Leadership

Executive Leadership

Dean Nafziger, Ph.D.
Chief Executive Officer more

Dr. Dean Nafziger is a nationally recognized leader and experienced executive, educator and researcher. His breadth of experience gives him the insight and ability to work confidently with researchers, policy makers and business executives, as well as the capability to deliver expertise that result in effective strategies and superior solutions.

From his training and research experiences, Dr. Nafziger has a deep understanding and knowledge of the rationale of scientifically valid research and analytical skills required to conduct rigorous, high quality research studies, including randomized controlled trials, quasi-experimental studies, and analyses using large data sets.

Dr. Nafziger’s stellar career includes research positions at The Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Social Organization of Schools, Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory (NWREL) and San Diego Unified School District (SDUSD).

Dr. Nafziger served in executive leadership roles at Far West Laboratory (now WestEd), Educational Testing Service (ETS), Sylvan Learning and Harcourt Educational Measurement. In his role as President at Harcourt Educational Measurement, Dr. Nafziger guided the management of contracts with 30 state departments of education, catalog product sales, and 1000 full time and 1500 temporary staff in specialized functions including sales, marketing, customer support, psychometrics, sampling and statistics, test development, new product development, program management and operational logistics.

Dr. Nafziger has published extensively in professional journals such as the Journal of Vocational Behavior, Journal of Counseling Psychology and The Journal of Applied Psychology. In addition, Dr. Nafziger has served on numerous boards of professional organizations. He has held officer positions with several professional organizations and is frequently called upon as a guest speaker.

Dr. Nafziger received his Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics, Northwest Nazarene College, Ph.D., Educational Administration and Research, New Mexico State University and attended Harvard Business School, Strategic Perspectives for Nonprofit Management.

Donald Barfield, A.B.D.
President more

Donald Barfield has over 20 years of executive leadership in educational organizations (public, non-profit and for-profit), including Far West Laboratory (now WestEd), San Francisco Unified School District and Harcourt Assessment. His leadership has resulted in the successful delivery of major research and development initiatives.

Extensive experience in assessment and research has made Donald a trusted advisor as evidenced in his roles as a participant on the National Academy of Sciences: Scientific Principles in Educational Research Committee, California Department of Education: Academic Performance Index (API) Technical Design Group and the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS) Board of Directors.

Donald has 15 years of Regional Laboratory experience and has been repeatedly recognized as being an intellectual leader. He has received 27 research grants/contracts from foundations, federal, state and local education agencies, non-profit organizations and businesses. The complexity and feasibility of work in schools and the challenges of educators is well understood by Donald. He has managed the development of multiple assessment products and is currently and has extensive experience in web-based professional development programs.

Donald received his B.S in Sociology, University of California, Riverside, M.A. Sociology, Harvard University and A.B.D., Sociology and Urban Planning, Harvard University.

Kathleen Barfield, M.B.A.
Chief Administrative Officer/Chief Information Officer more

As CAO, Kathleen oversees the administrative functions at Edvance Research, such as Finance, Human Resources, Contracts, Legal and Information Technology. As CIO, she provides leadership for implementing innovative solutions to scale high-quality products and services for educators at all levels.

Kathleen became a leader in the pioneering efforts of the early '90s to develop standards for sharing student information between educational institutions using early Internet protocols, having chaired the National Center for Educational Statistics task force on electronic record transfer to establish standards, managed several large scale development efforts to build student record systems, and developed solutions for district and state reporting needs. She has provided technology leadership for organizations such as the California Department of Education, WestEd, Oracle Corporation, and Harcourt Assessment, as well as consulted with student information system vendors and education agencies on instructional and administrative technology solutions.

Kathleen was instrumental in developing the California School Information Services (CSIS) program in the early '90s to provide accountability reporting on student-level information. She worked with the NCES, IHEs and districts to develop and implement a student transcript program for all students, as well as a statewide system for migrant education reporting. Through her work with Oracle and local school districts, she helped districts implement data warehousing solutions to meet their needs for data-driven reporting solutions. As senior director for eTesting and Reporting at Harcourt, she spearheaded the delivery of online testing and reporting solutions for schools, states and districts.

Kathleen received a B.A., International Studies, University of Pacific, Stockton and M.B.A., California State University, Sacramento. Additional credentials include the Graduate Language Program (Japanese), Stanford University and California School Leadership Academy.

Gail Ribalta, M.I.M.
Executive Vice President, Marketing more

Gail is a seasoned senior marketing executive who has a successful track record in operating businesses and over ten years in the business of education, including leadership positions at Texas Instruments, Harcourt Assessment and Mattel Toys among others. With over 25 years of experience in all aspects of marketing and product development, Gail has been recognized as an innovative problem solver with proven solutions. She has spent half of her career in developing international markets and has a solid foundation in operations and finance. Gail specializes in market research and interpreting the data into actionable strategic plans.

Gail has spent a significant portion of her career working for the benefit of children and with children’s educational products. Her extensive knowledge in market research and analysis has been a major strength in communicating and incorporating research findings into strategic assessment and practical application.

A major proponent of community outreach, Gail has been instrumental in providing support for a number of community organizations including the Texas Diversity Council, the Children’s Shelter, National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) and Communities in Schools.

Gail received her Bachelor of Arts, Economics & Political Science at Rutgers University and a Master of International Management, International Marketing and International Finance at Thunderbird, American Graduate School of International Management. She serves as an Adjunct Instructor, MBA Program On-Line, Norwich University and serves on the Advisory Council for the University of Texas at San Antonio, College of Liberal and Fine Arts.

Kristin Nafziger, M.A.
Executive Vice President, Emerging Practices more

Kristin is a nationally recognized leader in the areas of process and quality improvement, strategic planning, and performance measurement.

Due to Kristin’s extensive experience with helping educators identify process and quality improvement practices, she is routinely approached by national organizations, for instance the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Innovation and Improvement and WestEd (formerly Far West Laboratory), to provide leadership and guidance for developing project frameworks and improvement tools.

Kristin was an instrumental leader in creating an innovation guide book series for the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Innovation and Improvement (OII). Guides where Kristin served as the technical lead include:

Creating Strong District School Choice Programs;
Creating Successful Magnet Schools Programs; and
Alternative Routes to Teacher Certification.

Building upon the work of the innovation guides on public school choice and magnet programs, Kristin was the designer for a school choice symposium funded by OII. The symposium brought district and state practitioners together with local sites that were featured in the guides. These meetings gave the group first-hand knowledge about implementing and expanding educational options for parents and students.

Building on the work of the Guides and the choice symposium, Kristin was a key developer for www.BuildingChoice.org, produced by OII. BuildingChoice.org is an interactive online toolkit that provides practical information to districts for implementing and expanding their public school choice offerings, all the aim of improving student achievement.

Kristin is currently leading the charge to create another series of innovation guides scheduled to be published by the U.S. Department of Education beginning in January 2007. This series will feature distance learning programs that are expanding opportunities for rigorous coursework and virtual schools.

Prior to joining Edvance Research, Inc. Kristin was an integral part of the Education Initiative with American Productivity and Quality Center (APQC). During this time, she served as a Program Manager for the Baldrige in Education Initiative (BiE IN), a national effort bringing excellence and equity to education through the implementation of Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award criteria and other quality tools. While at APQC, she also oversaw two significant collaborative benchmarking studies that examined best practices in teacher preparation programs and improving procurement processes for statewide assessments.

Kristin received a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration with a concentration in Management and later earned a Master's degree in Communication Studies, both from Texas Tech University.

In addition to these past and expanding accomplishments, Kristin is the Director of Technical Assistance for REL Southwest. The focus of REL Southwest’s technical assistance unit is to help states and education organizations in our five-state region build capacity for making evidence-based decisions. REL Southwest implements a systematic outreach, problem clarification, response and referral, and market research strategy to produce and continuously refine a set of indicators about regional needs. REL Southwest responds to needs of regional constituents by providing access to the most rigorous and relevant research in an area of concern.

Mark McNiel, M.B.A.
Executive Vice President, Program Operations more

Mark brings vast program management experience and leadership skills to Edvance Research. He has led successful initiatives in energy, technology and education industries, including positions at Fina Oil and Chemical, The Everest Group, Compaq Computer and Harcourt Assessment.

Mark has garnered accolades for his expertise in creating project monitoring systems, including relational database structures, query models and innovative report formats, all crucial to effective program management.

He has created numerous project management systems designed to plan, monitor and control the most fundamental and vital aspects of a project such as time (schedule), cost (budget) and performance (specifications).

High quality technical skills, a keen sense of political acuteness and a strong problem-solving orientation have brought Mark great credibility and an outstanding reputation among internal and external clients.

Mark received a Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing at Angelo State University and a Master of Business Administration in Management at the University of Houston.