MSU PLS welcomes new PhD student Drayton Willey

September 23, 2024 - Emily Johnson

Drayton Willey joined the department in Fall of 2024 as a University Distinguished Fellow after graduating from Emporia State University summa cum laude with a B.S. in History and Government Studies. His research interests include education policy, usage and barriers to research in policymaking, and how issues in education become politicized. In his spare time Drayton paints model miniatures, reads science fantasy, and does amateur game design.

"I chose MSU because I was really impressed with the degree of work that the Political Science department, and in particular the public policy scholars, interacted with and worked with the College of Education. I have a passion for education policy, and I think MSU is one of the best universities in the country in how it joins political science and education administration," Wiley said. 

"I'm currently working on tuning the scope of future research on determining who influences policymakers on education policy and what inputs are the strongest on those influences. I'm attempting to determine how much of education policy is informed directly by research, and how much of it is synthesized by staff or even friends close to policymakers."

"I'm hoping to continue my research on education policymaking, rather that be in a university, industry or government. There's such a strong deficit in how we understand the creation of education policy compared to how we understand its implementation and I hope to remedy that however I can. I believe education is important, and I want to improve how we educate by contributing to our understanding of why our policymakers choose one strategy or another."

Welcome, Drayton!