Empowering Women in School Leadership

Dr. Trudy T. Arriaga served the Ventura Unified School District for 14 years as the first female superintendent.  She began her career as a trilingual paraeducator and enjoyed 40 years of service in education as a teacher, assistant principal, principal, director, superintendent and university instructor at all levels.  
Trudy retired as superintendent in July 2015 and was honored by the naming of the VUSD District Office, The VUSD Trudy Tuttle Arriaga Education Service Center.  She recently retired from Cal Lutheran University as a faculty member in the Educational Leadership Department in the Graduate School of Education.  Trudy is the co-author, with her esteemed colleague Dr. Randall B. Lindsey of Opening Doors: An Implementation Template for Cultural Proficiency, which delivers a compelling account on how leaders can create and expand cultures of inclusion and equity by dismantling and crafting new organizational policies and practices on behalf of the students they serve.  Her second book, “Leading While Female:  A Culturally Proficient Response to Gender Equity” and co-authored with Dr. Delores Lindsey and Dr. Stacie Stanley offers a counter narrative and strategies to overcome the barriers of women in educational leadership, followed by the companion journal, “My Leading While Female Journal”.  It has been her privilege to assist educational districts, institutions and organizations throughout the United States through keynote speeches, workshops, leadership and equity institutes and online professional development to align the actions of the organization with their stated values and principles in their effort to build a culturally proficient and inclusive organization for each and every one.   Trudy and her husband, Raymundo, are enjoying this grand chapter of life as grandparents to Rayo Mana and Sofia Anuhea.  Trudy can be contacted at trudyarriaga73@gmail.com

Dr. Delores B. Lindsey served as assistant principal, principal, and county office administrator. She served as Executive Director of the regional school leadership center. Delores uses her skills as Cognitive Coach and Adaptive Schools trainer blended with her understanding and skills as a cultural proficiency trainer to design and implement the 10-Day Certification Program for Culturally Proficient Educational Practice. She served as assistant professor at California State University San Marcos for more than 10 years. She retired from the institution; however, she has not retired from the education profession. Her primary focus is developing culturally proficient leaders. She helps educational leaders examine their organizations’ policies and practices and their individual beliefs and values about cross-cultural communication. Her favorite reflective questions are, Who are we? and, Are we who we say we are? Delores and her husband, Randall (her favorite SAGE/Corwin author), continue to co-write about the application of the four tools of Cultural Proficiency. Her most recent publications which are on Corwin’s bestseller list are Leading While Female: A Culturally Proficient Response for Gender Equity, and My Leading While Female Journey: A Guided Reflective Journal with Trudy Arriaga and Stacie Stanley.

Peter DeWitt, Ed.D., is the founder and CEO of the Instructional Leadership Collective. A former K–5 teacher for 11 years and principal for eight years, Peter has spent more than 12 years supporting educators and leadership teams across the United States and internationally. He provides keynotes, workshops, and long-term hybrid professional learning that combines in-person facilitation, virtual coaching, and sustained collaborative inquiry. His work focuses on instructional leadership, collective leader efficacy, and helping leadership teams turn professional learning into meaningful action.

Peter’s work has been adopted by state and provincial agencies, universities, school districts, school boards, regional networks, and ministries of education across North America, Australia, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and the United Kingdom. He is the author, co-author, or contributor to numerous bestselling books, many of which have been translated into multiple languages. Peter co-authors Education Week’s Finding Common Ground column with Michael Nelson, co-hosts Corwin’s Leaders Coaching Leaders podcast, and co-created Education Week’s A Seat at the Table.

Michael Nelson has been an educator for nearly 40 years and continues to consider “teacher” his most important professional title. Throughout his career, he has served as a classroom teacher, principal, district instructional leader, superintendent, and assistant executive director responsible for developing professional learning across the state of Washington. He currently serves as Thought Partner for the Instructional Leadership Collective, where he supports educational leaders through keynotes, workshops, coaching, and long-term hybrid partnerships.

Michael has received numerous state and national honors for his leadership. As a principal, his school received the National Blue Ribbon Award from the United States Department of Education. As a superintendent, he was named Washington State’s 2019 Superintendent of the Year and was elected by his peers to serve as president of the Washington Association of School Administrators. Across every role, Michael’s work has remained grounded in listening, empathy, collaborative leadership, and an unwavering commitment to keeping students at the center of educational decision-making.