Eglash holds a bachelor's degree in cybernetics and a master's in systems engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Eglash has also conducted studies in teaching children math and computing through simulations of indigenous and vernacular cultural practices.

His approach is one of many attempts to draw the inspiration to learn out of students' own cultural backgrounds.

He also studies social justice issues as they manifest in the practice of science and technology, ranging from the ethnic identity of “nerds” to the so-called appropriation of science and technology by groups disempowered on the basis of race, class, gender.

Another branch of this research explores how the “bottom-up” egalitarian principles found in many indigenous cultures could be applied to modern society in fields from economics to political science.