Timeline

1892

The prescient Mrs. Barnes

Historian and education theorist Mary Sheldon Barnes, wife of founding Education Prof. Earl Barnes, becomes Stanford’s first fulltime female faculty member. When university president David Starr Jordan hears Mrs. Barnes give a talk in Palo Alto, he is so impressed that he hires her on the spot as an assistant professor. Before her death in 1898, Mary Barnes pioneers the teaching of history using primary sources.  

1925

Women in education

Students form a chapter of Pi Lambda Theta, national women’s education honor society. 

1953

Two-career couple

Prof. Pat Sears, an educational psychologist, and her husband, Prof. Robert Sears, come to Stanford. Their hiring strikes a blow to anti-nepotism rules that inhibit two-career academic families. 

Pat Sears’ research on intellectually gifted women strikes a blow to midcentury stereotypes by suggesting that they are happier than average. 

1968

Taking the mic

At a university panel on response to Martin Luther King’s assassination, 70 members of Stanford’s Black Student Union take the microphone from Provost Richard Lyman. Frank Omowale Satterwhite, a doctoral candidate in higher education, reads 10 demands to boost African-American representation at Stanford.

Nine of the 10 demands are accepted with guidance from Prof. Robert Hess, an expert in urban education whose research before coming to Stanford laid the foundations for the federal Head Start program. Hess offers to guide Stanford’s initiative to increase and support African-American undergraduate enrollment. 

Joyce E. King, ’69, PhD ’74, then an undergraduate, is inspired to enter education after working in the Stanford president's office as a liaison to experimental admits, a program that was one of the 10 demands. King later became president of the American Educational Research Association.

1989

Supporting English learners

Bilingualism expert Prof. Kenji Hakuta comes to Stanford. With Prof. Guadalupe Valdes, he later cofounds the Understanding Language Initiative to support teachers of English-language learners.

1998

Crusader for equity

Prof. Linda Darling-Hammond comes to Stanford. She burnishes the School of Education’s reputation as a policy leader by mapping America’s growing educational inequity and outlining paths to reform. Her 2010 book The Flat World and Education wins the Grawemeyer Prize.

2001

Rising to the challenge

Partnering with East Palo Alto, Stanford education leaders open a charter high school. Later known as East Palo Alto Academy, the school employs innovative methods and yields graduation rates above 90 percent, far exceeding the state average for low-income students of color.

2008

Building great principals

The Stanford Principal Fellows Program opens to challenge and strengthen exceptional, early-career principals. During a year of intensive retreats and monthly working seminars, participants build leadership skills and the capacity to create transformative environments. 

2009

Partnering with San Francisco schools

Stanford formalizes a research-practice partnership with the San Francisco Unified School District. 

The large urban district acquires, interprets, and uses Stanford research, while Stanford students and scholars learn from real-world practices with the goal of advancing student achievement in San Francisco and beyond. 

2013

Lens on race, inequality and language

The doctoral program in Race, Inequality and Language in Education (RILE) enrolls its first cohort. 

In RILE, now headed by Prof. Arnetha Ball, students and scholars explore phenomena of race, language and inequality and apply their theoretical knowledge to educational practice in increasingly complex and diverse societies. In 2017, faculty vote to formalize RILE as a cross-disciplinary doctorate program. 

2013

Helping teachers to bloom where they're needed most

The Hollyhock Fellowship program brings talented early-career teachers to campus for skill-building, support and enrichment to help teachers persist and thrive in the classroom.

It joins such professional-development activities from the GSE's Center to Support Excellence in Teaching as courses at school sites and the summer Stanford Teaching Festival on campus. 

2014

Funding future teachers

STEP announces its Teaching Fellowships, which underwrite the full cost of tuition starting with the MA Class of ’16 for up to five students pursuing a teaching career.

2014

Promoting early math

To encourage research into preschool math acquisition, increasingly seen as a powerful predictor of later learning, Prof. Deborah Stipek and others launch the DREME (Development and Research in Early Math Education) Network.

2015

Mathematical mindsets

Prof. Jo Boaler publishes Mathematical Mindsets, encouraging positive thinking about math and a new approach to math teaching. She co-founds Youcubed, a center at Stanford that provides resources for math teaching and learning.