Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning

Elizabeth Ross serves as the Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning (TAL) at the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE). Directly prior, Elizabeth served as the Deputy Assistant Superintendent in TAL. In her role, Elizabeth is incredibly proud to lead OSSE’s Advancing Excellence work, which is designed to ensure that all DC students have the opportunity to excel by setting high standards, providing robust supports for educators and holding schools and school systems accountable. In recent years, this work has included drafting and implementing DC’s first Educator Preparation Approval regulations; publishing DC’s first comprehensive Educator Workforce Report; developing a new, one-year provisional teacher credential; supporting the launch of a state-of-the-art Educator Credentialing Information System (ECIS); leading a comprehensive re-write of Washington DC’s K-12 Social Studies standards and developing DC’s first citywide Financial Literacy standards and Social and Emotional Learning standards; and supporting DC’s Early Literacy Education Task Force to a consensus set of recommendations, which are currently being implemented by DC local education agencies (LEAs). 

Prior to joining the OSSE team, Elizabeth served as the Vice President and Managing Director of Teacher Policy at the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), where she oversaw state research and policy and led technical assistance to support states’ efforts to ensure that every student has effective teachers and every teacher has the opportunity to become effective. Before her time at NCTQ, Elizabeth worked at the US Department of Education on myriad equity-focused teacher quality initiatives and policies, including: Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Flexibility, Excellent Educators for All, and regulations and guidance to support the School Improvement Grants (SIG) program, and Titles I and II of the ESEA, as amended.  

Elizabeth began her career as a third-grade teacher at Simon Elementary School in Washington, DC. She holds a B.A. from Georgetown University, where she studied English Literature and Government; an M.A.T. from American University in Elementary Education; a J.D. from Villanova University School of Law, where she was a public interest scholar; and an Ed.M. from Harvard University Graduate School of Education, where she was a Zuckerman Fellow. Elizabeth also teaches US Legal Research, Analysis, and Writing at Georgetown University Law Center and Education Law and Policy at American University.