Kevin L. Clay, Ph.D.

Education

• Ph.D. in Educational Theory, Organization, and Policy, Rutgers University
• M.Ed. in Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education, Rutgers University
• B.A. in psychology, sociology minor (magna cum laude), Kean University

Research interests

Critical Black Studies in Education, local change theory and praxis, critical/political education, youth political identity, urban (educational) policy reform

Career highlights

• Robert Curvin Postdoctoral Fellowship, Rutgers University-Newark (2018-2019)
• National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation Dissertation Fellowship (2017)
• United Negro College Fund, Frederick D. Patterson Research Fellowship (2016)

Recent publications/projects

• Clay, K.L. and Rubin, B.C. (2019). “I look deep into this stuff because it’s a part of me”: Toward a critically relevant civics education. Theory and Research in Social Education.
• Clay, K.L. (2019). Education for what and whom?: The paradoxical nature of an Upward Bound program. In G. Conchas, B. Hinga, Abad, M. N., and K. Gutiérrez (Eds.), The Complex Web of Inequality in North American Schools: Investigating Educational Policies for Social Justice. London, England: Routledge.
• Clay, K.L. (2019). “Despite the odds”: Unpacking the politics of black resilience neoliberalism. American Educational Research Journal, 56(1), 75-110. DOI: 10.3102/0002831218790214.
• Williams, K., Burt, B.A., Clay, K.L., and Bridges, B. (2019). Stories Untold: Counter-Narratives to Anti- Blackness and Deficit-Oriented Discourse Concerning HBCUs. American Educational Research Journal. DOI: 10.3102/0002831218802776.

Bio

Dr. Kevin L. Clay’s program of research interrogates the ideological and material forces that shape urban (educational) policy and politics, youth political identity development, youth activism, and civic/political education. To this end, his research also includes inquiries into worldviews held by educational leaders and other stakeholders in Black/underserved educational spaces, particularly in relation to questions concerning how leaders and stakeholders theorize local change. This work draws on afro-pessimist, materialist, and de-colonial social theories to understand the ways in which poor youth, Black youth, and youth of color, experience, refuse, disrupt, internalize, and challenge material and ideological subjugation in dispossessed communities.