Senior Researcher and Director of Educational Futures

 

Dr. Best serves as Senior Researcher and Director of Educational Futures, focusing on generating knowledge and designing projects to help educators move into using emerging technologies and more effective learning strategies. Previously, he served as principal investigator and directed a $15M federal Star Schools grant that included K–16 partner organizations in Ohio, Kansas, New Mexico and California that conducted research on the use of mobile technologies and games in after-school programs to improve middle school reading and mathematics achievement of students in urban and rural schools. 

 

In addition, Dr. Best directed federal technology projects for the Ohio Board of Regents that included a federal project that brought together 50 Ohio teacher training universities to co-develop new resources and share existing resources electronically that address ISTE teacher technology standards. He established an $800M state agency, Ohio SchoolNet, to wire 110,000 classrooms in the state for data, voice, and video transmission; acquire hardware and software, and train over 50,000 teachers to incorporate technology into their classroom practices. To scale up Ohio SchoolNet, he mentored, managed, and lead a professional development staff of six directors and 24 staff members who oversaw portfolios of 24 professional development programs in technology for 110,000 teachers in the state of Ohio. Dr. Best also designed and managed the Ohio SchoolNet Telecommunity, a $36M distance learning project funded by nine telephone companies to provide infrastructure, support, and professional development to school districts to acquire and use distance learning technologies.

 

Dr. Best’s background also includes serving as Small Schools Coach for Small Schools Project at University of Washington: Vice President at Architects of Achievement in Seattle (WA) where he co-authored Architecture for Achievement; Project Director for federal projects at City University of New York and New York University, executive director for the Center for Leadership in Education, a Cleveland-based (OH) non-profit focused on supporting school improvement in northeastern Ohio; Director of Advanced Development for Fitch, Inc., and serving as technology administrator for Columbus (OH) Public Schools.