Kristin Conklin
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Kristin D. Conklin is a founding partner of HCM Strategists, LLC. Prior to starting HCM, Ms. Conklin served as senior advisor to the undersecretary of the U.S. Department of Education. She provided advice and analysis on high school rigor, postsecondary access, and college affordability. She helped develop the President’s FY08 education budget, which included the largest increase in Pell grants in more than 30 years.

Previously, Kristin spent 10 years working with states and representing state policy and policymakers in Washington. From 2000 to 2006, she was program director in the Education Division at the National Governors Association (NGA) Center for Best Practices. At NGA, she launched and managed the $23.6 million Honor States Grant Program, which supports gubernatorial leadership and high school policy innovation in 26 states. Ms. Conklin is co-author of the 2005 National Education Summit on High Schools policy blueprint and led the development of NGA’s Getting it Done: Ten Steps to a State Action Agenda, which has been implemented in more than 35 states. She directed the Washington office of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education from 1997 to 2000.

She has a master’s degree in public policy from Georgetown University and a bachelor’s degree in political science from California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly) in San Luis Obispo.

Blog Entries by Kristin Conklin

The Great Education Reads of 2011

1 Comments | Posted December 13, 2011 | 14:35:08 (EST)

Whether you "occupy" home, airports or train terminals this holiday season, it's a good time to reflect and catch up on some of 2011's greatest education reads.

HCM Strategists, a public policy and advocacy consulting firm, curated a short list of our favorites. From groundbreaking research to breakthrough ideas...

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Wake Up Rip Van Winkle, the College Demographic Revolution Is Upon Us

5 Comments | Posted September 27, 2011 | 12:58:20 (EST)

About once every decade an education report is released that delivers new information so arresting and critically important to the challenges of its time that it compels action. Complete College America's "Time is the Enemy: the surprising truth about why today's college students aren't graduating," released...

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For the Future of Higher Education, Keep Your Eye on Toledo

Posted September 8, 2010 | 10:13:17 (EST)

Keep your eye on Toledo, the metropolitan area with the highest college enrollment rate in the nation.

As a new class of students begins their first days in higher education, the northwest Ohio city on the Maumee River will be an important test of whether cash-strapped higher education can translate...

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America's Higher Education Collision Course -- Who Will Pay?

Posted July 8, 2010 | 14:41:55 (EST)

With tuition costs rising at double the rate of much-maligned health care costs, is it time for higher education to face the same pressures to reform how instruction is delivered as those confronting how health care is delivered? Both sectors are aiming to serve millions more Americans without major increases...

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Health Care or Education: A High-stakes Blindfolded Taste Test

Posted June 4, 2010 | 13:15:13 (EST)

Education and health care are arguably the two most important pillars of our society. If either fails, the economic and social impact is devastating.

Our education and health care systems, designed for a 20th century America, need to rapidly catch up with a nation closing out the first decade...

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