2016). Educational Policy, 30 (4), 606-648.
"Large scale highschool reform through school improvement networks: Examining possibilities for "developmental evaluation.""
Peurach D. J., & Lenhoff, S. W., & Glazer, J. L. (2016). TeachersCollege Record (Yearbook), 118 (14).
Glazer, J. L. & Peurach, D. P. (2015). Harvard Educational Review, 85 (2), 172-202.
Peurach, D. J. & Neumerski, C. M. (2015). Journal of Educational Change, 16 (4), 379-420.
"School improvement networks as a strategy for large-scale education reform: The role of environments."
Glazer, J. L. & Peurach, D. P. (2013). Educational Policy, 27(4), 676-710.
Peurach, D. J. & Glazer, J. L. (2012). Journal of Educational Change, 13 (2), 155-190.
"Executive leadership in school improvement networks: A conceptual framework and agenda for research."
VPeurach, D. J. & Gumus, E. (2011). Current Issues in Education, 14 (3), 1-17.
"Beyond ritualized rationality: Organizational dynamics of instructionally-focused continuous improvement."
Peurach, D. J., Penuel, W. R., and Russell, J. L. (2018). In C. James, D. E. Spicer, M. Connolly, & S. D. Kruse (Eds.), The Sage handbook of school organization (pp. 465-488). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
"Organizing and managing instruction in US public school districts: Considerations for families, communities, and states."
Peurach, D. J. & Yurkofsky, M. (2018). Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center.
"Intelligently partnering for Common Core implementation."
Peurach, D. J. (2015). In J. A. Supovitz and J. P. Spillane (Eds.) Challenging standards: navigating conflict and building capacity in the era of the Common Core (pp.113-122). Lanham, MD: Rowman-Littlefield.