Biography
Biography
Dr. Barbara S. S. Hong is an educator, scholar, author, academic leader, and principal consultant whose career has been devoted to expanding educational opportunity and helping students succeed from K–12 through college and into the workforce. For more than 25 years, she has worked across classrooms, universities, school systems, government agencies, and international organizations to improve teaching and learning, strengthen student persistence, and build educational systems that turn access into meaningful opportunity.
Dr. Hong earned her Ph.D. in Special Education from Columbia University and holds three master’s degrees in instructional practices for diverse learners, educational leadership and policy, and learning specialist studies. She is a licensed K–12 special education teacher, school principal, and district-level administrator, bringing to her work the perspective of someone who understands education from the classroom to executive leadership.
A three-time tenured professor, Dr. Hong has taught and worked with educators throughout the United States and internationally. Her global work has taken her to countries including Qatar, Turkey, Taiwan, Malaysia, Guatemala, and Singapore. She is a three-time Fulbright recipient, having been selected as a Senior Fulbright Scholar, Senior Fulbright Specialist, and Fulbright-Hays Fellow. In 2014, she was appointed by the U.S. Department of State as a Speaker Specialist and expert in disability and inclusion, working internationally with educators and educational organizations. She was also recognized as the first Honorable Visiting Scholar at Taiwan Municipal University of Education.
Dr. Hong’s scholarship examines a question that has shaped much of her career: Why do capable students struggle, and what can educators and institutions do differently to help them succeed? Her research has explored barriers to college persistence and completion, particularly among students with disabilities and students who encounter academic, economic, institutional, or navigational barriers. Her work also examines self-determination, faculty attitudes, teaching and learning, cognitive science, college readiness, and the transition from secondary to postsecondary education.
Her leadership has extended this research from scholarship into institutional practice. Dr. Hong has served as a faculty member, program coordinator, dean, special advisor to senior executives, Vice President for Student Success, and Dean of Postsecondary Transition Programs. Across these roles, she has led work in undergraduate education, enrollment and student success, academic advising, faculty development, institutional effectiveness, disability and accessibility, developmental education, Early College, dual enrollment, workforce and postsecondary pathways, and organizational change.
Today, Dr. Hong also serves as a Principal Consultant for schools and educational organizations seeking to build stronger connections between K–12 education, college, and career. Her consulting work focuses on the strategic design and scaling of Early College and postsecondary pathways, K–12/higher education partnerships, college and career readiness, curriculum and transfer alignment, educator capacity building, and data-informed systems for student success. Rather than creating programs that depend indefinitely on outside expertise, she works with institutions to build the knowledge, structures, partnerships, and internal capacity needed to sustain the work themselves.
As a speaker and professional learning facilitator, Dr. Hong works with educators, faculty, administrators, students, and families on high-impact teaching, the cognitive science of learning, disability and accessibility, self-determination, college readiness, student persistence, and educational leadership. Her approach reflects a principle that has guided her throughout her career: high expectations and genuine care are not competing ideas. Students are most likely to discover what they are capable of when the adults and institutions around them provide both.
Dr. Hong has served on the Oxford Education Research Symposium Advisory Board and on the Executive Board of the Council for Exceptional Children, an international professional organization dedicated to improving educational outcomes for individuals with disabilities. She is also the founding executive director of P.A.C.E.™ (Parents as Advocates for Change in Education).
Her work has been recognized with honors including the International Teacher of Honor Award and University Exemplary Faculty Award. She is the author of Failing Up: A Professor’s Odyssey of Flunking, Determination, and Hope, which received a Kirkus Star and was selected among Kirkus Reviews’ 100 Best Indie Books of 2018, as well as M.A.P. My Aspiration Plan, a college-success resource designed to help students develop the self-awareness, self-advocacy, and self-determination needed to take greater ownership of their education.