Julie F. Mead is Professor Emerita in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research examines topics related to education law. Recent scholarship has proposed policy language to ensure charter schools promote equal educational opportunity, traced the evolution of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program, examined voucher programs in relation to the education clauses of state constitutions, and analyzed voucher statutes for the presence or absence of non-discrimination requirements. She has published numerous articles in both education and law journals. She served as the 2021-22 President of the Education Law Association. She has also been active with the American Educational Research Association and University Council on Educational Administration and is a fellow with the National Education Policy Center. During her twenty-two years at UW-Madison, Dr. Mead supervised 40 doctoral students and taught numerous others in various education law courses.

Selected Publications:

Green, P.C., Mead, J.F., & Eckes, S. E. (2021). Covenants to discriminate: How the anti-LGBT policies of participating voucher schools might violate the state action doctrine. The New Hampshire University Law Review, 19, 163-195. https://scholars.unh.edu/unh_lr/vol19/iss2/1/

Mead, J.F. & Green, P.C. (2019). Advancing Intentional Equity in Charter Schools. Washington, DC: The Century Foundation. https://tcf.org/content/report/advancing-intentional-equity-charter-schools/

Mead, J.F. & Eckes, S.E. (2018). How School Privatization Opens the Door for Discrimination. Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center. http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/privatization.

Lewis, M. M., Mead, J. F., & Hall, D. (2017). The American Education Exchange Council as a ‘friend of the Court’ in education cases. University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change, 20(4), 305-339.

Eckes, S. E., Mead, J. F. & Ulm, J. (2016). Dollars to discriminate: The (un)intended consequences of school vouchers. Peabody Journal of Education, 91(4), 537-558.

Green, P. C., Baker, B. D., Oluwole, J. O., & Mead, J. F. (2016). Are we heading toward a charter school “bubble”?: Lessons from the subprime mortgage crisis. University of Richmond Law Review, 50, 783-808.

Mead, J. F. & Lewis, M. M. (2016). The implications of the use of parental choice as a legal “circuit breaker.” American Education Research Journal, 53, 100-131.

Mead, J. F. (2015). The right to an education or the right to shop for schooling: Examining voucher programs in relation to state constitutional guarantees. Fordham Urban Law Journal, 42, 703-743.

Mead, J. F. (2015). Private in name only: A statutory and constitutional analysis of Milwaukee’s private school voucher program. Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice, 21(2), 331-382.

Green, P. C. & Mead, J. F.  (2004). Charter Schools and the Law: Establishing New Legal Relationships. Norwood, MA: Christopher-Gordon Publishers, Inc.

Underwood, J. K. & Mead, J. F.  (1995). The Legal Aspects of Special Education and Pupil Services. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon, Inc.

Achievements

Immediate Past President, Education Law Association
Fellow, National Educational Policy Center

Faculty Distinguished Achievement Award, School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison, April 2021.

Mentor of the Year, Educational Leadership & Policy Analysis, University of Wisconsin-Madison, May 2011.

Jack A. Culbertson Award in Educational Administration for outstanding contribution of a junior faculty member in the field of educational administration.  Awarded by the University Council of Educational Administration, November 2002.

Outstanding Dissertation Award, 1994, National Organization on Legal Problems of Education (now ELA).