Full Team

Leadership

David Knight

Associate Professor, Educational Foundations, Leadership & Policy

Dr. David Knight is Director of the Center for Early Childhood Policy and Equity and the Center for the Study of Teaching and Policy at the University of Washington College of Education and serves as Associate Professor of Education Finance and Policy. David is a Fellow at the National Education Policy Center and a member of the Board of Trustees of the National Education Finance Academy.

His research focuses on the economics of education and school finance across the educational continuum from early childhood to postsecondary education. He studies educational systems through the lens of economic theory and methodologies. His work emphasizes distributive justice, racial/ethnic and socioeconomic equity, systematic racial segregation into under-resourced school districts, and policies aimed at reducing inequality and addressing racial and income-based disparities in educational opportunity.

Gail Joseph

Bezos Family Foundation Distinguished Professor in Early Learning
Executive Director, Cultivate Learning

Gail Joseph teaches courses, advises students, provides service, and conducts research on topics related to early care and education. Gail has been involved in research projects, professional development, and technical assistance activities at the local, state, and national levels.Her areas of research include child care quality and early learning, early childhood workforce development and professional learning, supporting children with special needs, and promoting children's social and emotional learning and mental health.

She is a co-creator of several digital professional learning resources such as Teacher Time, Circle Time Magazine, and Meaningful Makeovers. She was the PI of the Head Start Center for Inclusion, and the Co-PI of the National Center for Quality Teaching and Learning (NCQTL) funded by the Office of Head Start. Currently, Gail serves as the Executive Director of Cultivate Learning at the University of Washington. Additionally, she is the Founding Director of the EarlyEdU Alliance. The EarlyEdU Alliance is focused on increasing the quality of early learning settings nationwide by making relevant, affordable bachelor’s degrees accessible to the early childhood workforce.

Gail is the 2018 recipient of the David R. Thorud Leadership Award at the University of Washington.

Holly S. Schindler

Associate Professor, Learning Sciences & Human Development

Dr. Holly S. Schindler is an Associate Professor in the areas of Early Childhood and Family Studies and Learning Sciences and Human Development. She is also a Fellow at Harvard University’s Center on the Developing Child.

Her research focuses on three interconnected areas of scholarship. In one line of research, she uses meta-analytic techniques to identify best practices in early childhood education and family support programs. In a second line of research, she investigates the nuances of fathers’ roles in families as a potential vehicle for boosting the impacts of family support programs. As part of this line of work, she was recently recognized as a Foundation for Child Development Young Scholar for research implementing and evaluating a video coaching program with Mexican American fathers and their young children. Her third line of scholarship focuses on advancing methodological approaches for designing, evaluating, and scaling effective programs and practices. At the national level, she has collaborated with a team of colleagues to define, design, and disseminate tools for a new flexible approach to program development and evaluation within the Frontiers of Innovation network. Locally, she works with Best Starts for Kids Prenatal to Five Innovation Fund, which includes 13 innovation teams who are seeking to implement new or adapted approaches to support the health and well-being of pregnant individuals, children birth to age five and their families, service providers, and communities. Across these areas, Dr. Schindler’s research is driven by a desire to promote equitable systems in support of children and families.

Her work has been supported by funders such as the National Institutes of Health, Institutes of Education Sciences, and the Fatherhood Research and Practice Network, and has been featured in top-tier journals, such as Child Development, Early Childhood Research Quarterly, Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, and Journal of Marriage and Family.

Nancy Hertzog

Professor, Learning Sciences & Human Development>

Dr. Hertzog received her masters’ degree in Gifted Education from the University of Connecticut under the tutelage of Dr. Joseph Renzulli, and her Ph.D. in Special Education under her advisor Dr. Merle B. Karnes. Her research examines curricular practices and policies in the field of gifted education. From 1995 to 2010 she was on the faculty in the Department of Special Education and directed University Primary School, an early childhood gifted program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Collaboratively with the head teachers, she won several curriculum awards from the Curriculum Division of the National Association for Gifted Children. She joined the University of Washington in 2010 as a professor in the area of Learning Sciences and Human Development, and the Director of the Halbert and Nancy Robinson Center for Young Scholars (2010-2020). Currently her research focuses on equity and access to advanced learning opportunities in schools, and pedagogical strategies that help teachers challenge all students.

Soojin Oh Park

Assistant Professor, Learning Sciences & Human Development

Dr. Soojin Oh Park is an assistant professor at the University of Washington. Her interdisciplinary scholarship addresses critical gaps in the scholarship of early childhood education (ECE) and parenting through three interconnected strands of research: 1) The role of family literacy engagement on the early language and literacy development of Dual Language Learners (DLLs); 2) culturally grounded parenting practices for schools and policies to build on what families do, as opposed to what they lack; and 3) the improvement of early learning programs, policies, and systems. Across her research, teaching, and service, Dr. Park strives to think critically about the roots and mechanisms of inequities that reproduce social stratification, from the earliest years of life, and to collaborate with families and communities to cultivate the thriving of children’s linguistic and cultural repertoires within and beyond schools.