About the OERC
The Ohio Education Research Center (OERC) was founded in 2012 by a group of researchers from Ohio universities and independent research organizations. The initial charge for the OERC came from the Ohio Department of Education’s Race to the Top program (RttT). This project focused on the role of the OERC to develop and implement a coherent P-20 education research agenda in collaboration with the Ohio Department of Education (now the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce) and Ohio Board of Regents (now the Ohio Department of Higher Education).
Vision
The Ohio Education Research Center provides evidence-based evaluation and data science support to improve Ohio’s future.
Mission
The Ohio Education Research Center provides solution-focused data and evaluation to build educational, workforce, and social and housing support for Ohio communities and government.
Core funding for the OERC is provided by the Ohio Longitudinal Data Archive (OLDA) Partnership, a consortium of state agencies in Ohio. The OLDA Partnership includes the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, the Ohio Department of Higher Education, Opportunities for Ohioans with Disabilities, the Ohio Housing Finance Agency, and the Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities. The OERC also receives funding through private foundations as well as federal grants and contracts.
The OERC conducts research utilizing administrative data available through the OLDA Partnership. The OLDA Partnership centralizes state administrative data into a single data repository, the Ohio Longitudinal Data Archive, for education and workforce research..
In addition to conducting research using the data available through the OLDA Partnership, OERC research draws upon the expertise of its staff and an affiliated network of researchers to generate high-quality research products using a variety of methods and data sources, including case studies, environmental scans, literature reviews and survey research. The OERC creates products and tools that connect practitioners with research.