EDUCATION FIRST CONSULTING, LLC
SEATTLE, WA

Since 2006, conducted numerous research, due diligence, grantmaking effectiveness and convening projects for the College Ready, Postsecondary and Pacific Northwest teams. With the College Ready team, conducted due diligence and investment analysis on 20 states and the southern states, facilitated forums of state policymakers to explore resource reallocation, conducted a comprehensive landscape scan of the local, state and national landscape of assessment for learning and developed a series of policy briefs about effective implementation of evaluation, feedback and support systems for teachers. With the Postsecondary team, facilitated dialogue among key postsecondary grantees to identify areas for collaboration and strategic planning and facilitated the development of a joint statement by the foundation’s national grantees about transforming remediation and scalable practices to help all students succeed in their first academic year of college. Planned a major convening of 20+ district and state teams called Teaching is Learning. Also planned and facilitated the advocacy consultants network for multiple years, a convening of early learning and K12 Washington grantees, multiple teacher voice grantee convenings and Elevating and Celebrating Effective Teaching 2. We are practitioners, first and foremost. Our clients look to us because of our deep, practical expertise earned through our on-the-ground experiences as former teachers, district and state education leaders, policy advisors, and grantmakers. Because of our experience, we are humble about the challenges our clients face and realistic about the work needed to make a difference. Our team is plugged in across the country; we reside in more than 15 states and support education leaders in 41 states and counting. Every individual at Education First is committed to delivering the highest standard of quality as we partner with our clients to serve their students and communities. Sustainable investments and sound decisionmaking improves learning. In today’s world, success means not just earning a high school diploma, but also graduating with the knowledge and skills needed to compete for family-wage jobs and successfully pursue higher education or specialized career training. We partner with leaders and organizations that share this goal. We collaborate to pursue high expectations and timely supports that engage students; prepare, hire, develop and engage outstanding educators; identify the smart policies, practices and funding streams that help schools, school systems and state agencies excel; and build capacity for effective organizations and investments. A conviction that high standards—when reinforced by regular measurement, effective teaching, high support and shared accountability—can help all students excel A willingness to embrace innovative ideas that help educators be successful and all students achieve at higher levels Education First supports organizations that share these beliefs by helping them tackle the barriers that too often get in the way: low expectations and too little accountability; poor planning and weak or limited capacity; funding that is trumped by competing priorities; system inflexibility and a general aversion to innovative ideas; a focus on what feels right rather than what actually works; and policy decisions based on what makes adults most comfortable, not what is best for children. Helpful Resources Over three years, Education First has supported grantmaking and technical assistance to a network of grantee local and state advocacy organizations as they engaged in the critical tasks of educating state boards, legislators governors and the media; identifying and supporting teacher advocates; and engaging parents as new tests are adopted and administered and as score reports are released. Education First helped design and launch EdReports.org, a new national nonprofit organization that is the “Consumer Reports” for K-12 education, starting with instructional materials. Making a Difference Achieving our mission is our bottom line. We select projects around the nation with which we can have the greatest impact on students, educators and education systems. We work at the neighborhood, city, state and national levels. We are not beholden to a partisan agenda other than doing what’s right for kids and the adults who serve them. We aim to support each organization with which we work over time, through multiple engagements, because tackling tough problems requires more than a single shot. We invest in thought leadership so our impact extends beyond individual engagements. We measure impact and we hold ourselves accountable for delivering excellent support and results in every engagement. Our first clients included Achieve, Advance Illinois, American Federation of Teachers, the Cleveland Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Thomas B. Fordham Institute and the PIE Network, Washington State Board of Education and Washington STEM. In 2009, the Gates Foundation hired Education First to lead a large-scale, multi-state due diligence process to inform its investments in teacher effectiveness, data, college-ready policies and advocacy. From 2009-2010, Education First supported strategy, applications and/or interview prep for Race to the Top winners Colorado, Delaware, Hawai’i, Maryland, Ohio and Tennessee. In 2011, the firm was selected to support the US Department of Education and ICF International as part of the multi-year, technical assistance grant supporting all 19 Race winning states. We began supporting Race to the Top Districts in 2011. Because our mission extends to supporting deeper capacity in public education, we have published noteworthy reports, rubrics and toolkits on the Common Core State Standards, professional development, high-quality assessments, alignment of K-12 and higher education, deregulation and flexibility, and educator evaluation and development systems that improve teaching. Helpful Resources