Terry Peterson is a longtime associate of Secretary Riley, working with him on education issues first in South Carolina and now across America. He has a combination of considerable education policy work with community mobilization and teaching experience at the elementary, high school, and university levels. He has worked on important education issues at the local, regional and national levels, with a specialty of building parent-educator-business partnerships. As Riley's primary education advisor when he was governor of South Carolina, Peterson helped develop the reforms that won the state national acclaim, and continues in this role at the U.S. Department of Education.
In his current position, Peterson assists Secretary Riley and the U.S. Department of Education with strategic advice and action plans and supports activities to carry out the education agenda of the Clinton Administration.
Peterson works on many of the same priority issues that the Secretary is addressing; challenging education standards, improvement in reading, recruiting and training quality teachers, student financial aid for college, school improvement, linking elementary-secondary schools with college, accountability and strategies to fix failing schools, and using arts and science resources in the community to improve education.
He also co-chairs several cross-cutting education teams working on vital issues. Those include the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education, an informal partnership of 3,000 schools, religious, community, business and youth groups, and the Department-wide working group on outreach and community mobilization that includes the summer reading campaign Read*Write*Now! and the America Goes Back To School initiative.
Peterson is a nationally recognized leader in education reform. Prior to coming to the Department, he served on many national task forces that include At Risk Children and Youth of the Chief State School Officers Association. Under the prior Administration, Peterson chaired the U.S. Department of Education's task force on Accountability and School Improvement. He has also worked as a consultant to the Educational Testing Service and Committee for Economic Development.
Peterson earned a B.S. from the University of Wisconsin at Madison ( 67) and has an M.Ed and a Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina ( 74 & 78 respectively).
He has three grown children - Terek, Carly and Angie.
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