Timothy Hacsi
Biography
I grew up in southern California, born the day Kennedy beat Nixon; and then attending the same high school Nixon had gone to… so of course I now teach on the same plot of land as the Kennedy Library. I eventually headed east and received my BA in history at Oberlin College, and then my PhD in history at the University of Pennsylvania.
Area of Expertise
Professor Hacsi's research interests focus on the history of American public policy in the 19th and 20th centuries, especially policy pertaining to children and families, the history of education, and the history of poverty and public responses to poverty.
Degrees
PhD (History) University of Pennsylvania
BA (History) Oberlin College
Professional Publications & Contributions
- Second Home: Orphan Asylums and Poor Families in America (Harvard University Press, 1998).
- Children as Pawns: the Politics of Educational Reform (Harvard University Press, 2002).
- “Innovation and Accountability: Vouchers, Charters, and the Florida Virtual School.” In Reform Florida, edited by Alex Molnar, Education Policy Studies Laboratory, Arizona State University, April 2004. Brief No. 8.
- “Orphanages as a National Institution: History and Its Lessons.” In Home Away from Home: The Forgotten History of Orphanages, edited by Richard McKenzie (Encounter Books, 2009): 227-248.
Additional Information
Following graduate school, I held a postdoctoral fellowship in children’s policy at the University of Chicago and then a Spencer postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University, after which I returned to my roots as a historian and came to the University of Massachusetts Boston.
My current research is on higher education in the 20th century, particularly the ways in which various groups (people of color and women) have sought to receive equal treatment within public universities after gaining initial entrance.
Professor Hacsi's CV