CERU conducts research, disseminates information, and helps facilitate dialogue between the education community, policy makers, and the public at large about commercial activities in schools. CERU is the only national academic research unit dedicated to this topic. CERU is guided by the belief that mixing commercial activities with public education raises fundamental issues of public policy, curriculum content, the proper relationship of educators to the students entrusted to them, and the values that the schools embody. CERU is the successor of the Center for the Analysis of Commercialism in Education (CACE) at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.