DIRECTORS & STAFF
MEP Directors
David Klingbeil
Associate Professor in the School Psychology Program at UW-Madison. Klingbeil’s research is couched within the multi-tiered systems of support which are commonly used in schools (primarily in grades K through 8) to support the academic achievement and social-behavioral outcomes for all students. His work focuses on improving the universal screening practices schools use to identify students in need of additional support and evaluate evidence-based interventions that are useful for support students after they are identified. His current research projects include studying factors that predict long-term intervention effects for second and third grade students receiving high-impact tutoring in reading.
Eric Grodsky
MEP Director and Professor of Sociology & Educational Policy Studies at UW–Madison. Grodsky’s research is focused on inequality in educational opportunities and achievement across the life course. He has written on the role of race/ethnicity and social background in shaping college attendance and completion, the role of testing in American education, and how education shapes health and mortality at midlife. Grodsky’s current projects include work on the role of full-day preschool in student learning, variation in the underlying causes of student disparities in school attendance, and the relationship between educational opportunities and achievements in adolescence and the experience of chronic pain at midlife.
Brianne Monahan
MEP Deputy Director and research director for the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD). Monahan oversees the Research Department and co-leads brokering work with Beth Vaade.
Beth Vaade
MEP Director and Senior Executive Director of Research, Assessment & Improvement for the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD). Her work focuses on research & evaluation, strategic planning, liberatory design and cultivating partnerships.
MEP Staff
Ellyssa Eiring
MEP Research Coordinator. Ellyssa has 10 years of k-12 teaching experience and has been with WCER in project management since 2017. She has managed a variety of projects, most recently with CIMER, Culturally Aware Mentoring, and the Institute for Diversity Science. She is also the Graduate Program Manager for the Interdisciplinary Training Program at WCER.
Olga Murasova
MEP Project Assistant and PhD student in sociology. Olga works with quantitative data and is currently collaborating on MEP-directed research studying post-secondary pathways and tutoring.