Seth Hunter

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Phone: (703) 993-4485
Email: shunte (@gmu.edu)

View Seth Hunter's curriculum vitae

Dr. Seth B Hunter is an Associate Professor of Education Leadership and Policy with a Mason affiliation in Research Methods. He is also a Senior Fellow at EdPolicyForward, the Center for Education Policy at Mason, and a Fellow with the Tennessee Education Research Alliance, a partnership among Vanderbilt University, the Tennessee Department of Education, and other researchers. His research interests concern educator and organizational effectiveness, research use by policymakers and practitioners, and human-machine partnerships. To explore these topics, Dr. Hunter applies multiple methods (econometric, psychometric, computational, descriptive, and qualitative) and draws on multiple frameworks (psychological, economic, leadership, management, and educational). Dr. Hunter's work appears in computer science conference proceedings and several top-tier education journals, including Educational Researcher, Education Administration Quarterly, Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, American Journal of Education, and the American Educational Research Journal.

Before his academic career, Dr. Hunter worked/ served in various K-12 organizations, including the Kentucky Department of Education as a field agent supporting teacher leaders, principals, and superintendents; the Kentucky Council of Teachers of Mathematics as President; the Kentucky Education Association as State Representative; and classroom teacher of middle and high school students.

Dr. Hunter has advised the Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia Departments of Education, a multistate rurally-focused teacher evaluation organization in the Midwestern USA, and several school districts on education policy and practice matters.

Dr. Hunter is happily married to Dr. Amy English Hunter, and they are the proud parents of two children. Dr. Hunter loves barbecuing, ice hockey, puzzles, interesting foods, and many kinds of (hi-fi) music.  

educator and organizational effectiveness

research use by policymakers and practitioners

human-machine partnerships

^ computer science conference proceedings are equivalent to education journal publication; * student co-author                                                        

Bajwa, N.*, Hunter, S. B., & Das, S. (In Press). Actionable Insights from Observational Data: The Case of Advanced Classes in K-12 Education. To be in Proceedings of the 6^th

Association for Computing Machinery on Equity and Access in Algorithms, Mechanisms, and Optimization (EAAMO 2026). ^

Bowser, K. M., Hunter, S. B., & Curby, T. (Online). Sources of Variance in Principals’ Ratings of Teaching: Baseline and Within-Year Growth Trends. Leadership and Policy in Schools.

https://doi.org/10.1080/15700763.2026.2704069

Bowser, K. M.* & Hunter, S. B. (In Press). Time to Change? Switching from One Set of Teacher Evaluation Reforms to Another and its Association with Student Achievement Scores.

Journal of Education Human Resources.

Hunter, S. B. & Steinberg, M. (Online). Saving the Best for Last: Rating Elevation in Low-Performing and Novice 

Teachers' Final Formal Observations. Educational Researcher. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X261449757

Hunter, S. B., & Bowser, K. M.* (2026). Reformed teacher evaluation in rural Missouri: Main and moderated relationships with student 

achievement and relationships-to-expenditure ratios. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 34. https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.34.9248

Kho, A. & Hunter, S. B. (2026). Free Meals for All: The Effects of the Community Eligibility Provision in Tennessee. Educational Studies,

52(2), 129-147.

Hunter, S. B., Kho, A. & Bowser, K. M.* (2025). Policy-Assigned Teacher Observations, Their Implementation, and Student 

Discipline Outcomes: Main, Mediated, and Moderated Relationships. American Educational Research Journal, 62(6), 1173-1206.

WORKING PAPERS

Do You Observe What I Observe? The Predictors and Consequences of Discordance in Teacher and Evaluator Ratings of Teacher Performance

• College of Education and Human Development
• School of Education
• Education Leadership
• EdPolicyForward

• Advanced Internship in Education (EDUC - 994)

• Supervision and Evaluation of Instruction (EDLE 618)
• Using Research to Lead School Improvement (EDLE 690)
• Internship in Educational Leadership (EDLE 791)
• Instructional Leadership-Supervision Policy and Practice (EDLE 818)
• Independent Study for the Doctor of Philosophy in Education (EDUC 897)
• Doctoral Dissertation Proposal (EDUC 998)
• Doctoral Dissertation Research (EDUC 999)