Image: Denisa Gándara (PhD 2016) and Sosanya Jones investigate how policymakers use discursive strategies in advocating higher education policy in "Who Deserves Benefits in Higher Education?: A Policy Discourse Analysis of a Process Surrounding Reauthorization of the Higher Education Act." The paper appears in the fall 2020 issue of Review of Higher Education. Using the Promoting Real Opportunity, Success and Prosperity through Education Reform (PROSPER) Act as a case study, Gándara and Jones explored the deliberations recorded during the committee sessions of December 2017. This approach highlights the importance of the markup process and how it can effect final committee versions of bills. They found considerable evidence of the discursive strategies of avoidance and constituent classification. The use of these strategies tightly aligned with social constructions and levels of power of the policymakers. Gándara and Jones write, "By making visible these processes, this study can propel advocates, including policy intermediaries, and stakeholders targeted (or neglected) in this process, to anticipate markups and seek to inform or otherwise influence these processes." Full article available at: https://muse.jhu.edu/article/766477 Type of News/Audience: Research
