Committed to the Success of Every Educator and Student

Linda Diamond, CORE’s President, previously served as a public school teacher, principal, Director of Curriculum and Instruction for a K–12 school district, and Senior Policy Analyst with an emphasis on school to career, charter schools, and school reform. Mrs. Diamond is also the co-author of CORE’s professional books Teaching Reading Sourcebook, Assessing Reading: Multiple Measures and Vocabulary Handbook.

Mark Simmons, CORE’s Chief Operating and Financial Officer, brings more than 20 years experience building the financial management, administrative and accounting  functions in  small and large organizations. Prior to CORE, Mark held senior financial and accounting positions with firms in the service and manufacturing sectors including GEA, Guess? and Crimson Consulting Group. Mark is a specialist in strategic planning and partnerships, operations processes, ROI, internal control, cost management and margin improvement. Mark holds a Master’s Degree in Finance from the University of Colorado, Denver.

Dale Webster is CORE’s Chief Academic Officer. He leads the Educational Services division and is responsible for the day-to-day operations, training, and quality control of CORE’s educational consulting and management staff. Dale brings 20 years of experience in teaching, professional development/technical assistance, research, state-level policy work and administration, and curriculum development to schools and districts across the country.

Dale earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal studies and a California Multiple Subjects Teaching Credential from San Diego State University, a master’s degree in educational psychology from the University of Houston, and a Ph.D. in education at the University of California, Irvine, where his research focused on vocabulary development for English learners. Dale has served on the California Curriculum Commission, an advisory body to the California State Board of Education on curriculum frameworks and textbook adoptions, as well as numerous other state and local educational panels. Dale is also president of Interactions for Peace, a nonprofit organization that teaches peaceful problem-solving skills to youth, and he is a board member of the San Diego branch of the International Dyslexia Association.

Dean Ballard is the Director of Mathematics for CORE. He holds a master’s degree in math education from Sonoma State University (SSU) and secondary teaching credentials for both mathematics and English. Dean has 18 years of experience in the classroom teaching all levels of math from 5th grade through AP Calculus. Additionally, he has 14 years’ experience as a math consultant providing professional development for both elementary and secondary math teachers, writing curricular and exam materials, directing programs, and speaking at local and national math events (NCTM, NCSM, NABE, and others). As CORE’s Director of Mathematics for the last six years Dean has developed CORE’s math trainings, overseen CORE’s expert math team and services, and worked extensively with schools, teachers, and consultants on effective instruction and implementation of rigorous standards including implementation of the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics. Dean is a member of NCTM (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics), NCSM (National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics), CMC (California Math Council), and TODOS: Mathematics for All.

Brian Blanning is CORE’s Educational Services Resource Manager. He has been with CORE for more than 17 years and is responsible for client scheduling, materials fulfillment, consultant logistical support, editorial project management and event management.

Prior to CORE, Brian was a project manager with the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce and an event manager for a technology magazine.

Scott K. Baker, Ph.D., is a Senior Research Associate at the Center on Teaching and Learning at the University of Oregon. Previously, he was with the Center on Research and Evaluation at Southern Methodist University (SMU). Prior to joining the Center on Research and Evaluation, Dr. Baker was the Associate Director of the Center on Teaching and Learning at the University of Oregon and the Director of Pacific Institutes for Research in Eugene, Oregon. Dr. Baker’s education interests focus on teaching and learning in literacy and mathematics, and the education needs of English learners. He is the Principal Investigator on a number research projects at the Center on Teaching and Learning, including
Read Aloud, Sentinel Schools Project and Systematic and Explicit Teaching Routines.

Elsa Cárdenas-Hagan is a bilingual speech and language pathologist, a certified teacher, dyslexia therapist, certified academic language therapist and a qualified instructor. Dr. Cárdenas-Hagan is the President of the Valley Speech Language and Learning Center in Brownsville, Texas and works with the Texas Institute for Measurement, Evaluation and Statistics at the University of Houston.

Elsa has spent the last 15 years working in national research projects sponsored by the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development and the Institute of Education Sciences, a research arm of the United States Department of Education. Each national project was related to the development of language and literacy skills among Spanish-speaking English learners. She has worked with teams of researchers designing assessments and interventions for English learners who struggle with reading.

Dr. Cárdenas-Hagan is currently the Chairperson of the National Joint Committee on Learning Disabilities, a Past-Vice- Chairperson of the International Dyslexia Association (IDA) as well as Past Editor-in-Chief of all IDA publications, Past Chairperson of the Texas State Board for Speech Pathology and Audiology and Past Chairperson of the Texas State Dyslexia Advisory Board. She has also served as a board member of the Academic Language Therapy Association, Southwest Regional Education Laboratory and Texas Comprehensive Center at the American Institutes for Research.

Elsa has written many scholarly articles, curricular programs, and book chapters related to the oracy and literacy development among English learners. She is currently working on a textbook for teaching English learners. It is her hope that pre-service teachers will have the opportunity to learn evidence-based practices for teaching literacy to a diverse population of students.

David J. Chard, Ph.D., became Dean ad interim of Boston University Wheelock College of Education & Human Development on June 1, 2018. He was previously President of Wheelock College before its merger with Boston University. Prior to that, Dr. Chard served as Dean of the Annette Caldwell Simmons School of Education and Human Development at Southern Methodist University (SMU), where he created a strategic vision focused on undergraduate and graduate programs built on evidence-based practices.

Among his accomplishments at SMU were developing a qualified and diverse faculty, strengthening interdisciplinary collaborations, building new academic programs and fostering a positive culture. During his 10-year tenure, the Simmons School grew to include five departments with an operating budget of over $25 million and more than $60 million was raised in support of the school and its mission.

Dr. Chard holds a Ph.D. in special education from the University of Oregon and a B.S. degree in mathematics and chemistry education from Central Michigan University. He has held faculty positions at Boston University, the University of Texas at Austin and served as associate dean in the College of Education at the University of Oregon. At Oregon, he oversaw curriculum and academic programs in the College of Education.

Dr. Chard has published more than 100 articles, monographs, book chapters, and books. He is a member of the International Academy for Research in Learning Disabilities, and has served in leadership roles in numerous professional organizations. Prior to his becoming dean, Dr. Chard was an active researcher focused on studying instructional practices that are most effective at meeting the needs of students with learning disabilities. He has directed or co-directed grants and contracts totaling more than $15.5 million.

He is the author of numerous instructional programs on early literacy, language arts, and mathematics spanning K-12 education and has been a classroom teacher in California, Michigan, and in the U.S. Peace Corps in Lesotho in southern Africa.

A frequent presenter at national and international education conferences, Dr. Chard has taught courses on behavior management, special education reading and writing, learning disabilities, and special education law. He has served on more than 30 doctoral dissertation committees in special education, communication disorders and sciences, literacy and language, school psychology, and cognitive psychology.

In October of 2011, Dr. Chard was nominated by President Barack Obama to serve on the Board of Directors of the National Board for Education Sciences (NBES). He was confirmed in 2012 by the U.S. Senate and was elected chair of the board in 2013.

Dr. Chard is the father of three adult children.

Goldenberg is currently Professor of Education at Stanford University. His many publications have appeared in academic and professional journals, and he has been on the editorial boards of Language Arts, The Elementary School Journal, Reading Research Quarterly, American Educational Research Journal, and Literacy, Teaching and Learning. His current projects focus on improving literacy achievement among English learners in elementary and middle school, language and literacy development among Mexican children in Mexico, and development of a measure of classroom quality for English learners.

Michelle K. Hosp, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Special Education at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. A nationally known trainer and speaker on problem solving and the use of progress monitoring data, she has worked as the Director of the Iowa Reading Research Center, a trainer with the National Center on Progress Monitoring and the National Center on Response to Intervention, and is currently on the technical review committee for the National Center on Intensive Intervention. Her research focus is on reading, and MTSS/RTI in relation to CBM and CBE. Dr. Hosp has published numerous articles, book chapters, and books related to reading and effective decision making practices.

Dr. Edward J. Kame’enui is a native Hawaiian, born in Hilo, Hawaii and raised in Kalihi on the Island of Oahu. He graduated from the Kamehameha Schools, a school for native Hawaiian children. Dr. Kame’enui’s scholarly interests are in reading, writing systems, language development, and academic interventions which he attributes to his experience growing up speaking “pidgin English” fluently, reading connected text infrequently and dysfluently, and communicating, albeit haphazardly, with his deaf mother and bigger twin brother.

From 2005-2007, Dr. Kame’enui served as the nation’s Founding Commissioner of the National Center for Special Education Research (NCSER) in the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), which serves as the research and statistical arm of the U. S. Department of Education. He has had the honor of speaking at the White House, participating in round tables and other WH events (e.g., UNESCO presentation in Paris) with then First Lady, Mrs. Laura Bush, and directing several national federal research and technical support initiatives on reading. He also served on the original advisory boards for the PBS television shows “Between the Lions” and WETA’s “Reading Rockets.” He is Dean-Knight Professor Emeritus  at the College of Education, University of Oregon.

Dr. Kame’enui has co-authored 20 college textbooks, including 5^th editions of two books, on teaching reading, curriculum design, vocabulary instruction, higher order thinking, and classroom management. He has more than 200 publications including 120+ refereed research articles and 55 book chapters on a range of topics including learning disabilities, early reading intervention, vocabulary instruction and development, school-wide reading improvement, the design of high quality educational materials, and the architecture of instruction.

During the almost 30-year period from 1990 to his full retirement in 2018, Dr. Kame’enui and his colleagues at the Center on Teaching and Learning (CTL) (for which he is the Founding Director) were awarded more than $70 million of federal, state, and private research and training funds, which included directing and implementing several national and state reading and academic intervention initiatives.