The Board

Dr. Bowman has worked in education for more than two decades. After earning his doctorate at the RAND Corporation's Pardee RAND Graduate School in Policy Analysis (Quantitative Methods and Education Policy), he worked with Albuquerque Public Schools as a Harvard Graduate School Strategic Data Project Fellow to increase the strategic use of data and accountability through the Strategic Data Project at HGSE’s Center for Education Policy. While in New Mexico, Dr. Bowman was asked to serve on the state teacher evaluation advisory council (NMTEACH) and spent four years at Santa Fe Public Schools as the Chief Information and Strategy Officer, where he led the digital learning, technology, accountability, and data analysis initiatives of the district. Deeply committed to equity in education, he returned to Albuquerque Public Schools in 2016 to continue his strategic approach to improving educational outcomes for all students and the collaborative implementation of educational technology. Currently, Dr. Bowman is a Board Member at the Association for Education Finance and Policy and the Chief Technology Officer for Albuquerque Public Schools.

Dr. Steele earned a Bachelor of Arts at the University of Florida, Master of Education at Harvard University, and Ph.D. at the University of South Florida. During his thirty-five year career he served the district as a high school math teacher, assistant principal, International Baccalaureate coordinator, high school principal, and General Director for Secondary Education. As Project Director for the Empowering Effective Teachers program, Dr. Steele was integrally involved in the design and implementation of Hillsborough’s teacher and leader evaluation and professional development systems.

Mr. Robledo is a self-employed business consultant leading business development projects in the private industry. He works primarily with high-tech startups in the Boston area, helping them drive revenue growth and expand their market presence. Prior to becoming an independent consultant, Carlos worked as Vice President of Strategic Partnerships and as Director of Business Development at two leading Field Service Management software companies. Additionally, Carlos serves as a business mentor at the non-profit EforAll in Lawrence, MA. Carlos is passionate about empowering people and enabling organizations to achieve growth through effective business partnering. Carlos has particular interest in engaging with the local LatinX community and using his experience and leadership skills to serve organizations that improve the lives of LatinX people. He hopes to use his experience to enable a brighter future through access to better education opportunities and to facilitate a smooth integration into the American workforce.

Dr. Silverman is a trusted advisor to public and private sector leaders on organizational strategy relative to complex policy, personnel, and market dynamics. She advises senior executives and their teams on building effective strategies to conceptualize, communicate, manage, and lead change in rapidly evolving environments—while also deeply understanding and building their own capabilities as people, professionals, and leaders. An organizational psychologist, she is particularly interested in helping people develop a holistic approach to understanding themselves (self-awareness) and one another (relational trust) as the foundation for creating optimal experiences at work. Dr. Silverman resides in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with her wife and two sons, divides precious free time among running, reading, and CrossFit, and is an avid women's sports fan.

Dr. Bhatt is the Senior Research Director for the University of Chicago Crime Lab and Education Lab. In this role, Dr. Bhatt serves as the principal investigator on a number of applied research studies, including those focused on high-dosage tutoring; alleviating mental health for young women; and READI Chicago, an initiative to reduce gun violence involvement among those at highest risk. Her current work focuses on leading the Personalized Learning Initiative, a multi-site randomized controlled trial of over 16,000 students designed to understand how we can scale the benefits of high-dosage tutoring to reach more students in an equitable manner. Her work has been published in high impact journals such as the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the American Economic Review, and Science and has been cited in media outlets such as the New York Times, National Public Radio, and the Chicago Tribune. Prior to her work at the Crime Lab and Education Lab, she worked as a researcher at the American Institutes for Research where she led projects related to college access and retention, teacher quality, school finance, and school accountability policy. She is a former Fulbright Scholar and holds a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in Education Policy and an M.P.P. and B.A. in Public Policy from Vanderbilt University.

Dr. Ricketts is an experienced leader in K-12 research, evaluation, and data analytics. As the Executive Director of Research, Evaluation, and Analytics at Gwinnett County Public Schools, she drives data-based decision-making and strategic initiatives on research and data utilization across the district. Her experience includes building school accountability frameworks, enhancing the access of school and district leaders to meaningful data dashboards, and improving the user experience and utilization of dashboards. One of her main goals is to bridge the gap between data and practice in a way that allows data to have a meaningful impact on outcomes for students. Her previous roles include Director of Enterprise Analytics and Director of Data Analytics at Gwinnett County Public Schools, Senior Data Analyst for Atlanta Public Schools, and Strategic Data Fellow at the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard through which she spent two years working on human capital analytics at the Delaware Department of Education. With experience spanning across school districts and state departments, Shanna is dedicated to optimizing educational outcomes through data-driven insights and continuous improvement. Shanna holds a PhD in Educational Studies from Emory University, an MBA from INSEAD, and a Bachelors in Economics from Harvard University.