EPI | Youth Policy Lab

In the News

Jacob comments on competing screen policies for students

Jan 28, 2026 EdSurge

Brian Jacob, the co-director of University of Michigan's Youth Policy Lab, believes the two initiatives can co-exist, as they address two separate ideas. One expresses enthusiasm for applying AI for educational purposes, while the other centers fear ...

Jacob comments on competing screen policies for students

In the Media

Jacob comments on fall in public school enrollment in wealthy districts

Jan 8, 2026 The 74

Brian Jacob found that white families removed their children from public schools at much higher rates in districts that were slow to reopen for in-person instruction. Jacob said in an interview that he was "not surprised" to see that parents who had ...

Jacob comments on fall in public school enrollment in wealthy districts

News

What is the secret to better reading outcomes?

May 26, 2025 Education Week

As states have struggled for decades to improve 3rd grade literacy on a large scale, many have enacted policies to hold struggling readers back a year. Education Week recently highlighted Christina Weiland and Brian Jacob's evaluation of Michigan’s “...

What is the secret to better reading outcomes?

News

PPIA students reflect on their summer of study and social life

Aug 2, 2023

What are the dynamics of inequity in labor markets? How do we determine appropriate categories for people in a multicultural society? How is the U.S. approach to ethnicity and nationality different from what they are doing in Europe? These were...

PPIA students reflect on their summer of study and social life

News

Ford School welcomes PPIA 2023 cohort

Jun 19, 2023

The 2023 Public Policy and International Affairs (PPIA) Junior Summer Institute (JSI) has welcomed 23 students from 11 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. This year’s cohort will spend seven weeks taking classes, participating in polic...

News

Ford School welcomes local and state elected officials to boost collaborative work

Feb 16, 2023

Elected officials from local, county, and state government came to the Ford School to hear about the potential for collaborations with their offices and the School’s faculty, research centers, and students. Fifteen members of the Michigan State Se...

Ford School welcomes local and state elected officials to boost collaborative work

Publication

Groundbreaking data from College and Beyond II help researchers examine diverse college experiences

Jan 10, 2023

Researchers have known for decades that attending college is associated with wide-ranging benefits to individuals and society. What is not entirely clear are the mechanisms that connect these beneficial outcomes with the undergraduate experience. For...

Groundbreaking data from College and Beyond II help researchers examine diverse college experiences

In the News

Jacob discusses chronic absenteeism fueled by pandemic

Feb 20, 2022 The Columbus Dispatch

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, schools across the nation are struggling with rising absenteeism rates. Brian Jacob, Walter H. Annenberg Professor of Education Policy, weighed in on the issue. "There was a once-in-a-century global public h...

Jacob finds little benefit, large costs to pretrial juvenile detention

State & Hill

Building strength

Jun 10, 2021

With new leading-edge research and faces at the school, the Ford School builds depth in two key policy areas. Energy and the environmentEconomics, political science, psychology, and community engagement are at the roots of the Ford School’s interdisc...

News

Examining Detroit students' college pathways

May 26, 2021

Academic and non-academic barriers are preventing Detroit high school students from enrolling and succeeding in college. Detroit Students’ College Pathways and Outcomes, a policy brief released by the Youth Policy Lab (YPL) at the University of Michi...

YPL report: Pre-COVID, more than half of Detroit students felt anxious or depressed, 1 in 4 considered suicide

Publication

Career and technical education offers pathways for students with disabilities in Michigan

May 13, 2021

Career and Technical Education (CTE) could offer one way of bolstering educational attainment among and providing valuable job skills to students with disabilities (SWD). A new release by the Youth Policy Lab at the Ford School looks at CTE participa...

Career and technical education offers pathways for students with disabilities in Michigan

News

Dynarski named NASPAA "Public Service Matters" Spotlight Award recipient

Oct 21, 2015

Professor Susan Dynarski has been named a recipient of the "Public Service Matters" Spotlight Award by the Network of Schools of Public Policy, Affairs, and Administration (NASPAA) for her ongoing work on college affordability and student debt. Honor...

In New York Times, Dynarski makes the case for universal college admission testing

Report

Understanding Michigan’s Reconnect Program Applicants

October 30, 2025

Alex Bartik, Brad Hershbein, Brian Jacob, Kevin Stange, Bryan Stuart

The Michigan Reconnect Program was launched in 2021, providing free community college tuition to Michiganders who are 25 or older and who have not already earned a college degree. In this report, the authors summarize the characteristics of individua...

cover photo of reconnect 2025 report: a young female checking information on a laptop