William R. Penuel is professor of Educational Psychology and Learning Sciences in the School of Education at the University of Colorado Boulder. His research sits at the intersection of learning sciences and policy. He studies the design, implementation, efficacy, and sustainability of efforts to improve science and mathematics education. He has explored how participatory design, professional development, curriculum, and teachers’ collegial interactions support improvement efforts. Recent projects have examined the efficacy of project-based curricula in science, how teachers’ assistance to colleagues can augment the effects of professional development, and how research-practice partnerships facilitate use of research among district leaders. He is co-principal investigator of the Research+Practice Collaboratory, which is developing and testing new approaches for relating research and practice more productively.
He is editor of two recent volumes on educational research methodologies (Learning Research as a Human Science, 2010, with Kevin O’Connor; Design-Based Implementation Research, 2013, with Barry Fishman, Anna-Ruth Allen, and Britte Haugan Cheng) and numerous journal articles and book chapters.