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Board
of Directors
Secretary
National Fellow
Institute for Learning, University of Pittsburgh
Beth
J. Lief, secretary of the board, has been a leader in public education
reform and innovation for 20 years. She is currently
a Nation Fellow at the Institute for Learning, based at the Learning
Research and Development Center, University of Pittsburgh. The
Institute for Learning is an internationally recognized center
for linking research and practice in urban public school reform.
Her work is focused on leadership development in Region 10 of the
New York City Department of Education, regions that includes all
public schools in Harlem, Washington Heights and the Upper West
Side of Manhattan, New York, as well as a cluster of small schools
in the Bronx..
Immediately prior to joining the Institute for Learning,
Lief served as a consultant to the New York City Department
of Education’s strategic planning process, coordinating
the instructional aspects of the planning process and
managing the literacy working group. From March, 2000
until June, 2003, she was Senior Vice President for Strategic
Relations for Teachscape, a venture that uses Internet
supported resources, including videos of exemplary teaching
practice, specialist commentary and other materials,
to provide professional development services to teachers
and administrators.
Lief was founding president for 11 ½ years of
New Visions for Public Schools, the largest educational
reform organization in New York City devoted to improving
the City’s public schools. During her tenure, New
Visions developed and provided professional development
in more than 700 schools and had many of its initiatives
replicated on a national basis. Among other initiatives,
New Visions was the first recipient of an Annenberg challenge
grant that helped create 35 small schools; formed collaborative
study groups for superintendents; introduced classroom-based
literacy assessment in the early grades to the City’s
public schools; and received a National Science Foundation
grant to work in middle school mathematics in some of
the City’s most struggling districts. Lief began
her work in public education as a civil rights lawyer
with the N.A.A.C.P. Legal Defense and Educational Fund,
Inc., serving as one of the lead attorneys in the Kansas
City, Missouri school desegregation lawsuit, and later
served from 1984 to 1986 as Executive Director of the
Mayor’s Commission on Special Education in New
York City.
Lief serves on the Board of Directors of Public Education
Network, Bank Street College of Education and New Visions
for Public Schools. She has been a member of numerous
other governmental and non-profit boards and committees,
including the National Board for Professional Teaching
Standards’ Exceptional Needs Standards Committee.
Lief has published articles and chapters on public education
reform, small schools and characteristics of successful
schools, and has received several awards for her work.
Lief received her B.A. from Barnard College, magna cum
laude, Phi Beta Kappa, and her J.D. from New York University,
cum laude, where she was a Root Tilden scholar.
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