Linda Darling-Hammond, who was widely believed to be a candidate for a top job in the U.S. Department of Education, said last week she is going to stay in California and support President Barack Obama’s agenda in her role as an education professor and researcher at Stanford University.
Ms. Darling-Hammond, who has done extensive research on teacher quality and international benchmarking, said she will be working to establish a new policy center at Stanford. She has also been asked to play a key role in an international performance-assessment project. Family concerns were also a major factor in her decision, she said.
Ms. Darling-Hammond was one of the first education advisers to then-Sen. Obama’s campaign, and helped devise his teacher-residency proposal. She also led his education policy transition team.