Will aims to influence education policy to ensure all benefit from their right to education through collaborating with civil society, international organisations, and peers in academia. He has over 20 years teaching and researching in education, including leading courses for universities based in the United States, France, Bangladesh, and the UK. Prior to joining the University of Edinburgh, he worked as a Sr Policy Analyst for UNESCO’s Global Education Monitoring (GEM) Report where he contributed to the 2016 to 2020 reports and led the development of the 2017/2018 GEM Report on Accountability in Education. Since leaving the GEM Report, Will continues to engage with UNESCO colleagues through knowledge exchange and research activities, including contract research for the GEM Report, UNESCO Institute for Statistics, and the International Task Force on Teachers for Education 2030. He also collaborated with the UNESCO Bangkok Office and other civil society organisation and academics in the region to lead the report Barriers to Secondary Education in the Asia Pacific Region: A Scoping Review of Four Countries. Beyond his engagement with UNESCO, Will was also a Thomas J. Alexander Fellow at the OECD.
Will holds a Bachelor's in Sociology from Portland State University, a Master's in Teaching from Western Oregon University, a Master's in International Development from the University of Denver, and a PhD from the Pennsylvania State University. His research focuses include the role of international organisations and global goals in shaping national education policy, access to education and barriers to education for the most marginalised, and issues surrounding testing, teachers, and accountability. He has published over 70 research articles, chapters, and reports, including his edited book The Global Testing Culture: Shaping Education Policy, Perceptions, and Practice and his co-edited recently completed special issue for the International Review of Education on Global Governance and the Sustainable Development Goal for Education.
Will has held various leadership positions and advised multiple government and regional agencies. He is currently the Academic Lead for the Data for Children Collaborative, Board Chair of the Teacher Empowerment and Advocacy League, and a member of the Editorial Board for Comparative Education. He is currently completing his term on the Executive Committee for the Education and Development Forum (UKFIET) and was previously a member of the Editorial Board of the Korean Education Development Institute's Journal of Educational Policy. He has been invited to share his work by the Japan International Development Agency and the United States’ Committee for Informing Assessment Policy of the National Council of Measurement in Education, and contributed to the Scottish COVID-19 Inquiry. He currently co-leads workshops on translating and communicating research to a policy audience in his role as Sr Technical Expert for the Data and Research in Education Research Consortium (DARE-RC). This has included workshops for the Pakistan Institute for Education and other government agencies in the country. Will is also acting as an education expert for the review of the ASEAN Regional Plan of Action on the Elimination of Violence Against Children.
