ASSISTments National Advisory Council
From TeacherWiki
Dennis Berkey, President and CEO of Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI)
Dennis Berkey was appointed President and CEO of Worcester Polytechnic Institute in 2004 following thirty years of service in higher education as a tenured faculty member and senior administrator at Boston University. He is an award winning teacher and the author of several mathematics textbooks. His published research is in applied mathematics, and his administrative posts have included department chair, dean of arts and sciences, and university provost. His academic degrees are all in mathematics (B.A., Muskingum College, M.A., Miami University, Ph.D., U. Cincinnati).
Kathryn Boudett, Lecturer on Education, Harvard University Graduate School of Education
Director of the Data Wise Project, Kathryn Parker Boudett focuses her research and teaching on helping educators make effective use of a wide range of data sources. She conducts research on best practices in teaching educators to use data effectively. Before joining the HGSE faculty, Kathryn worked as a consultant to the Boston Plan for Excellence, where she investigated Boston schools on the forefront of effective data use and helped synthesize lessons learned from their experiences. Degrees - Ph.D., Harvard University
Diane Briars, past president of the National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics
Diane Briars is a mathematics education consultant and immediate past president of the National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics, a 3,000-member international organization. She is co-director of the Algebra Intensification Project, a joint venture of the Learning Science Research Institute, University of Illinois at Chicago and the Dana Center, University of Texas at Austin. Diane was the mathematics director for the Pittsburgh Public Schools with responsibilities for all aspects of the K-12 mathematics programs. She was a member of the National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century. She is a former director of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. Diane taught 7th and 8th grade math at St. Mary's School in Evanston, Ill., then came to Carnegie Mellon University's psychology department to study cognitive science and computer modeling of mathematics thinking. She holds three degrees from Northwestern University -- a bachelor's and master's in math and a Ph.D. in math education.
Ronda Brandon, Chief Academic Officer, Laying the Foundation
Ronda Brandon served as the English Department Chair at Sterling High School in Baytown. She taught English I Pre-AP* and English IV AP* Literature. She trained middle school teachers and worked extensively on alignment from middle school to AP. She has worked with school districts across Texas and Kansas to align curriculum and raise standards. Ronda has been widely considered one of the most sought after Pre-AP consultants in the Southwest region. She has coordinated the English training at College Board summer institutes at Rice and SMU, served as a Lead English teacher at various institutes, and conducted numerous 2-day workshops. In 2001, she was awarded the Advanced Placement* Special Recognition Award by the Southwest Region of the College Board. In 1999, she was chosen to work on the Lighthouse Initiative; a joint College Board and Texas Education Agency project that aligned the TEKS with AP objectives. Ronda began working as a consultant for the O'Donnell Foundation on the English Benchmarks committee in 1998, and continued as a consultant for the AP Incentive Program in DISD.
Andrew Chen, President, EduTron Corporation
Dr. Andrew Chen is the President of EduTron Corporation. Before founding EduTron he was a physics professor and a principal research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He currently serves on the Mathematics and Science Advisory Council for the Massachusetts Board of Education. Dr. Chen provides high quality professional development in mathematics and science to teachers at all levels in Intensive Immersion Institutes. He works with school districts and school administrators to increase their capacity to support excellent mathematics and science instruction. He also works with higher education institutions to develop rigorous and effective pre-service and in-service preparation in mathematics and science. He received a BA in physics from National Taiwan University and a PhD in physics from Columbia University.
Gail Connelly, Executive Director, National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP)
Gail Connelly is Executive Director of the National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP) and President of the NAESP Foundation. She has served the Association in senior leadership roles for more than two decades. During Gail’s 25-year tenure as a member of NAESP’s executive team, the Association more than doubled in size to become the largest and most well-respected advocacy organization dedicated solely to serving elementary and middle level school leaders in their commitment to all children. She led the development of NAESP’s National Distinguished Principals Program, the National Principals Resource Center, the NAESP Web site, the e-Knowledge Portal for Principals, and the Peer Assisted Leadership Services, a mentoring program for principals. Gail recently orchestrated the development of two major publications: Vision 2021: Transformations in Leading, Learning and Community and Leading Learning Communities: What Principals Should Know and Be Able To Do and created a Strategic Framework to guide operational efforts aligned with Vision Goals established by the NAESP Board of Directors. Gail was awarded the NAESP Honorary National Distinguished Principals Award in 2008 and recently received the NAESP Outstanding Service Award for 25 years of dedicated service to principals and children.
Chris Dede, Professor, Harvard Graduate School of Education
Chris Dede is the Timothy E. Wirth Professor in Learning Technologies at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education. His fields of scholarship include emerging technologies, policy, and leadership. His funded research includes five current grants from NSF, Qualcomm, and the US Department of Education Institute of Education Sciences to explore immersive simulations and transformed social interactions as means of student engagement, learning, and assessment. In 2007, he was honored by Harvard University as an outstanding teacher and in 2011 he was named a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association. Chris has served as a member of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Foundations of Educational and Psychological Assessment and a member of the 2010 National Educational Technology Plan Technical Working Group.
Jim Goodell, Independent Consultant
Jim Goodell has led the design, development, and implementation of interactive learning technologies and organizational improvement strategy since 1983. He has provided information-driven process improvement solutions to state education agencies and school districts throughout the nation. Jim recently left his role as Executive Vice President at the Center for Educational Leadership and Technology (CELT) after 12 years of working with executive leadership at State Departments of Education, LEAs, and national education organizations on strategic planning, organizational development, process improvement, longitudinal data systems architecture and technology implementation. Jim played an important role in CELT’s Teacher-Student Data Link project. Jim joins Quality Information Partners full-time in October 2011, in support of the Common Education Data Standards (CEDS) project funded through the National Center for Education Statistics. His role will include facilitating CEDS K-12 area and supporting the development of CEDS governance and processes. Jim is the author of numerous books and articles and frequently presents at national conferences. He is licensed as an elementary school teacher and superintended. He serves on a school board and the board of a private company.
Richard Halverson, Associate Professor of Education, University of Wisconsin
Dr. Richard Halverson's research aims to bring the research methods and practices of the Learning Sciences to the world of educational leadership. His research explores the use of data driven instructional systems in schools, and the development of game and simulation based tools for professional learning. He currently co-directs the Comprehensive Assessment of Leadership for Learning (CALL) study to develop an on-line, 360-degree formative evaluation system for school leadership. Dr. Halverson co-founded the Games Learning and Society (GLS) research group at UW-Madison. He is a Fellow at the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery, and is an affiliate member of the UW-Madison Curriculum & Instruction and Educational Psychology departments, and a founding member of the UW-Madison Learning Sciences program area.
Margaret Heritage , Assistant Director of Professional Development at CRESST, UCLA
Margaret Heritage is Assistant Director for Professional Development at the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing (CRESST) at UCLA. Her current work at CRESST focuses on data use for school improvement, including formative assessment, and on teacher evaluation. vvPrior to joining CRESST she had many years experience in schools in the U.K and the U.S., including a period as a County Inspector of Education in the U.K., and as Principal of the University Elementary School, the laboratory school of the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at UCLA. Heritage was also member of the faculty in the Department of Education at the University of Warwick, England, and in the U.S. has taught courses in the Departments of Education at UCLA and at Stanford University. Her most recent publications include a co-authored paper, published in Education Measurement: Issues and Practice, on teachers use of formative assessment evidence (2009), a contribution on student self-assessment to a special issue of the National Middle School Association Journal (2009), a paper co-authored with W.J. Popham on professional development for formative assessment use, published by the Educational Testing Service (2008), and a co-authored a book with Alison Bailey, Formative Assessment for Literacy and Academic Language, published in 2008. Her latest book, Formative Assessment: Making It Happen in the Classroom (2010), is published by Corwin Press.In that book she calles out two comptuer system useful for formative assessments, and ASSISTments is one of them.
Keith Krueger, CEO, Consortium for School Networking (CoSN)
Keith R. Krueger (CAE) is CEO of the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), a national nonprofit organization that serves as the voice of K-12 technology leaders, especially school district CTO’s, who use technology strategically to improve teaching and learning. He has extensive background in nonprofit/association management and is particularly interested in using information technologies for education, health and libraries. He received a Masters of Arts in Public Affairs from the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute at the University of Minnesota. Mr. Krueger has a global reputation as a key thought leader. He has represented the National Science Foundation on a joint EU/US committee planning a joint research agenda for eLearning, and served as a delegate to various United Nations and G8 international ICT in education meetings. He has organized senior level U.S. delegations to visit Australia, Asia and Europe to examine best practices in educational technology.
Dale Mann, Managing Director, Interactive, Inc.
Dr. Dale Mann is a political scientist who specializes in education policy---both analyzing it and acting on it. A former special analyst in the Executive Office of President Johnson, Professor Mann is currently working on instructional technology. A decade ago, Dr. Mann formed a company, Interactive, Inc. to develop and publish technical solutions to learning problems. Dr. Mann is currently working to speed the convergence of the entertainment, technology, and education sectors of Australia; evaluating the impact of instructional technology on school achievement in American states; and assessing a major product launch dealing with learning in American homes. With the support of the Soros Foundations, he has provided management training for 1,250 school administrators in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Macedonia, and Kyrgyzstan. Dr. Mann is a member of the senior faculty at Columbia University where he works to advance education in schools, homes and workplaces and with public sector and private sector partners.
Craig Mason, Professor, University of Maine Orono
Craig Mason is Professor of Education and Applied Quantitative Methods at the University of Maine, where he serve as the Director of the Center for Research and Evaluation. In addition, he is the Co-Director for the Maine Education Policy Research Institute. Craig serves as an informatics consultant for the Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Program in the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Craig’s primary research interests are in Developmental Epidemiology and Biobehavioral Informatics. His efforts in developmental epidemiology focus on educational outcomes and developmental disabilities in children, while his work in biobehavioral informatics focuses on electronic data linkage and data system design. Common to all of this work is a strong interest in Quantitative Methods.
Mort Orlov, President, Mass. Insights Math and Science
Mort Orlov is the President of the Mass Math + Science Initiative, which is implementing the Advanced Placement Training and Award Program in the Commonwealth. Mort was formerly the Principal of Chelsea High School. During his tenure at Chelsea, he expanded the AP program and implemented an attendance incentive program. He previously served as Chairman of the Department of Military Science at Boston University. In addition to his academic background, Mort served for 23 years as an infantry officer in the United States Army in a variety of command and staff positions. Mort holds a B.A. from Tufts University, and a Masters of Military Arts from the School of Advanced Military Studies in Fort Leavenworth, KS.
Jim Pellegrino, Professor, University of Illinois at Chicago
Jim Pellegrino is Liberal Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor and Distinguished Professor of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He also serves as Co-director of UIC’s interdisciplinary Learning Sciences Research Institute. Dr. Pellegrino's research and development interests focus on children's and adult's thinking and learning and the implications of cognitive research and theory for assessment and instructional practice. Much of his current work is focused on analyses of complex learning and instructional environments, including those incorporating powerful information technology tools, with the goal of better understanding the nature of student learning and the conditions that enhance deep understanding. Dr. Pellegrino has served as head of several National Academy of Science/National Research Council study committees. These include chair of the Study Committee for the Evaluation of the National and State Assessments of Educational Progress, co-chair of the NRC/NAS Study Committee on Learning Research and Educational Practice, and co-chair of the NRC/NAS Study Committee on the Foundations of Assessment which issued the report Knowing What Students Know: The Science and Design of Educational Assessment.
John Phillipo, CEO, Center for Educational Leadership and Technology (CELT)
Dr. John Phillipo is the principle founder and CEO of CELT. Dr. Phillipo is internationally recognized as a resource consultant for schools, businesses, and state/federal departments of education on issues related to design and implementation of comprehensive information technology systems. Dr. Phillipo is a former science/math teacher and school administrator. He has also served as director of a national technology "lighthouse” program for at-risk youth, as well as developer/demonstrator for three nationally validated (USDOE/OERI) education technology programs. Dr. Phillipo completed his doctoral degree studies at the Harvard Graduate School of Education in the area of administration, planning, and public policy.
David Prichard, Professor, Research Laboratory of Electronics at MIT
Professor David E. Pritchard is an Associate Director of the Research Laboratory of Electronics (RLE) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Professor Pritchard carried out pioneering experiments on the interaction of atoms with light that led to the creation of the field of atom optics. Professor Pritchard's investigations in atom-light interactions also led him into the field of laser cooling where he made a number of pioneering contributions, including the work that led to the creation of the magneto-optical trap. This device became the workhorse in atom cooling experiments, including most studies of Bose-Einstein condensation. Professor Pritchard is also a dedicated teacher. During the past few years he has developed a computer-based tutorial for elementary mechanics called Cybertutor, which has been used successfully in versions of 8.01: Physics I. Professor Pritchard received his B.S. from California Institute of Technology and his Ph.D. from Harvard, working with Professor Daniel Kleppner, who soon thereafter came to MIT, bringing Pritchard with him as a postdoctoral fellow. Pritchard joined the faculty of the Department of Physics in 1970. He has many honors, including the Broida Prize of the American Physical Society. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Elliot Soloway, Professor, University of Michigan
Elliot Soloway is Arthur F. Thurnau Professor at the University of Michigan and has appointments in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, the College of Engineering, the School of Education, and the School of Information. For the past 20 years, Elliot and his colleagues in the Center for Highly Interactive Computing in Education (HI-CE) have been exploring the ways in which computing and communications technologies can support inquiry-based pedagogy in K12 science classrooms. In 2001, undergraduates at the University of Michigan selected him to receive the Golden Apple Award as the Outstanding Teacher of the Year. In 2002 Elliot was selected to receive the ACM SIGCSE Outstanding Contribution to Computer Science Education Award, and two years later the EECS College of Engineering HKN Honor Society awarded Elliot the Distinguished Teacher of the Year Award. Elliot is a co-founder of GoKnow and is its chief strategy officer.
Malbert Smith, President, MetaMetrics
Malbert Smith is President and Co-Founder at MetaMetrics Inc based in Durham, NC. Together with co-founder and CEO A. Jackson Stenner, Ph.D., Dr. Smith created The Lexile Framework® for Reading; The Lexile Framework for Writing; and The Quantile Framework for Mathematics. Focused on fostering literacy and mathematics excellence, Dr. Smith strives to make educational measurement useful and actionable in classroom instruction and the home. Dr. Smith has taught graduate seminars in educational research and test development and design at Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, from which he received the Distinguished Alumni Award. He serves on the UNC School of Education Foundation Board and the National Rural Educational Outreach Center, and is a member of the Critical Friends of Council of Chief State School Officers. Dr. Smith also is a member of The American Association for the Advancement of Science, The American Educational Research Association and The National Council on Measurement in Education. He frequently speaks at various events on educational research and measurement. Malbert is a doctorate of philosophy degree holder with an emphasis in educational psychology from the University of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Bill Tucker, previously at Education Sector, now at the Gates Foundation. With this move, he is an observer on the council.
Bill Tucker has helped to lead Education Sector since its inception in 2005. In his policy work for Education Sector, he focuses on technology and innovation—specifically virtual schooling, assessments, and data systems. Bill is a social entrepreneur who has founded and led both nonprofit organizations and for-profit companies. His expertise ranges from finance to strategic development and technology, he has extensive knowledge of the nonprofit sector, and he has led the growth of several organizations. Prior to graduate school, Bill managed the training, conference, and publishing operations at CompassPoint Nonprofit Services, the nation's largest provider of management and technical training to nonprofit organizations. In 1997, Bill founded the Young Nonprofit Professionals Network (YNPN) and later served on YNPN's national board of directors. As a board member in the mid-1990s, he also helped to launch Hands on San Francisco (now Hands on Bay Area). His involvement in education dates to early in his career, when he managed a middle/high school student volunteer and service-learning program, working with 22 schools and over 75 community organizations, and also served a year in VISTA as a community organizer for an adult literacy program in Tampa, FL. He currently serves on the board of directors of the Policy Innovators in Education Network, DC School Reform Now, and Achievement Preparatory Public Charter School. He is a graduate of Duke University and has both an MBA and a Master's of Education from Stanford University.
Karen Cator, Director, Office of Educational Technology, United States Department of Education- Project Liaison
{Karen is not on the advisory board, but offers to serve as our liaison with the the US Department of Education.} Karen Cator is the Director of the Office of Educational Technology at the U.S. Department of Education. She has devoted her career to creating the best possible learning environments for this generation of students. Prior to joining the department, Karen directed Apple's leadership and advocacy efforts in education. In this role, she focused on the intersection of education policy and research, emerging technologies, and the reality faced by teachers, students and administrators. She served as Special Assistant for Telecommunications for the Lieutenant Governor of Alaska. She is the past chair of the Partnership for 21st Century Skills and has served on several boards including the Software & Information Industry Association—Education. Ms. Cator holds a Masters in school administration from the University of Oregon and Bachelors in early childhood education from Springfield College.
David Driscoll, former Commissioner of Education in Massachusetts
Dr. David P. Driscoll was the 22nd Commissioner of Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, appointed by the Board of Education on March 10, 1999, and has worked in public education and educational leadership for 45 years. As Commissioner, Dr. Driscoll oversaw the development of the state's curriculum frameworks, implementation and expansion of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS), the development of the state's School and District Accountability System, and the development and administration of the Educator Certification Test and new licensure regulations. Dr. Driscoll has served as President of the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO), and currently serves on the board of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute and the K12 Advisory Board and the Alliance for Excellent Education. He was recently appointed Chair of NAGB by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.
Bob Swiggnum, Georgia Department of Education’s Chief Information Officer
He is the overall direction of technology for the Georgia Department of Education. He leads the Technical Services, Instructional Technology, and Virtual School functions. Prior to working for the department of education, he worked for Fortune 500 companies in technology roles.
Neil Heffernan, 2012 Copyright
