Dr. Grover J. “Russ” Whitehurst is a widely respected and influential figure in education research and policy in the U.S. and around the world. His government appointments have included service as the Director of the Institute of Education Sciences at the U.S. Department of Education and as the U.S. Assistant Secretary for Educational Research and Improvement. He has also served as Chair of the Department of Psychology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook and as Academic Vice President of the Merrill-Palmer Institute. Currently, he is the Herman and George R. Brown Chair and Director of the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution. Dr. Whitehurst received his PhD in Experimental Child Psychology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1970 and has conducted research in the areas of program evaluation, teacher quality, preschools, national and international student assessments, reading instruction, education technology, and education data systems.