Eugene W. Hickok is the United States Under Secretary of Education. President Bush formally nominated Dr. Hickok on March 30, 2001, and he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on July 10, 2001. In his role as Under Secretary, Dr. Hickok will serve as one of the Education Department’s top three ranking officials and as a principal adviser to U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige.
Prior to his appointment, Dr. Hickok was Pennsylvania’s Secretary of Education, responsible for overseeing the state’s education system—kindergarten through college. A powerful advocate for parental choice and accountability in education, Dr. Hickok helped implement a sweeping education-reform agenda. Pennsylvania now has higher standards for students and teachers; a strong accountability system; locally designed charter public schools; stronger reading, literacy and library programs; and a model education technology initiative. He also served on the boards of trustees of Pennsylvania’s four state-related universities, and on the State System of Higher Education’s Board of Governors. During his six years as Secretary of Education, Dr. Hickok also testified before the Pennsylvania General Assembly and the U.S. Congress about Pennsylvania’s education policies and initiatives.
Dr. Hickok also was a founding member and chairman of the Education Leaders Council, a group of reform-minded education chiefs who oversee 30 percent of the nation’s K-12 public school students.
For 15 years, Dr. Hickok taught political science at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and served as director of the college’s Clarke Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Contemporary Issues. He also was an adjunct professor at the Dickinson School of Law. He was recognized as an outstanding teacher and was twice awarded Dickinson’s prestigious Ganoe Award for Inspirational Teaching in 1985 and 1990.
Dr. Hickok also was an associate director of the political science department at Mississippi State University, and the director of financial aid for Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia.
An expert on public policy, the U.S. Constitution and Federalism, Dr. Hickok has published numerous articles and books on government and public policy, and has made presentations on these topics before myriad local, state and national organizations. In 1991, Dr. Hickok was a consultant to the governments of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia regarding constitutional, political, and economic reform.
In 1986 and 1987, Dr. Hickok served as a special assistant in the Office of Legal Counsel at the U.S. Department of Justice. He also has served as an adjunct scholar at the Heritage Foundation, where he was a resident scholar in 1990 and 1991.
He was elected as a member of the Carlisle Area School District Board of Directors and served until his appointment in 1995 as Education Secretary.
Dr. Hickok is a graduate of Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia. He also received his master’s and Ph.D. from the University of Virginia.
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