Margo Gottlieb

Margo Gottlieb is Director of Assessment and Evaluation for the Illinois Resource Center, Arlington Heights, and Lead Developer for the World-Class Instructional Design and Assessment (WIDA) Consortium at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research, University of Wisconsin, Madison. In working with WIDA, Margo has spearheaded the design and development of the PreK–12 English language proficiency standards. She is a national expert in the design of assessments for English language learners, the evaluation of language education programs, and the development of English language proficiency standards in PreK–12 settings. She began her career as an English as a Second Language and bilingual education teacher. Margo has consulted and provided technical assistance to governments, states, school districts, publishers, universities, and professional organizations. Active in the global association Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), Margo has chaired the committee on the national PreK–12 English Language Proficiency Standards, published in 2006, which is built on the WIDA template. She was appointed to the Steering Committee for the 2009 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Framework for Reading as the representative from TESOL. Throughout her career, Margo has remained steadfast in trying to improve assessment practices for English language learners.

Dr. Gottlieb is co-author of On Our Way to English, a comprehensive K–5 EL program, and author of the Rigby ELL Assessment Kit, an English language proficiency benchmarking tool.

Dr. Gottlieb received her B.A. in the teaching of Spanish, an M.A. in Applied Linguistics, and a Ph.D. in Public Policy Analysis, Evaluation Research and Program Design.