
Dr. Stephen Porter is a Professor of Higher Education in the Department of Educational Leadership, Policy, and Human Development at North Carolina State University, where he teaches graduate courses on applied statistics and data analysis. He earned his Ph.D. in political science, with a concentration in econometrics, from the University of Rochester. Before entering academia, Dr. Porter spent a decade in university administration, culminating in his role as Director of Institutional Research at Wesleyan University.
Dr. Porter’s research focuses on student success, postsecondary faculty, and survey methodology. His extensive body of work, cited over 8,000 times, has been supported by funding from the Institute of Education Sciences, the Lumina Foundation, the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education, and the Walton Family Foundation.
In addition to his research, Dr. Porter has served on the editorial boards of seven journals, including the American Educational Research Journal, Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, and Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness. His expertise has led to chairing multiple grant review panels for the Institute of Education Sciences. Dr. Porter has held visiting scholar positions at both the Center of Excellence for Complex Data Analysis and the Education and Workforce Development division at RTI International, as well as the Center for the Studies of Higher Education at Nagoya University, Japan. Additionally, he has consulted for the 2016 and 2020 National Postsecondary Student Aid Studies. He is currently co-leader of the American research team for the Future of the Academic Profession, an international survey of faculty to take place in almost 40 countries in 2026.
Active in local politics, Dr. Porter has served in various roles with the Wake County Republican Party, including election greeter, election observer, vice-precinct chair, and delegate to the county, district, and state conventions. He is also a member of the North Carolina Federation of Republican Men and is a Board Member for the Wake County Selective Service System Local Board.
He has published political commentary with the Carolina Journal, the James Martin Center, and the National Review.
After North Carolina State University targeted him for referring to an academic conference as a ‘woke joke’ on his blog, he filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the university, but ultimately lost the case on appeal to the Supreme Court.