Amanda Kruger Hill

I spent years teaching high school and leading a principal's office before I taught at a university. I helped design and launch several innovative schools, then moved into system-level educational leadership. That path now shapes how I lead the Cowen Institute at Tulane University.

I lead the Cowen Institute where we equip, education leaders and practitioners with the skills and resources to increase educational and postsecondary success among New Orleans students, and I teach undergraduate and graduate courses in leadership and education. I partner with educators, principals, and college access practitioners closing persistent gaps in college readiness across the city.

As the Jill H. and Avram A. Glazer Professor of Social Entrepreneurship at the Taylor Center for Social Innovation and Design Thinking, I bring design thinking and entrepreneurial methods into my courses and the Cowen Institute's community programs. I draw on my experience launching schools from scratch to teach leaders to prototype solutions instead of just diagnosing problems. I also coach principals through Columbia University's Principals' Academy and Relay Graduate School of Education's National Principal Academy Fellowship.

Running a school, and later a school system, taught me that the biggest obstacle to change is rarely a lack of good ideas. It is the absence of a structure for testing them before the stakes get too high. I built my coaching practice on that conviction.

I earned my Doctorate in Educational Leadership, specializing in entrepreneurship, from Johns Hopkins University, and a Master's in Educational Leadership, Principal Licensure, and a B.A. from UC Berkeley. I am certified in executive coaching through the Tulane Leadership Institute and the Center for Executive Coaching. My recognition includes the Tulane Research, Scholarship, and Artistic Achievement Award, a community impact commendation from Alameda County, Gambit's 40 Under 40, and Tulane Woman of the Year.

I am a Bay Area native who has made New Orleans home, and building schools in both communities taught me that the strongest educational innovation is rooted in the place it serves.