He completed a Master of Arts (2000) and Ph.D. (2001) in Educational Policy and Leadership at Ohio State University.
[7] From 2008 to 2013, Milner served as the Lois Autrey Betts Associate Professor of Education and founding director of the Learning, Diversity and Urban Studies graduate program in the Departments of Teaching and Learning and Leadership, Policy and Organizations at Peabody College of Education and Human Development at Vanderbilt University.
Of note are his 2010 publication, Start Where You Are But Don't Stay There: Understanding Diversity, Opportunity Gaps, and Teaching in Today’s Classrooms Archived 2015-09-29 at the Wayback Machine (Harvard Education Press).
In 2015, Milner published Rac(e)ing to Class: Confronting Poverty and Race in Schools and Classrooms Archived 2015-10-04 at the Wayback Machine (Harvard Education Press).
In 2014, Milner co-edited The Handbook of Urban Education Archived 2015-10-06 at the Wayback Machine (Routledge), with Kofi Lomotey.