
Every year, Derek Black, professor of law and Carolina Distinguished Professor, checks Education Week’s Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings to see the accomplishments of the scholars he respects most in the field.
In 2023, he was surprised to discover his name at No. 63 on the list of 200 top scholars. This year, he made a huge jump, landing at No. 30 overall.
Although the list includes a few education professors with law expertise, Black is the highest-ranked education law scholar and only full-time law professor to appear on the 2025 Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings.
By the numbers
Black is:
- One of 15 scholars to receive the highest rating of education press mentions (30).
- One of 10 scholars to receive the third highest rating for newspaper mentions (20).
- 23 in Amazon rating, reflecting the highest-ranked books on Amazon.
What they’re saying
“To be ranked right alongside giants like Gary Orfield, who basically pioneered education
civil rights and segregation research, and other people to whom I have looked up to
for decades is pretty humbling,” says Black.
Driving the trend
Black is a highly sought after expert in education policy disputes and litigation.
This year alone he is an expert in four different cases involving private school vouchers,
school funding, the history of education and discrimination. In 2023, Black testified
at the House Committee on Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Early Childhood,
Elementary, and Secondary Education on “School Choice: Expanding Educational Freedom
for All.”
He is also celebrating the release of his latest book, Dangerous Learning: The South's Long War on Black Literacy, published by Yale University Press. In this book, he describes the violent lengths to which southern leaders went to repress Black literacy and the extraordinary courage it took Black people to resist. Black also delves into the deep imprint those events had on education and how this legacy is resurfacing today.
Black also directs the Constitutional Law Center, which provides primary source training, support, and professional development opportunities for South Carolina educators, and performs in-depth research and analysis of a variety of constitutional law topics, focusing primarily on education.
For context
First published in 2010, the annual Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings recognize
university-based scholars who focus wholly or primarily on educational questions.
Traditionally, these scholars specialize in economics; government and policy; and
curriculum, instruction and administration.
For the rankings, more than 20,000 university-based scholars are evaluated on nine publicly available metrics: Google Scholar; Book Points; Highest Amazon Ranking; Syllabus Points; Education Press Mentions; Web Mentions; Newspaper Mentions; Congressional Record Mentions; and X Score.