HGSE Adds New Faculty Members

Dean James Ryan has announced the appointment of three new faculty members to the Harvard Graduate School of Education: Assistant Professor Emmerich Davies Escobar, Senior Lecturer Irvin Scott, and Assistant Professor Bertrand Schneider.

“Together, Emmerich, Irvin, and Bertrand bring to our faculty a tremendous amount of experience and expertise in areas that are absolutely critical to advancing our work — including international education policy, school leadership, and learning design,” Ryan said. “They will be invaluable resources for our students, and I couldn’t be happier to welcome them to the HGSE community.” 

The following faculty have joined the Ed School:

• Emmerich Davies Escobar specializes in education policy and politics, the political economy of development, and the politics of service provision, with a regional focus on South Asia. His dissertation, for which he was awarded the National Academy of Education/Spencer Dissertation Fellowship, examines the growth of private elementary education in India and the consequences of using private rather than public schools on individuals’ beliefs and civic engagement.
• Irvin Scott served for the past five years as the deputy director for K–12 education at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. In that role, he led the investment of $300M in initiatives focused on transforming how teachers are recruited, developed, and rewarded. Prior to joining Gates, Irvin was an English teacher for 11 years, a principal, an assistant superintendent, and the chief academic officer for Boston Public Schools. 
• Bertrand Schneider, who officially joins the faculty in January 2017, is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education, where he recently obtained a Ph.D. in the Learning Sciences and Technology Design Program. His research interests include the development of new and original interfaces for collaborative learning in formal and informal learning environments (e.g. maker spaces and fabrication labs).