About Us - [ Staff - Cynthia A. Ward, Ed. D. ]
Dr. Cindy Ward, Associate Director, has over 25 years of experience in the field of education. She has taught in the public schools, held high-level administrative posts, and served in Mississippi's Governor's office and its Department of Education. In 1990, she began applying her wide-ranging expertise to improving the quality of educational assessment-a move that ultimately led her to her previous position as Vice President, Proposals and Contract Management, for ETS K-12 Works, Inc., a subsidiary of Educational Testing Service (ETS), in San Antonio, Texas.
During her tenure at ETS K-12 Works, Dr. Ward played a pivotal role in establishing the infrastructure for a new K-12 subsidiary from the ground up, building revenues from zero to over $14 million, and exceeding company revenue goals for first 18 months of the ETS K-12 initiative. During that period, Dr. Ward coordinated the development of over 20 competitive proposals, which included close work with the corporate leadership team and staff in the development of the proposal that secured ETS K-12 Works the largest testing contract in K-12 assessment (California's $150 million STAR contract). In addition, Dr. Ward served as the company's representative for the Association of Test Publishers, and represented ETS K-12 Works at both state and national conferences.
Among her other professional highlights, Dr Ward counts her invitation to author a piece focusing on the legal issues related to high-stakes testing for a special issue of The Journal of Applied Measurement in Education in 2000, her selection as the Outstanding Young Alumnae of the Year by the Mississippi University for Women in 1990, and her internship to the Executive Director of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE), in Washington, D.C., in 1981 as some of the more memorable.