Purdue ELRC takes #NextGiantLeap, names new director
The College of Education named Loran C. Parker as the new director of the Evaluation and Learning Research Center (ELRC). She will succeed Wilella (Willie) Burgess, who has directed the Center for the past 23 years. Parker will officially begin her new position on July 1, 2026, and Burgess will retire by December 31, 2026.
“Willie Burgess has provided 23 years of outstanding leadership to the ELRC, substantially growing the Center’s portfolio of projects across multiple disciplines with clients all around the world, and with great resilience successfully navigating the center through many institutional structural changes and external challenges,” said Wayne E. Wright, associate dean for research, graduate programs and faculty development. “As she steps down from the director role and prepares to retire at the end of this year, we express our deepest gratitude and congratulate Willie for a total of 35 years of dedicated service in various leadership positions at Purdue.”
The Evaluation and Learning Research Center (ELRC) applies social science theory and research methods to design, engineer, research, and evaluate social innovations that promote learning, development, and justice.
Burgess has led many ELRC projects, but says that two recent U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded projects hold special meaning for her and illustrate the reach and breadth of ELRC research and evaluation efforts.
- Evaluation of an Accelerated Basic Education Program in Somalia: Burgess led an international team working on a USAID project aimed at examining the effectiveness of educational models in Somalia. The team included researchers from the U.S., the Resilient Africa Network (RAN) in Uganda, and the Somali Research and Development Institute (SORDI) in Mogadishu. They conducted a longitudinal study of formal primary and accelerated basic education programs in Somalia, addressing a significant barrier to effective education policy building by providing much needed data on student learning outcomes and levers and barriers to student success in Somalia in particular and in post-conflict regions generally.
- Building the Evidence Base on Effective Public-Private Sector Engagement: Burgess led an interdisciplinary team examining the influential factors leading to positive and productive relationships among government agencies, private sector actors, and community stakeholders. This work led to a robust model and set of best practices for structuring successful public-private partnerships and evaluating partnership success that informs all ELRC partnership work.
The ELRC maintains a portfolio of 20-25 funded projects from a variety of funding sources, including: U.S. Departments of Education, Agriculture, Health & Human Services, and War; National Science Foundation; National Institutes of Health; Lilly Foundation; Spencer Foundation; Lumina Foundation; ECMC Foundation; and more.
Center projects have included work and partnerships across every Purdue college, across the country, and in several international contexts including Peru, Somalia, Tanzania, and Germany. The Center generated more than $1.2M in income in FY 2025 and is projected to generate more than $1.3M in income in FY 2026.
Parker brings a wealth of experience to her new position, having worked with the ELRC for 17 years. She served first as an assessment specialist (2009-2017), then as a senior evaluation and research associate (2017-2021), as the Center’s associate director (since 2017), and as principal scholar (2021-present). She is a “triple Boilermaker” with three degrees from Purdue University: a BS in Atmospheric Science (2004), and two degrees from the College of Education – both an MSEd (2006) and a PhD (2009) in Science Education. She has 38 peer-reviewed publications with over 1,700 citations.
“We do advance our own original research, but we are most impactful and our work is most meaningful when we are partnering with communities and stakeholders who are actively working to address learning and development challenges,” Parker said. “My interests as a scholar and evaluation practitioner are to continually use my skills and knowledge in education and the social sciences in partnership with others—so I can learn from them and they can learn from me—and together we can make society work better for everyone.”
Several ELRC projects most meaningful to Parker include:
- PERU-Hub: A consortium of U.S. and Peruvian universities and nonprofit organizations created a center based in the Peruvian amazon region that brought local farmers and entrepreneurs together with groups of international (Peru, Columbia, U.S.) researchers, students and extensionists to collaboratively identify research and development solutions for the region and its communities. Parker worked with colleagues in Peru to build a team that could monitor the consortium, evaluate its success, and identify key learnings that would be of interest to the wider international development community.
- VetaHumanz, a partnership with Purdue Veterinary Medicine office of Engagement: Parker has provided evaluation support for the partnership’s award-winning engagement work that supports STEM education in local Lafayette and Indianapolis elementary schools and out-of-school learning organizations.
Parker has several hopes and dreams as she takes over the directorship of the ELRC.
“The ELRC has a large, diverse ecosystem of partners and has been effective at helping our partners identify and develop compelling evidence for their impacts and communicate the story of their program or project,” she said. “One of my initial hopes for the ELRC is that we can spend some time and energy communicating the impact that ELRC creates collectively across all our partnerships and projects.”
“We are thrilled to see Dr. Loran Parker take on this important role in the college and university,” Wright said. “She has played a key role establishing the international reputation of the ELRC as a leading evaluation center and has established clear vision for continuing and expanding the work of the Center.”
“The ELRC is a wonderful illustration of the depth and breadth of the College of Education and their research and evaluation expertise is highly sought-after,” said Phillip J. VanFossen, interim dean of the College, and Ackerman Distinguished Professor. “With an ongoing portfolio of more than 20 active projects, their work adds credibility and value to projects with other faculty across the Purdue University campus and beyond. For more than 15 years, Dr. Loran Parker has been at the center of this ELRC scholarship, helping to contribute to evidence-based education reform. We are very excited to see her continue this impact in a new leadership role.”
“The future of the ELRC is bright and I’m thrilled to hand over Center leadership to my long-term colleague, Dr. Loran Parker,” Burgess said. “Loran brings deep knowledge, extensive expertise, unbounded vision, and a passion for research and evaluation practice built on care. While Loran will bring new ideas and new directions, her long-term tenure at the Center and the trust she embodies among ELRC staff and partners will ensure a smooth transition.”
About the ELRC
The Center currently known as the Evaluation and Learning Research Center (ELRC) has its roots as one of the original Purdue University Discovery Park Centers – the Discovery Learning (Research) Center (DLRC). Launched in 2003, DLRC was founded to address the need for new educational models, tools, and evaluation strategies to meet the needs of 21st century learners and the changing interdisciplinary workforce needs of the future. With a mission to “Advance education in STEM and related disciplines through interdisciplinary research and innovation in teaching and learning,” the DLRC produced long-lasting scholarship, programs, models, and partnerships that informed and continue to inform policy and programs across the University and beyond. Today’s ELRC supports research, education and engagement projects through our expertise in educational theory, research methodology, evaluation, and project management
Source: Wayne E. Wright
More:
ELRC reflects on 2024 successes, plans for 2025
PERU-Hub team, partners evaluate project’s progress at Peru workshop
College’s international impact: Reinvigorating Somali education