Linda Darling-Hammond

Charles E. Ducommon Professor of Education at Stanford University

Linda Darling-Hammond is a national treasure.  In 2006, Education Week selected her as one of the ten most influential people in education policy for the previous decade.  This list included two presidents, a governor, a senator, a congressmen, as well as billionaire Bill Gates.  That’s powerful company.

During the 2008 election and transition, Obama asked Darling-Hammond to serve as his chief education advisor, causing her to be the most-mentioned person for Education Secretary.  Why was she was passed over?  Her positions on teacher effectiveness and the No Child Left Behind Act were politically on-target, but corporate, free-market reformers didn’t like that teacher unions preferred her.  Her stand against merit pay was a political liability.  The corporate reformers preferred, and got, Arne Duncan.

Politics aside, Darling-Hammond is regarded perhaps as America’s most distinguished education leader and academic.  She has published a dozen books and more than 300 articles, has served on the most prominent government and corporate advisory boards, holds 8 honorary degrees, and has received many prestigious awards for service.

Her life’s work has focused on improving teacher effectiveness by improving the profession as a whole.  She is at the top of the knowledge mountain when it comes to designing effective teacher education programs and teacher credentialing systems.  She is an expert on how to restructure low performing schools.  Her purpose with all these efforts is to cut into America’s persistent achievement gaps.  Her latest book, The Flat World of Education, is a magnum opus.   

"Education is a public good.  We all benefit, or we all hurt, depending on the quality of education other people's children get." -Linda Darling-Hammond

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