Susan Millar serves as a senior scientist at UW-Madison, where she directs the Learning through Evaluation, Assessment and Dissemination (LEAD) Center. The LEAD Center, an organization of some 12 professionals, supports faculty (primarily in the science and engineering fields) engaged in educational reform activities by providing evaluation research. Most of her LEAD Center projects take a systemic approach, entailing diverse factors that affect student learning processes and outcomes, the organizational and cultural factors that influence faculty reform efforts. Her work at the LEAD Center led her to consider how the emerging information technologies can best be used to help SMET faculty education reformers achieve their goals for student learning. This, in turn, led her to accept the role of "Lead Fellow" for the 1999-2000 Institute on Learning Technology, a project of the NISE's College Level One team. Susan currently serves on several national boards, including the Advisory Committee of the Education and Human Resources Directorate of the NSF.
Susan was trained as a cultural anthropologist at Cornell University. In previous positions, she taught with the UW-Madison Women's Studies Program, managed large-scale databases and conducted analysis for the University of Wisconsin System Administration, co-directed the Pew-funded National Study of Master's Degrees, and conducted research as a member of the Center for the Study of Higher Education at Pennsylvania State University.
email: smillar@engr.wisc.edu
Susan Millar, Lead Fellow, Institute on Learning Technology