"Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn."
- Benjamin Franklin
Virginia “Ginger” Herrman is steeped in DI experience. She has spent more than 10 years as a DI Coordinator at Park Elementary School. She was involved with the initial implementation of DI at Park Elementary and became a coach in the first year. Two years later, she became the building-wide coordinator. She has been a teacher in Great Bend, Kansas for over 20 years, including over 12 years as an ESL Teacher. Ginger has a B.S. in Elementary Education K-9 from Newman University and an M.S. in Science from Kansas State University. She also has an ESL Endorsement from Fort Hays University. Ginger has served as a mentor teacher for new teachers through a District Mentoring program. She has also presented In-Service to Elementary and District teachers on curriculum day.
Ginger has been a DI trainer for more than a decade with NIFDI. She has trained in Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Nebraska, Kansas, New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Texas, and Guam. She has also presented a training session at the Annual National Direct Instruction conference. She has been an Implementation Manager in Nebraska, San Antonio, and the Rio Grande Valley. She is currently an Implementation Manager for 10 IDEA schools in El Paso, Texas.
"You can fool all the people some of the time. You can fool some of the people all of the time. But you can't fool all the people all of the time."
- Abe
Mr. Davis has a long and extensive association with Direct Instruction (DI). He was a member of the original team trained in Illinois and implemented the DI Follow Through model. He was the on-site consultant for the Direct Instruction Follow Through Model in Providence, Rhode Island, for five years. Later, he served as the National Coordinator of the Director Instruction Follow Through Model, with responsibilities for the administration and implementation of Follow Through sites in school districts across the country.
During the 1980s, he worked as a student-teacher trainer at the University of Oregon and then as the Director of the Early Education Program at the U of O. Since joining NIFDI in 1997, he has been the Project Director for Baltimore, Guam, and other sites. Having taught for several years in Oregon public schools, he served as NIFDI’s National Implementation Coordinator, coordinating the allocation of resources and providing support and oversight to all NIFDI schools until 2014.
Mr. Davis holds an Oregon Handicapped Learner Endorsement, as well as Elementary and Secondary Teaching Certificates and Principal Certification.
"Some of the best things in life are on the other side of difficult conversations."
- Kwame Christian
Dianna Carrizales-Engelmann, Ph.D., has centered much of her professional career on the development and implementation of large-scale assessments, as well as on supporting equitable and inclusive practices in educational administration. Between 2008 and 2012, Dr. Carrizales-Engelmann served in the capacity of Director for Monitoring, Systems, and Outcomes in the then Office of Student Learning and Partnerships at the Oregon Department of Education (ODE). From 2012 to 2014, Dr. Carrizales-Engelmann supported the initial development of the SMARTER Balanced national assessments as a contracted project manager across multiple aspects of the assessment's development. Over the course of her career, Dr. Carrizales-Engelmann has also served local schools as a licensed school psychologist. In her current position as Assistant Dean for Administration, Equity and Inclusion in the College of Education at the University of Oregon, she helps implement the college's governance policies with a specific focus on supporting and facilitating the college's shared work in equity and inclusion. Dr. Carrizales-Engelmann works closely with the college's various operational teams on matters requiring administrative action and represents the college to local, regional, and national partners. Dr. Carrizales-Engelmann is a co-author of Merrell's Strong Kids and Merrell's Strong Teens, social and emotional learning curricula for grades 3-12 that are based on the work of late University of Oregon Professor Ken Merrell.
"An education is something that can never be taken away or lost."
Debbie Egan spent 43 years in the field of education. Her graduate work included Special Education and Educational Leadership. She has been an elementary and middle school teacher of special education, an elementary and middle school principal, a special education director, a superintendent at the district level, and the superintendent of the Lane County Education Service District. Debbie also taught for 17 years at the University of Oregon and supervised many Education Administrative practicum students. Debbie served as a lead evaluator for AdvancED in the state of Oregon for three years. She also worked in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, helping those countries establish special education policies. Her heart has always belonged to the premise of Direct Instruction. She has advocated and implemented various projects throughout her career, including Direct Instruction.
