Blackboard is committed to helping each client achieve continuous, measurable improvement. Learn more about the Blackboard team of consultants, advisors and product strategy experts who stand with you as you strive to better fulfill your distinctive mission and achieve your unique goals.
| Blackboard Global Services |
Advisory Team |
Product Strategy Team |
Karen Yoshino, Ph.D.
Director, Blackboard Global Services |
Mary J. Allen,. Ph.D.
Consultant/Author, Higher Education |
Neil Allison
Director, Product Marketing |
Kendall Rice, Ph.D.
Senior Manager, Blackboard Global Services |
Bob Mundhenk
Consultant, Higher Education |
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Meaghan Duff, Ph.D.
Senior Director, Blackboard Global Services |
Ephraim Schechter, Ph.D.
Consultant, Higher Education |
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Tim Aaron
Director, Blackboard Global Services |
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BLACKBOARD GLOBAL SERVICES
The Blackboard Global Services Team offers proven experience in institutional effectiveness planning, software application implementation, systems integration, and change management for higher education institutions. Blackboard’s strategic and functional consultants are subject matter experts in learning outcomes assessment, continuous improvement methodologies, online learning best practices, and all products in the Blackboard Academic Suite. Our consulting project managers and technical leads possess a depth of knowledge in IT project management and all applicable technologies. Let our professionals assist your team in expanding the culture of inquiry and achieving measurable improvement on your campus.
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KAREN YOSHINO, Ph.D.
DIRECTOR, BLACKBOARD GLOBAL SERVICES
Dr. Yoshino possesses a broad range of education administration experience including outcomes assessment, accreditation review, and diversity management for and colleges and universities. Currently, she provides consulting services to academic institutions at all stages of outcomes assessment projects beginning with initial assessment planning and design through results analysis for improving student learning and other organizational outcomes. With over twenty-two years experience as a college administrator, she has served on numerous accreditation teams in public and private institutions and contributed to educational policy at the national level. Dr. Yoshino’s prior professional roles include Executive Director for the SAT at The College Board, Director of Institutional Assessment at Occidental College, and over eighteen years as a college business officer at Harvey Mudd College including service as the Executive Assistant to the President. Dr. Yoshino holds a Doctorate of Philosophy in Education from the Claremont Graduate University where her dissertation focused on leadership in U.S. higher education. She was a visiting scholar at New York University in 2006 collaborating with colleagues on a 2007 paper entitled Asian/Pacific Americans and Higher Education: Facts, Not Fiction: Setting the Record Straight.
Presentation and Papers:
Design and Assessment: Theory and Practice. International Journal of Engineering Education, Vol. 17, Nos. 4 and 5, 0pp 472-475, 2001 |
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KENDELL RICE, Ph.D.
SENIOR MANAGER, BLACKBOARD GLOBAL SERVICES
With a background in institutional effectiveness assessment and higher education consulting, Dr. Rice joined Blackboard Inc. to support academic institutions in planning for and implement the Blackboard Outcomes System™. Formerly, he was an IT Consultant and Manager of the Center for Institutional Effectiveness at Datatel, Inc. As a senior level administrator in higher education for more than twenty years, Dr. Rice served both two-year and four-year institutions including Tulsa Community College, University of North Carolina at Asheville and the University of Kentucky. He holds a Master of Theology degree from Southern Methodist University and Doctorate of Philosophy in Higher Education Administration from The University of Oklahoma. Recently, Dr. Rice served on the Board of Directors for the U.S. Senate Productivity and Quality Award for the State of Virginia and the Board of Examiners for the Baldrige National Quality Award for Performance Excellence sponsored by the United States Department of Commerce. |
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MEAGHAN DUFF, Ph.D.
SENIOR DIRECTOR, BLACKBOARD GLOBAL SERVICES
Dr. Duff possesses five years of consulting management experience and over ten years of higher education teaching experience. She specializes in the areas of online learning and teaching with Web-enabled instructional software. An experienced strategic consultant, she leads cross-functional teams in the implementation of learning- and assessment-related technologies including all applications in the Blackboard Academic Suite™. Prior to joining Blackboard, she worked as a product specialist for The George Washington University and an assistant professor of history for Vanderbilt and Western Kentucky universities. Dr. Duff holds a Doctorate of Philosophy in American History from The College of William and Mary in Virginia. She currently teaches as an adjunct instructor at the University of Massachusetts-Boston with the Blackboard Learning System – Vista Enterprise Edition™. |
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TIM AARON
DIRECTOR, BLACKBOARD GLOBAL SERVICES
Tim Aaron has been serving the information and enterprise application needs of the college and university market for over twenty years including as an administrator at Duke University and over ten years with Blackboard. As Services Business Director for Blackboard Global Services, he oversees the development of new strategic, operational and technical services for a diverse set of clients. He is a nationally recognized expert in the Transaction Systems business and has provided extensive strategic consulting and project management services to dozens of clients. With the release of the Blackboard Outcomes System, he has joined the Academic Suite services group to apply his services development and management skills to this exciting new product offering. Mr. Aaron holds Masters of Business Administration and Masters of Planning degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. |
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ADVISORY TEAM
Comprised of leading scholars and practitioners in institutional assessment, general ducation and program assessment, Blackboard’s Advisory Team informs Blackboard’s ongoing product strategy with decades of experience advising hundreds of institutions. These national experts also help to share best assessment practices among Blackboard clients and will help to build strong communities of practice in our growing client base. |
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MARY J. ALLEN, Ph.D.
CONSULTANT/AUTHOR, HIGHER EDUCATION
Mary J. Allen is a consultant in higher education specializing in assessment and accreditation. In the last decade she has offered workshops to thousands of faculty and administrators, including invited workshops for the American Association of Higher Education (AAHE), Association of American Colleges and Universities, American Psychological Society, Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges, AAHE/WASC co-sponsored assessment conferences, and over 80 colleges, universities, and college districts. She has published two books on assessment: Assessing Academic Programs in Higher Education (Anker, 2004) and Assessing General Education Programs (Anker, 2006). She is the former Director of the system-wide California State University Institute for Teaching and Learning and a Professor Emeritus of Psychology from California State University, Bakersfield, where she served as professor, department chair, and founding director of the faculty development center and the assessment center. She holds a Ph.D. in Psychology and a M.A. in Statistics from U.C., Berkeley.
Presentations and Papers:
AAC&U General Education and Assessment Conference, Role of Technology to Support Campus Assessment Efforts, March 2007 |
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BOB MUNDHENK
CONSULTANT, HIGHER EDUCATION,
Robert Mundhenk, after completing his Ph.D. in English drama and UCLA, began teaching English at Fordham University but after six years moved to Northampton Community College in Pennsylvania, where he was and English Professor, Dean of Humanities and Social Sciences, Vice President for Academic Affairs, and Director of Assessment. After twenty-seven years at Northampton, he became Director of Assessment and Senior Scholar at the American Association for Higher Education. During his career, he has published many articles and monographs, most on technical education and assessment; has served in many capacities, including President, for the National Council on Occupational Education; has written for and consulted with the American Association of Community Colleges, particularly on federal legislation; and has been a consultant for both the Pennsylvania and United States Departments of Education. A founding board member of ACBSP, he has been very active in accreditation issues and has worked closely with Middle States, the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association, and the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. Since AAHE’s closing, he has served as a consultant to the Higher Learning Commission, the American Council on Education, the American Association of Community Colleges, and NASPA, for which designed annual assessment conferences and a new center, the International Center for Student Success and Institutional Accountability (ICSSIA). He is currently the Interim Director of ICSSIA.
Presentations and Papers:
George Washington University Executive Seminar on Outcomes Assessment, Regional Accreditation Requirements and Outcomes Assessment, December 2006
Seton Hall University Executive Seminar on Outcomes Assessment, Regional Accreditation Requirements and Outcomes Assessment, April 2007 (PDF) |
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EPHRAIM SCHECHTER, Ph.D.
CONSULTANT, HIGHER EDUCATION
Dr. Schechter has been a faculty member in experimental psychology, directed an academic program, and served as an institutional researcher and assessment director. He has been involved in college and university outcomes assessment for over twenty years, has coordinated campus-wide and focused assessment projects and helped academic and administrative units develop and implement outcomes assessment programs, and has presented numerous workshops at national and regional assessment conferences. He developed and maintains the well-known meta-list Internet Resources for Higher Education Outcomes Assessment at http://www2.acs.ncsu.edu/UPA/assmt/resource.htm, and directed the assessment components of North Carolina State University's recent SACS reaffirmation. Since retiring from NC State at the end of 2004, Dr. Schechter has consulted on assessment, institutional effectiveness, and accreditation for campuses ranging from small local colleges to doctoral/research-extensive universities. He has also presented and consulted on assessment for administrative units.
Presentations and Papers:
Ball State University Executive Seminar on Outcomes Assessment, Addressing Regional Accreditation Requirements for Outcomes Assessment, November 2006 |
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PRODUCT STRATEGY TEAM
With experience creating industry-leading software solutions for education institutions, the Product Strategy Team partners closely with Blackboard clients worldwide to develop powerful, easy-to-use solutions that address fundamental assessment challenges and help every faculty member and administrator to realize new opportunities for improvement. |
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NEIL ALLISON
DIRECTOR, BLACKBOARD PRODUCT MARKETING
Focused on the Blackboard Outcomes System, Neil brings extensive product marketing experience in higher education and K-12, as well as education policy expertise. Neil has advised politicians and governments on economic, tax and education policy, and publishers as well as companies developing new markets. Most recently, he helped the American Association of Publishers define strategies to help colleges meet increasing demands for accountability, Ingram Books on the business and marketing plan for a new digital publishing venture, and Prentice Hall on higher education marketing. Neil was a founding executive team member of SMARTHINKING, the live online tutoring company serving higher education and K-12 markets, and developed and signed the first assessment-driven online tutoring services under the federal supplemental education services (SES) program for the Massachusetts Department of Education. Neil studied education and training policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School.
Presentations and Papers:
Learning Impact, Measuring for Insight: Some Kick-off Thoughts, April 2007 |