The REL Governing Board helps REL Mid-Atlantic prioritize the education needs of the region, provides strategic guidance on REL work to maximize local effectiveness, and leverages members' regional networks to amplify and disseminate REL products. REL Mid-Atlantic Governing Board members represent diverse expertise and experience.

Jairo Borja

New Jersey

As the president of Borja Consulting Group, Jairo Borja is on a mission to elevate small business owners and entrepreneurs to their full potential. "Dr. B" is a sought-after speaker, author, and consultant. He is also the vice president of corporate and entrepreneurial programs for the Statewide Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey (SHCCNJ), which represents 120,000 Hispanic business owners in the state. In this role, he oversees all corporate and entrepreneurial programming for the SHCCNJ. Dr. B holds a doctorate of business administration degree in marketing from Walden University, a master's of business administration degree in management from Long Island University, and a bachelor's of business administration degree in management from Berkeley College.

Maya Martin Cadogan

District of Columbia

DC, her people, and issues of equity and social justice are in Maya Martin Cadogan's history, heart, and home. Maya serves as the executive director of DC PAVE (Parents Amplifying Voices in Education), which she founded in 2016 with an all-parent board of directors to connect, inform, and empower parent leaders to give families in DC a voice and a choice in the vision for education. She was an entrepreneur-in-residence with New Schools Venture Fund in 2015–2016 as she worked to found PAVE. Prior to PAVE's founding, Maya served as the chief of staff at Achievement Prep, a public charter school network located in Ward 8, where she developed and led the organizational infrastructure as the network grew. She previously served as the director of policy and special programs for Center City PCS, another DC charter network with six campuses; as a senior program manager for Sponsors for Educational Opportunity, a nonprofit that places students of color in corporate financial internships; and as an assistant director of admissions for her alma mater, Dartmouth College, focused on growing the number of racially underrepresented students at the college. Maya holds a bachelor's degree in sociology and history from Dartmouth College and a master's of public policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Her current roles include board chair of LEARN–DC, a public charter school that opened through a first-of-its-kind parent-driven selection process; an advisory committee member of Bard DC Early College High School and Rocketship Public Schools; and a board member of EmpowerK12 and the PIE Network.

Karen Couch

Maryland

Karen Couch is the superintendent of Kent County School District in Maryland. Dr. Couch has been a superintendent in Maryland and New Mexico for 21 years and previously served as an associate superintendent for personnel, elementary school principal, and teacher. She received numerous educational leadership awards throughout her career. During her tenure as an elementary school principal, her school was recognized as one of the outstanding schools of excellence, receiving the Blue Ribbon School Award for New Mexico. In 2010 she was named Superintendent of the Year for New Mexico, and in 2021 she received this honor for the state of Maryland.

Marcus A. Delgado

Pennsylvania

Marcus Delgado is the Deputy Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Education’s Office of Administration. Mr. Delgado oversees multiple administrative functions in this role, including financial management and department development. He brings over 20 years of education experience to Pennsylvania, having most recently served as the chief executive officer for One Bright Ray Community High School, and as principal and teacher before that. Mr. Delgado holds a master’s of education degree from Arizona State University and a bachelor’s degree in secondary education and teaching from Temple University.

Laura Desimone

Delaware

Laura M. Desimone is the L. Sandra and Bruce L. Hammonds Professor in Teacher Education, interim director of the School of Education, and director of research for the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Delaware. Dr. Desimone studies how state, district, and school-level policy can better promote changes in teaching that lead to improved student achievement and to closing the achievement gap between advantaged and disadvantaged students. She uses multiple methods, including longitudinal surveys, interviews, classroom observations, and randomized controlled trials, to study implementation and effects at all levels of the policy system. She has garnered over $30 million in grants from the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), the National Science Foundation, and other major organizations, including efficacy and exploratory studies in mathematics, science, teacher learning, and standards-based reform. She has co-led major IES research centers (the 21st Century Research and Development Center on Cognition and Science Instruction and the Center on Standards, Alignment, Instruction, and Learning), co-directed the University of Pennsylvania's IES predoctoral training program from 2007–2014, and was principal investigator (PI) on an IES postdoctoral grant at Penn from 2010–2015. She is currently co-PI on a study of middle school math curriculum implementation led by colleagues from Mathematica, and PI on a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, studying curriculum and professional learning reform in 12 districts across the country serving predominantly minoritized children.

Matthew Duque

Maryland

Matthew Duque is the director of the Office of Research, Planning, and Program Evaluation at the Maryland State Department of Education, where he conducts and oversees original research, program evaluation, and data analytics to inform decision making. He previously was a research analyst at the DC Office of the State Superintendent of Education and served as a strategic data project fellow in Baltimore County Public Schools. He began his career in education as a high school teacher in Boston Public Schools and holds a Ph.D. in urban education policy from the University of Southern California.

Theodore Dwyer

Pennsylvania

Theodore Dwyer serves as the chief accountability officer of the Data, Research, Evaluation and Assessment (DREA) Division at Pittsburgh Public Schools (PPS). There, he leads the four DREA departments of Data and Accountability, Research and Evaluation, Assessment, and Charter Accountability. His efforts are focused on improving data quality, expanding the internal research and evaluations taking place in the district, ensuring actionable assessment information is available to teachers and leaders to make student-centered decisions, implementing data governance processes, supporting data transparency for the public, and providing appropriate information to the public to allow informed choices related to the charter options in the city. Prior to his role at PPS, Dr. Dwyer served as the manager of evaluation in the Hillsborough County, Florida, school district for eight years, overseeing the external research review process and external grant evaluators, working with his team to provide actionable evaluations and analyses, and strengthening relationships with external partners in institutions of higher education and community organizations. Dr. Dwyer holds a Ph.D. in curriculum and instruction with a focus on research and evaluation from the University of South Florida.

James Fogarty

Pennsylvania

James Fogarty is the executive director of A+ Schools, an equity-focused, problem-solving organization working to improve the learning outcomes of all children in Pittsburgh. He is a parent of two children in Pittsburgh Public Schools and has been working on issues of educational improvement in Pittsburgh since 2010. A former Breakthrough Collaborative teacher, he has profound respect for educators and the difficult job they do. His training as a lawyer and time working for a Silicon Valley firm further strengthened his belief that all children deserve access to a high-quality education and access to and experience with networks and opportunities afforded to those who attend the best schools in the nation.

Mark Holodick

Delaware

Mark Holodick was confirmed as Delaware's Secretary of Education in January 2022. Before joining the Delaware Department of Education, Dr. Holodick served for two years as senior leadership specialist for the University of Delaware's Delaware Academy for School Leadership (DASL). In this role, he coordinated the Governor's Institute for School Leadership and served as lead faculty for DASL's Principal Preparation Program. He also conducted research in collaboration with school districts and charter schools and designed and facilitated research-informed professional development for school leaders. From 2009–2020, Dr. Holodick served as superintendent of the Brandywine School District following a long history with the district as a student, teacher, assistant principal, and principal. He also served as principal at Concord High School as well as at a blended middle and high school in the Delmar School District. Dr. Holodick has been recognized as the Delaware Association of Educational Office Professionals' 2016 Administrator of the Year, the Delaware Association of School Librarians' School Administrator of the Year, and by his peers as the Delaware Chief School Officers Association (DCSOA) 2017 Superintendent of the Year. He is a member of the statewide Vision 2025 implementation committee and previously served as both president and vice president of the Delaware Interscholastic Athletic Association. Additionally, Dr. Holodick has served as DCSOA president, on the College Board's Superintendent Advisory Board Council, on Goldey-Beacom College's Board of Trustees, and on the board of the Delaware College Scholars Program.

Stephanie Ingram

Delaware

Stephanie Ingram is the current president of the Delaware State Education Association, a role she has held since 2018. As the leader of her state affiliate, she represents more than 13,000 active and retired educators in the organization. She began her teaching career as a 4th grade teacher in the Colonial School District more than 20 years ago.

David Kasyan

New Jersey

David Kasyan is the principal of Brick Township High School. He embraces a shared leadership philosophy, empowering students and staff to contribute and collaborate toward a positive school culture. He is an advocate for inclusive education practices, responsive instruction, and equity. He believes it is our responsibility to develop the whole child, while working collaboratively with all stakeholders within a learning community to achieve desired outcomes of success. Dr. Kasyan began his career in education in the Jackson School District, where he was a special education teacher in the elementary and high school grade levels before becoming an assistant principal at the elementary level. Dr. Kasyan joined the Brick Township School District in 2017 as principal of Emma Havens Young Elementary School and accepted his current position in 2021. He received the New Jersey State PTA Outstanding Principal of the Year award in 2021. Dr. Kasyan completed his undergraduate education at Lebanon Valley College, where he double majored in elementary education and special education. He holds a master's degree in administration and leadership from Georgian Court University and a doctorate in education: educational leadership from Saint Peter's University. Dr. Kasyan works with the New Jersey Leadership Academy to provide professional development to current and aspiring leaders. He also sits on the Board of Trustees for the Foundation for Educational Administration.

Jeffrey Lawson

Maryland

Dr. Lawson is the Superintendent of Cecil County Public Schools in Maryland. A servant leader, his mantra is ‘people first’ and he believes public education is a community service that should provide equitable opportunities for all children and families in Cecil County. Dr. Lawson has 40 years of experience in K–12 education, 15 of those years with Cecil County Public Schools serving as the Executive Director of High School Education and then moving into the Associate Superintendent of Education Services position prior to his current role. Before arriving in Cecil County, Dr. Lawson worked for the Delaware Department of Education for 25 years as a high school mathematics teacher, assistant principal, middle and high school principal, central office director, and education associate. He also spent 17 years an adjunct instructor at the University of Delaware and Wilmington University teaching undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral-level courses. Dr. Lawson is President of the Public School Superintendents’ Association of Maryland and past President of the Eastern Shore of Maryland Educational Consortium. He is a member of the Cecil County Chamber of Commerce, the Cecil Economic Development Commission, the Business Education Partnership Advisory Council, the Maryland Higher Education Commission Financial Assistance Advisory Council. He also serves on the Board of Ethics for the City of Newark in Delaware.

Harry Lee

New Jersey

Harry Lee is the president and CEO of the New Jersey Public Charter Schools Association, a membership organization that supports public charter schools in New Jersey. He has more than 18 years of experience in New Jersey's education landscape in his current role and as a former charter school authorizer, charter management organization executive, and independent consultant. Harry previously worked as the chief strategy officer at iLearn Schools, a nonprofit charter management organization based in New Jersey. He spent more than a decade with the New Jersey Department of Education, working primarily in the Charter Schools Office serving as the school performance and accountability manager and then director. He holds a B.A. from Yale University and an M.P.A. from Rutgers University–Newark.

Chad Muntz

Maryland

Chad Muntz is the Associate Vice Chancellor for Decision Support at the University System of Maryland (USM) He leads the Institutional Research, Data, and Analytics Office, helps shape higher education policy, and oversees mandatory reporting for internal and external audiences. Chad reports annually to the Board of Regents in support of Regent Committees for Finance, Education Policy and Student Life, and Intercollegiate Athletics as well as the workgroups for Enrollment and Strategic Planning. Chad sits on the statewide data advisory board for the Maryland Higher Education Commission and represents USM on the State's Longitudinal Data System Research Board. He holds a B.S. in mathematics and psychology from Evangel University, an M.S.in judgment and decision-making and quantitative methods from Ohio University, and an M.S. in data analytics from the University of Maryland Global Campus.

Diana Pasculli

New Jersey

Diana Pasculli is the executive director in the Division of Education Services at the New Jersey Department of Education (NJDOE). In this role, she supports the offices that handle school performance reports, Federal funding and monitoring, multilingual/bilingual programs, and mental health and social and emotional learning initiatives. Throughout her time at the NJDOE, Ms. Pasculli has held a variety of roles and she has worked to provide all students equitable access to high quality education by engaging on a variety of topics such as educator certification, dual enrollment, teacher leadership, student assessments, and strategic operations. In 2017, she co-led the development of the 2017 ESSA State Plan. Previously, Ms. Pasculli was a middle school teacher for six years, first in the Bronx, New York, and then in Newark, New Jersey. Ms. Pasculli holds a B.A. in psychology from Smith College, an M.S. in teaching and childhood education from Fordham University, and a J.D. from Rutgers Law School.

Marilyn Pryle

Pennsylvania

Marilyn Pryle, Ed.D., NBCT, is an English teacher at Abington Heights High School in Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania. She has authored seven books for educators and is the recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Fulbright Program. Dr. Pryle served as the 2019–2021 Pennsylvania Teacher of the Year.

Geoff Sanderson

Maryland

Geoff serves as the Deputy State Superintendent of Accountability for the Maryland State Department of Education. He previously served as the Chief Accountability Office for the McKinney Independent School District in Texas, where he steered end-to-end operations across assessment, transportation, and information reporting divisions. In this capacity, he enabled equitable resource allocations across school sites by developing need-based funding models and ensured continuous grade-level success by redesigning the internal performance monitoring system. He also launched a mobile app for students and families, granting them access to real-time map-based bus locations. Geoff has prior accountability leadership experience in Maryland, having served as the Associate Superintendent of Shared Accountability for the Montgomery County Public Schools. He holds an advanced degree in school psychology from Trinity University.

Cora Scott

Delaware

Cora Scott is the deputy secretary of the Delaware Department of Education. Dr. Scott has more than 25 years of experience in district and charter schools as well as work in higher education. With a focus on educational equity, Dr. Scott works to ensure every student has access and opportunity with the appropriate supports for success. She began her education career as a teacher in Cecil County, Maryland, where she also served as special education coordinator before joining the Christina School District as an instructional coach. She also had leadership roles at the University of Delaware and Newark Charter School before joining the Brandywine School District as an assistant principal. She later was promoted in Brandywine to director of pupil services, director of curriculum and instruction, and executive director of elementary education before being named assistant superintendent. A graduate of Glasgow High School in the Christina School District, Dr. Scott completed her undergraduate degree in elementary and special education at the University of Delaware before earning both a master of education degree and doctorate of education in school leadership from Wilmington University.

Jim Vaughan

Pennsylvania

Jim Vaughan became executive director of the Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) in 2015. He began working for PSEA in 2004 and became assistant executive director for government relations in 2007. In that role, he was responsible for the association's lobbying, advocacy, and political operations and served as part of PSEA's senior management team. Since 2007, Mr. Vaughan has been involved in all aspects of the organization's policy and operational decisionmaking. He also oversaw a fundamental change in PSEA's member-to-member advocacy structure, helping design a system that now includes 11 full-time field staff members who serve as region advocacy coordinators and more than 3,000 PSEA members who serve as building action coordinators in their buildings. Mr. Vaughan has led PSEA's successful lobbying and campaign initiatives, deploying the association's lobbying and advocacy staff to defeat legislation that threatened public education and PSEA members' rights and to elect pro-public education candidates for the General Assembly, judiciary, statewide row offices, and the governor's office. Mr. Vaughan holds a bachelor's degree in political science from Millersville University.

Tonya Wolford

Pennsylvania

Tonya Wolford is the chief for district evaluation, research, and accountability (ERA) at the School District of Philadelphia (SDP). Dr. Wolford holds a B.S. from The University of Maryland and a Ph.D. and M.Ed. from the University of Houston. She has worked at the intersection of education and research for many years, starting her career in medical education in the District of Columbia and in Houston at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Wolford is dedicated to facilitating the use of research and data to improve outcomes for children in Philadelphia. For eight years, Dr. Wolford held various roles in the Office of Research and Evaluation at SDP before becoming chief for ERA. Over the years, she has conducted research and evaluations across all aspects of K–12 education, including attendance, early literacy, arts education, school turnaround, family and community engagement, disciplinary practices, and career and technical education, among other topics. She has worked extensively in the emerging field of research-practice partnerships and served on the steering committee for the National Network of Education Research-Practice Partnerships at the Kinder Institute, Rice University.

Christopher Wooleyhand

Maryland

Dr. Christopher Wooleyhand is a retired elementary school principal with over 30 years of experience in education. He currently serves as executive director of the Maryland Association of Elementary School Principals and is a former adjunct instructor at McDaniel College. His work has focused on the connection between teacher leadership and school performance and he often writes about achievement gaps and the need for equitable practices in education. In 2023, he was awarded Administrator of the Year by the Central Maryland Chamber of Commerce. Dr. Wooleyhand is a former Peace Corps volunteer in the West Indies. He holds a doctorate degree in instructional leadership for changing populations from Notre Dame of Maryland University, a master’s of education degree in outdoor education from Northern Illinois University, and a bachelor’s in physical education from Towson University.

Rashida Young

District of Columbia

Rashida Young is the partner leading the Schools, Talent, & Racial Equity team at Education Forward DC, which provides funding for organizations and schools that aim to improve school quality, develop educator pipelines, and address racial barriers to educational success. Prior to this role, Ms. Young was chief school performance officer at the DC Public Charter School Board, where she managed the School Performance Department, which conducts the agency's school oversight functions including accountability, charter reviews, new school applications, site reviews, school support, and monitoring for special populations. Ms. Young began her career teaching high school in both traditional public schools and public charter schools in Virginia and the District of Columbia. She holds a B.A. in history and a master's degree in teaching from Hampton University.

Carey Wright

Maryland

Carey M. Wright, Ed.D., is a native Marylander and serves as the Maryland State Superintendent of Education. She previously served for nine years as State Superintendent of Education for Mississippi, where she is credited with its elevation as a national leader in literacy instruction and outcomes. As the longest-serving Mississippi state superintendent, Dr. Wright led the implementation of successful education reforms that resulted in significant annual gains in English Language Arts and Mathematics proficiency. A passionate advocate for early childhood education, Dr. Wright also implemented Mississippi’s first publicly funded Early Learning Collaborative program which earned national recognition from the National Institute for Early Education Research as one of only five states meeting all 10 quality standards for early childhood education. Prior to her leadership in Mississippi, Dr. Wright was chief academic officer for the District of Columbia Public Schools as well as deputy chief for the Office of Teaching and Learning. Dr. Wright also served as associate superintendent for the Office of Special Education and Student Services for Montgomery County Public Schools. She was a teacher, principal, and director of special education and student services in Howard County Public School System. Dr. Wright is a former member of the Chiefs for Change Board of Directors and the National Assessment Governing Board. Her honors include the 2022 Mississippi Top 50 Most Influential Leaders Award. She is a University of Maryland graduate, earning undergraduate, advanced, and doctoral degrees in education.