Jamaal Bowman, the controversial New York congressman, often appeals to his work as a former school principal and his Ed.D. in education as the basis for his policy positions.
But, according to our analysis, Bowman’s primary academic work — his 2019 dissertation, “Community Schools: The Perceptions and Practices that Foster Broad-Based Collaboration among Leaders with the Community School Ecosystem” — is riddled with basic errors, failures of logic, and multiple instances of plagiarism. (Bowman did not return a request for comment.)
Bowman has boasted about the paper on social media and considers it formative to his political orientation. When asked recently about his political views, Bowman said, “I identify as an educator, and as a Black man in America. But my policies align with those of a socialist, so I guess that makes me a socialist.”
The dissertation, which Bowman completed at Manhattanville College, says that “Black, Latinx, and poor White children have been historically oppressed throughout American history,” and as recompense makes an argument for “community schools,” a concept developed by the Brazilian Marxist pedagogist Paulo Freire, in which schools would be expanded to provide full-time government services for every aspect of society, including for adults.
The statistical work in the paper is limited, and the method primarily consisted of “qualitative” research, with Bowman interviewing 13 school administrators, activists, and parents. Each was immediately placed in a demographic box and assigned the role of oppressor or oppressed. For example, Bowman wrote that “Ms. Melendez, a parent leader at Manny Ramirez High School, was born in the Dominican Republican [sic]” and is a true member of the New York community, while “Ms. Warren, who identified racially as White, discussed being very aware of being ‘a visitor in someone else [sic] community all the time.’”
