Dr. Karen Acton is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education within the Educational Leadership and Policy (ELP) program at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), University of Toronto.

Dr. Acton brings extensive experience from both K-12 and higher education systems, having served as a teacher, department head, principal, system-level administrator, and Education Officer with the Ministry of Education. Dr. Acton previously held a position of Assistant Professor at Western University in the Faculty of Education before coming to OISE. Drawing on this broad leadership background, Dr. Acton currently teaches masters and doctoral-level courses in educational leadership and policy, research methods, program implementation, and school change. She also contributes as a research consultant for the charitable organization Learning for a Sustainable Future.

Dr. Acton’s research examines leadership and educational change through qualitative and mixed-methods approaches across local, national, and international contexts. Her publications explore topics such as principals as change agents, leadership in challenging circumstances, and transformative pedagogies in sustainability education – including age-appropriate climate change education for young learners. Her research also includes cross-national perspectives, such as a recent study examining the motivations of Doctor of Education (EdD) students across six countries.

Elizabeth Buckner is an Associate Professor of Higher Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Prof. Buckner is a member of the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education, and holds the Canada Research Chair in Higher Education for Sustainable Global Development. She is an inaugural member of the SDG Scholars Academy, an initiative of SDGs@UofT, and Member of the Data Sciences Initiative. 

Her research examines how global trends affect higher education policies, institutional practices, and students’ lives. Her research has focused on three primary lines of research - private higher education, internationalization and more recently, sustainable development. 

She views universities as incredibly powerful social institutions, mobilizing resources to both reproducing and occassionally, transforming their societies. Her research is motivated by the conviction that what universities do, and how they do it, matters and that there is much room for improvement to make universities places of wisdom, opportunity, care, and humility. She is particularly interested in how universities can escape status competition to address their complicity in reproducing inequality, recognize their ethical responsibilities, and contribute to more equitable and sustainable futures. 

She is currently recruiting doctoral (PhD and PhD Flex) and M.A. students interested in studying various dimensions of how macro-societal structures, trends, and pressures affect universities as organizations and institutions. In the funded doctoral stream, she is specifically recruiting students interested in studying universities' organizational commitments to sustainability and sustainable development in Canada and cross-nationally. If you are interested, please apply to the program in Higher Education within the Department of Leadership, Higher & Adult Education. 

Ruth Childs is a Professor in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. She conducts research and teaches courses related to research design, assessment, and evaluation.

I am an associate professor of Educational Leadership & Policy in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE).

My research examines educational policy and social inequality, both in North America and internationally. Specifically, I am interested in socio-economic disparities in academic achievement, school segregation, neighbourhood inequality, and policies around school and program choice, streaming and tracking. I use a sociological lens and quantitative methods for analysis of large-scale data. I am also interested in the methods and policy uses of international large-scale assessments, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC). Please click on the "Scholarly & Creative Works" tab to view my publications.

I am cross-appointed in the department of sociology (status only) and am affiliated with the Data, Equity and Policy in Education (DEPE) lab, the Equity in Education Canada research lab, the Data Sciences Institute, the School of Cities and the Comparative, International & Development Education Centre (CIDEC).

I am currently recruiting doctoral and masters students interested in using quantitative methods to study educational inequality, policy and/or international comparisons in K-12 school systems. (Please simply apply to the program in Educational Leadership & Policy within the department of Leadership, Higher & Adult Education, and mention my name in your application.)

Daniel (Danny) Corral is an assistant professor of higher education in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. His research explores how structural factors like institutional policies, finance, and support programs influence student access to and success in postsecondary education. By examining these systems, Danny sheds light on the barriers and opportunities that shape student pathways into and out of higher education. His research has been published in leading journals such as The Journal of Higher Education, The Review of Higher Education, Research in Higher Education, and AERA Open, among others. His research has also drawn attention from international media outlets, including The New York Times and Inside Higher Ed. Danny teaches courses on student diversity, finance, and research methods.

He earned his Ph.D. in Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. 

Dr. Corral is not actively recruiting doctoral or master's students for the 2026/2027 admissions cycle.

Dr. Katherine Entigar is an Assistant Professor of Adult Education and Community Development (Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education) at OISE/UofT. Dr. Entigar's scholarship troubles borders and authority in adult education and draws upon critical language studies, critical migration studies, feminist and queer praxes, and anti-oppressive educational practice in community-based and postsecondary contexts. Dr. Entigar is a community-based practitioner with over 20 years of experience working with culturally and linguistically dynamic students such as newcomers, 2sLGBTQ+ community members, and students with disabilities. 

Dr. Entigar is a current Senior Faculty Fellow and past Faculty Fellow at the Centre for Community Partnerships at University of Toronto, an Associate Researcher in the Identity, Home, and Belonging cluster at the Centre for Feminist Research (York University), and the 2025 recipient of OISE’s Distinguished Contributions to Teaching Award. 

Dr. Beyhan Farhadi is an Assistant Professor of Educational Policy and Equity at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Specifically, she researches K-12 EdTech policy: online education, learning and disciplinary surveillance, in public schools.  Her focus on policy is critically focused, prioritizing teacher enactment and leadership. She is interested in questions of power, justice, and resistance to neoliberal restructuring using interpretive research. She draws from extensive experience teaching in Ontario secondary schools and public education advocacy to bridge research and practice.

During her 2-year tenure as a Postdoctoral Fellow at York University, she researched policy enactment and the implementation of educational policy online during COVID-19 school closures. 

Dr. Farhadi holds an MA in English from York University (2010) where she studied critical theory, literature in the Global South, and researched activist performance art. She holds a PhD in Geography from the University of Toronto (2019). Her dissertation research examined the relationship between e-learning and educational inequality in the Toronto District School Board. She has a book forthcoming with University of Toronto Press.

Dr. Beyhan Farhadi is currently the Vice President of the Canadian Association of Sociology of Education.

Joseph (Joe) Flessa is an Associate Dean, Programs at the University of Toronto's Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. He is also a Professor in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education. His work has focused on school leadership in urban and comparative contexts. Professor Flessa is a member of the Centre for Leadership and Diversity and teaches courses in Educational Policy. 

Bio

Ruth Hayhoe is a professor in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education in the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Recognized globally for her work, Prof. Hayhoe's research has mainly related to Chinese higher education and educational relations between East Asia and the West. She teaches courses in the Higher Education program in comparative education theory and methodology and international Academic relations.

She has received many honors including an Honorary Doctorate in Humane Letters from Victoria University in Toronto (2019, as well as honorary doctorates from the Open University of Hong Kong (2015) and the Hong Kong Instituteof Education (2002. In addition she holds the Silver Bauhinia Star from the Hong Kong SAR Government and is Commandeur dans l’ordre des Palmes académiques (Paris, France). In 2025, she was awarded a Honorary Doctorate by the University of St. Joseph in Macau. 

Glen A. Jones is Professor of Higher Education in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education, and former dean of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. A globally recognized scholar in the field of higher education, Jones is a prolific contributor to the Canadian and international literature on higher education and a frequent public speaker and commentator on higher education issues. He has received numerous awards for his research and contributions to higher education scholarship, including an honorary degree. He has supervised more than 40 doctoral students, though he is no longer taking on new students. Prof. Jones teaches in the higher education program. 

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Grace L Karram is an Assistant Professor and faculty program coordinator in the higher education program which is housed in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Prof. Karram teaches recurring issues in higher education, comparative higher education, and teaching and learning in higher education. Her research explores the academic profession, international branch-campuses in the Arab Gulf and Southeast Asia, study abroad programs and and spirituality. 

Grace also hosts the wildly popular podcast "Your Paper Sucked but it will Change the University," in which she interviews university and college administrators about what they learned in the first paper of their master's degree. https://www.oise.utoronto.ca/yourpapersuckedpodcast

Hye-Su Kuk is an Assistant Professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), University of Toronto. Her research investigates the nuances of “participation” within public spheres—particularly community organizations, everyday political spaces, social movements—through the lens of learning and education. Working with concepts such as social movement learning, activist learning, and democratic citizenship learning, she uses ethnographic and comparative approaches to examine how activist-educators in South Korea navigate the hybrid conditions of coloniality, neoliberalism, and Cold War legacies to cultivate more participatory forms of democracy. She also collaborates with community organizations in Toronto to explore everyday political practices and the possibilities for grounding critical pedagogy in community-based work. Through empirical analyses of the tensions and contradictions of participation on the ground, she investigates how the ideals of democracy, which are often Western-centred, are being challenged, negotiated and reconstructed.

A second strand of her scholarship centers on the politics of knowledge production, informed by her position as an international, non-Western scholar. Her recent article in Adult Education Quarterly brings a postcolonial perspective into adult learning theory, critiquing developmental assumptions in expansive learning theory and proposing “enunciatory learning” as a postcolonial alternative. She is additionally building on the concept of de-imperialization, beginning from an East Asian standpoint and working toward frameworks for solidarity across diverse groups differently shaped by colonialism and imperialism. Her work in this area focuses on how solidarity against colonialism and imperialism can be built across distinct histories, positionalities, and manifestations of colonial power.

Eric Lavigne is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. His research interests include: higher education administration, management, and leadership; organizational change; decision-making; political behaviour; and administrators’ careers, recruitment, and performance evaluations. 

Dr. Ann E. Lopez is a Jamaican-born professor of Educational Leadership and Policy at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education, University of Toronto. She is the Director of the Centre for Leadership, and Diversity, and Special Advisor to the Dean on School and Community Partnerships. Her academic career at the University of Toronto also includes Provostial Advisor Access Programs, and Academic Director Initial Teacher Education. Ann is an author, speaker, and researcher who advocates for embedding equitable practices and policies in all aspects education and schooling. Dr. Lopez’s teaching and research explores school leadership praxis across contexts. Her scholarship is undergirded by anti-racist, anti-colonial, decolonial methods and approaches that examine the impact of coloniality on school leadership theorizing and practice in Global North and Global South contexts. Dr. Lopez’s aim as a critical scholar and educator is to bring together all those committed to creating teaching and learning spaces where all students can thrive. Dr. Lopez is the author of several books and journal articles and shares her work local and globally. She is co-Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of School Leadership and Co-Series Editor, Studies in Educational Administration. Ann has been recognized for her contributions to education. In 2020 she received the OISE Award for Distinguished Contributions to Teaching, in 2022 the University of Toronto Award of Excellence and Jus Memorial Human Rights Prize – Influential Leader, and in 2024 the OISE Award for Excellence in Educational Leadership and OISE Alum Mentor of the Year Award and the Canadian Association for the Study of Educational Administration (CASEA/ACEAS) Distinguished Service Award.

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I am the William G. Davis Chair of Community College Leadership in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) at the University of Toronto; Professor Emeritus, Department of Sociology, University of California-Berkeley; and a Faculty Affiliate of the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

I have substantive, theoretical, and methodological lines of research. Substantively, I focus on whether and how structural factors maintain inequality, reduce educational opportunity, constitute discrimination, and threaten human rights. Methodologically, I devise new, theoretically-grounded measures of social phenomena; study and assess logics of case selection; and critically evaluate new methods. Theoretically, I have two lines of research. One concerns the theory of effectively maintained inequality, which was based on analyses of socioeconomic inequality in education in the United States and has been replicated in Canada and several other countries. Another line of research uses critical race theory, feminist theory, and critical legal theory to conceptualize discrimination as a damaged social relation. My work in that domain began in Theorizing Discrimination in an Era of Contested Prejudice, a book that was banned from the United States Naval Academy Library by officials of the Trump Administration in April 2025.

I am currently recruiting doctoral and masters students interested in learning and using quantitative methods to study inequality in education, especially inequality in some way connected to postsecondary education, and/or interested in learning and using quantitative methods to study race, sex, and other forms of discrimination and discrimination effects. If you are interested, please apply to the program in Higher Education within the Department of Leadership, Higher & Adult Education, and mention my name in your application.

Bio

Jamie Magnusson (they/them) is an Associate Professor of Adult Education and Community in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Dr. Magnusson's community work spans street based harm reduction outreach, sex worker justice, encampment justice, food security, community safety and queer and trans abolitionist organizing. They are a member of the No Pride in Policing Collective. Magnusson is writing a book under contract with De Gruyter Press, tentatively titled "Queer and Trans Participation in Collective Life: Political Organizing in the Militarized City. 

Caroline (Carly) Manion is an Associate Professor in the Educational Leadership and Policy program in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Prof. Manion serves as Director of the Comparative, International and Development Education (CIDE) Collaborative Specialization, and Director of the related research centre (CIDEC).

Dr. Lance T. McCready is an Associate Professor in the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education and former Director of the Transitional Year Programme at the University of Toronto. A community-based educator, researcher, and program developer, his work examines the education, health, and welfare of Black families, youth, and adults through interdisciplinary, community-engaged, and equity-focused approaches. With more than three decades of leadership and service in Black and 2SLGBTQIA+ communities in Canada and the United States, Dr. McCready has developed and supported community health education, HIV/STBBI prevention, peer-led wellness, and social support initiatives with African, Caribbean, and Black (ACB) gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (GBM). His scholarship bridges education, health, mediation, and community development, with a particular focus on culturally grounded and community-responsive models of care, learning, and systems transformation. Dr. McCready currently serves as Co-Principal Investigator of the Transforming the Lives of Black Children and Youth Project, the Exploratory Study of Black Gender-Expansive Youth, the Black Coalition for AIDS Prevention GetaKit Study, and the International Partnership for Queer Youth Resilience. He is also Co-Founder and Education and Training Lead for the Black Mediation Centre and serves on the Steering Committee of the Black Gay Men’s Network (BGMN). Grounded in community-based participatory research (CBPR), program science, and implementation-oriented approaches to intervention design and evaluation, Dr. McCready’s research advances innovative strategies for improving health equity, educational access, and community well-being. His areas of expertise include Black community health and wellness; participatory program development and evaluation; adaptation and implementation of evidence-based interventions; Black studies; youth studies; queer of color analysis; culturally responsive mediation and family support models; and equity, access, and social justice in education, health, and human service systems.