About

Researcher. Educator. Social Worker. Disabled. Parent.

Dr. Cowhy uses organizational, institutional, and political lenses to understand the implementation of educational policies designed to impact our most marginalized students. Jen pays particular attention to the role of administrators and parents in her research. Much of her work focuses on understanding the implementation and leadership of special education policy. Her program of research aims to disrupt persistent inequities and to understand and improve educational policies and to disrupt inequities within education. Jen is especially committed to improving the experiences, conditions, and outcomes for students with disabilities and/or learning differences, their families, and educators who work tirelessly to support them.

Jen’s award-winning dissertation, “Why do we have to fight so hard:” Exploring the role of parents as policy agents in special education explores the critical role that parents play within special education policy implementation. This archival and interview study centers on the question of why, in the contemporary US, parents—not educators or school systems—bear the overwhelming responsibility to understand and enforce special education policy? Under what conditions? And, with what consequences? Her research explores questions of policy implementation, family engagement in schooling, power and privilege, race and racism, administrative burdens, and the organizational and institutional environments . Given the interdisciplinary nature of her work, Jen draws from theoretical and methodological approaches from various fields, including education, political science, sociology, law and society, and disability studies.

She is also a partner, a type 1 diabetic, a sewer, a runner, and the mother of three beautiful tiny humans, an active 11-year-old rescue dog, and a cranky senior cat. Jen’s family fills her with tremendous joy and inspires her to continue working for better policies and a better world.