Courtney Bell

Courtney Bell serves as the Director of the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) and Professor of Learning Sciences at the University of Wisconsin – Madison. A former high school science teacher, Courtney earned her doctorate at Michigan State University in Curriculum, Teaching, and Educational Policy and a BA in Chemistry at Dartmouth College. Courtney is passionate about understanding and improving teaching for historically underserved children. Her interdisciplinary collaborative work is situated at the intersections of research, policy, and practice. It spans issues of parental choice, performance assessments of teaching, international comparisons of teaching, teaching quality, teacher learning, teacher education, and the measurement of teaching. Courtney led the international development of two observation systems and served as a PI on the OECD-organized TALIS Video Study (also called the Global Teaching InSights study). She is currently engaged in both national and international studies of teaching, teacher education, and teacher learning.