Jeanne H. Purcell, Ph.D. is a consultant and leadership development coach, as well as an ASCD faculty member. A teacher for over forty years, K-22, she has worked with every type of school system—rural urban, suburban, large, small, private, BIA schools, Career and Technical Schools—to build sustaining plans with a singular focus: to increase student achievement. Pathways toward this singular goal include:
• The development and implementation of high quality standards for all students,
• Meaningful curriculum differentiation for the full range of students, special education to high-achieving,
• Superior teacher preparation,
• Capacity-building coaching for building level leaders, as well as central office personnel,
• Sustained, differentiated coaching—which often includes thought partnerships—to transform the culture of low-performing schools,
• Assessment development, both formative and summative, as well as the interpretation of the related data to modify goals and direction.
Over the last decade, Purcell has had extensive experience with all aspects of professional development and coaching, from listening and simple feedback for one practitioner to transformational coaching with entire central office teams and boards of education to secure new ways of thinking and creating organizational structures that enhance the learning needs of all 21st century learners. As an ASCD faculty member. she has held long-term contracts with Fort Worth Career and Technical Schools, Atlanta Public Schools, Killeen Texas Public Schools, as well as the Bureau of Indian Affairs Schools. In her ASCD work, she is noted for her expertise in all curriculum areas, K-12; her expertise in meeting the needs of all learners, from special education students with motivational issues through high-end learners; her expertise related to all client roles from teachers through central office and State Department of Education officials; her enthusiasm and “can-do” attitude; and her ability to customize for a district’s or client’s unique needs.
She has held faculty positions at the University of Connecticut, as well as recently at Rutgers University. Equally important, she spent over ten years in the Connecticut State Department of Education, where she: provided leadership to the state’s 1,100 public schools on a number of curriculum and assessment issues, including the adoption of the Common Core State Standards; wrote, secured and monitored over $20,000,000 of very successful curriculum-related grants; and advocated with all key constituents—superintendents, state department officials, and legislators—for educational protocols, strategic plans and policies that had the greatest likelihood of enhancing the achievement of Connecticut’s most deserving students. Throughout that time, Purcell authored eight books and provided hundreds of professional development seminars—both face-to-face and online—for teacher leaders and administrators on a wide variety of critical educational issues.
Categories: Educator, Educator - Differentiated Instruction, Educator - Formative Assessment
