Education
- Postdoc 2012 – University of Amsterdam, Psychological Methods
- Ph.D. 2010 – Simon Fraser University, Psychology (Theory and Methods)
- M.Sc. 2005 – University of Calgary, Psychology
- B.A. 2002 – University of Calgary, Psychology (Hons)
Area of Expertise
- Psychometrics
- Educational measurement
- Educational technology
- Small group collaborations
- Educational psychology
Background
Peter Halpin specializes in psychometrics and educational measurement. He earned his Ph.D. from Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. Prior to joining UNC, he was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Amsterdam, and an assistant/associate professor at New York University. He has served (or currently serves) on the editorial boards of American Education Research Journal, AERA Open, Journal of Educational Measurement, Journal of Educational Psychology, and Psychometrika, and is one of 65 elected members of the Society of Multivariate Experimental Psychology.
Research
The overall goal of Peter Halpin’s research is to develop innovative and rigorous statistical methodology to address pressing issues that arise in educational research, practice, and policy. Examples of some research questions his work has addressed are listed below.
- How can online learning environments be designed to support small-group interactions among students, and what do students learn as a result of such interactions?
- How can we use intensive time-series data obtained from students’ use of educational technology to make reliable, valid, and fair inferences about student learning?
- What makes teaching practices “effective” and how can we best provide educators with meaningful feedback about their practices?
- How do the psychometric properties of outcome measures affect the conclusions that can be made from cluster-randomized control trials?
- How can we measure children’s early development in a way that is both psychometrically rigorous and feasible to implement on a global scale?
His applied work has addressed the development, validation, and/or scoring of assessments of early childhood development, child functioning, childhood adversity, children’s home environment, student collaboration, soft skills, academic outcomes, instructional practices, and teacher working conditions. This work has been conducted in local, national, and international settings, and in collaboration with organizations including ETS, mdrc, the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, RTI International, Save the Children, UNICEF Data and Analytics Section, and the World Bank Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund. His research has been supported by the Institute of Education Sciences, the National Academy of Education, the National Science Foundation, and the Spencer Foundation.