Resnick to Step Down as LRDC Director in 2008

Will continue here as researcher and director of Pitt’s Institute for Learning

Lauren Resnick, director of the University’s Learning Research and Development Center (LRDC) since 1977, will resign that post next summer.

University Professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science, Resnick will then focus on her internationally renowned research and will continue as director of Pitt’s Institute for Learning.

“Few people have contributed as much to our understandings of how children learn than University Professor Lauren Resnick,” said Pitt Chancellor Mark A. Nordenberg. “She is an internationally known scholar in the cognitive science of learning and instruction and has applied her knowledge to improve teacher and student performance in school systems across the country. Under her leadership, our University’s Learning Research and Development Center has gained national recognition, and we always will be grateful for her commitment, both to leading-edge educational research and to Pitt.”

Pitt Provost and Senior Vice Chancellor James V. Maher said Resnick’s decision to resign as LRDC director “concludes 30 years of notably successful administrative leadership and service in that position to the center and to the University. It has been an honor to work with Dr. Resnick, both in her role as director and in her participation in the activities of our Council of Deans.”

Promoted to the rank of University Professor in January 2006, Resnick is the founder and director of the Institute for Learning, providing organizational design, professional training services, and research on learning and teaching advances to urban school districts across the nation. She also was the cofounder and codirector of the New Standards Project, which developed educational standards and assessments for school districts and governments.

Among Resnick’s many awards and honors are the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction Oeuvre Award for outstanding contributions to the science of learning and instruction, the American Psychological Association’s (APA) Edward L. Thorndike Award for distinguished contributions to psychology of education, and APA’s 2007 Distinguished Contribution of Applications of Psychology to Education and Training Award. She is a lifetime national associate of the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine; a member since 1981 of the National Academy of Education; a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science; and a fellow of the American Psychological Association.

Resnick was founding editor of Cognition and Instruction and, more recently, of Research Points. She is past president of the American Educational Research Association. Resnick has been awarded honorary doctorates by two European universities.

She earned an AD in history at Radcliffe College in 1957, graduating magna cum laude with the Radcliffe History Prize; an AM in teaching at Harvard University Graduate School of Education in 1958; and an EdD in research in instruction at Harvard University Graduate School of Education in 1958.

A search committee, chaired by Vice Provost George E. Klinzing, will be formed in the coming months to identify a new director of LRDC.