Linda Darling-Hammond

Linda Darling-Hammond is the Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education at Stanford University, where she serves as principal investigator for the School Redesign Network and the Stanford Educational Leadership Institute. Her research, teaching, and policy work focus on educational policy, teaching and teacher education, school restructuring, and educational equity. Prior to Stanford, Darling-Hammond was the William F. Russell Professor in the Foundations of Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. There, she was the founding Executive Director of the National Commission for Teaching and America's Future, the blue-ribbon panel whose 1996 report What Matters Most: Teaching for America's Future, catalyzed major policy changes across the United States to improve the quality of teacher education and teaching. Among her more than 200 publications is Powerful Teacher Education: Lessons from Exemplary Programs (Jossey-Bass: 2006), The Right to Learn (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1997), recipient of the American Educational Research Association’s Outstanding Book Award for 1998, and Teaching as the Learning Profession (co-edited with Gary Sykes), recipient of the National Staff Development Council’s Outstanding Book Award for 2000. She began her career as a public school teacher and has co-founded several schools, including charter schools in East Palo Alto, CA.