For more than 35 years, Gary Hess has been working in PreK-12 public and charter schools. This experience includes serving as a classroom teacher, district instructional coach, and 14 years as a building administrator in an urban school district. As a school principal and instructional leader, he led his team in continuous improvement, and has experience utilizing the “Marzano Teacher Evaluation Model” and “Essentials for Achieving Rigor”, and now supports schools with Instructional Empowerment training and coaching for teachers and administrators.
Gary has also worked as a School Improvement Facilitator with the Pennsylvania Department of Education as a member of Pennsylvania’s Comprehensive Support and Improvement (CSI) School Improvement Initiative “to engage school leaders and school-based teams in a continuous improvement process.” Now through his facilitation of IE’s “Instructional Leadership Institute” and implementation coaching, Gary also supports school and district-based teams to develop, implement, and monitor improvement plans that are based on evidence-based practices.
He is committed to the success of at-risk students and has served in schools with high populations of students of poverty and English language learners. Working now as an IE School Leadership Coach and Consultant, Gary delivers professional development in IE’s Model of Instruction, which has the power to improve academic achievement and social-emotional learning simultaneously, while also closing gaps between students of differing abilities, preparing students for college and the workplace, and promoting equity and access.
Gary has a robust background in leading standards-based instruction, evidence-based pedagogy, decision-driven data collection, formative assessment, school systems improvement, and PLC facilitation. His diverse experiences give him a broad perspective as he supports systems in refinement and change for successful student achievement.
