Heather Kirkpatrick

Heather Kirkpatrick is the President and Chief Executive Officer at Alder Graduate School of Education. Heather earned her PhD in Education Administration and Policy Analysis at the Stanford University School of Education, her Master’s in Education Administration and Policy Analysis from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and her BA from Barnard College. After her undergraduate years, she worked in a nonprofit for indigent adults with mental illness in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and then taught high school at Erasmus Hall in Brooklyn, New York.

Today, Heather is honored to have the opportunity to continue leading what began in 2009 as a pilot to develop teachers and principals through a residency model at Aspire Public Schools. Previously, as Chief People Officer at Aspire Public Schools, she helped grow the organization from two schools in 2000 to 40 schools in California and Tennessee by the time she transitioned to Alder GSE sixteen years later.