Dana Chambers
Dana Chambers is a principal technical assistance consultant, bringing with her a decade of experience as a teacher, researcher, and project manager, with specific expertise in instructional leadership and educator effectiveness. She provides technical assistance to states and districts on educator effectiveness initiatives.
Prior to joining AIR, Chambers served as interim director of curriculum design for Grant Wiggins’ Authentic Education. In this role, she managed a design team as they developed Common Core-aligned, understanding-focused curriculum materials for a network of turnaround middle schools in a mid-Atlantic school district. She also spent several years as a senior associate with edCount, LLC, a DC-based education consultancy firm where she provided technical assistance to school districts focused on Common Core implementation, curriculum design, school culture, formative assessment, and professional development. In addition to her project responsibilities, Chambers contributed to business development through leading responses to request for proposals, and served as senior editor for edCount reports and other publications.
Chambers began her career as a New York City Teaching Fellow, spending three years as an elementary and middle school teacher in high needs classrooms, and went on to be the dean of students in a top performing urban charter middle school in Brooklyn, playing a central role in school operations and managing school culture and the student discipline system. In addition to this work, she was a legislative aide in a congressional office, managing a broad domestic policy portfolio of education, housing, grant development, women and children, and other social issues. During her graduate work at New York University's Steinhardt School of Education, Chambers was selected for a Founders Fellowship, where she assisted several professors in conducting education research, writing and editing articles, and co-authoring referee reports for submissions to scholarly education journals. She has permanent teaching certification from New York State.