Contract Research,Curricular Reform,and Situated Selves: Between Social Justice and Commercialized Knowledge

Using a critical ethnographic perspective, I describe how social scientists actively transition into the evaluation industry in a reform environment that is marked by increased privatization of all aspects of public education. I do this by exploring adaptations that contract evaluators use to enhance a sense of personal connection to their work (i.e., contribution to social change) and the ways in which macropolitical interests intersect with those personal stories. I close with a discussion on possible implications for social scientific knowledge work.