Professional Learning Communities at Work®

Maria Nielsen, educational speaker and author, specializes in supporting teachers and administrators in the areas of PLCs, RTI, school culture, curriculum design, the highly engaged classroom, and assessment systems. Her life’s work is to help schools build successful systems to ensure high levels of student learning.

Mike Mattos is a globally recognized author and presenter who transforms schools through Response to Intervention (RTI) and Professional Learning Communities (PLCs). In 2024, Global Gurus named him one of the top 30 educational thought leaders worldwide.

Paul C. Farmer is an experienced practitioner who started in education as a career and technical education (CTE) teacher. He has held multiple leadership roles, including department chair, teacher specialist in career and technology education, assistant principal, principal, and project director of instructional technology integration.

Sarah Schuhl specializes in professional learning communities, mathematics, assessment, school improvement, and RTI. She has been a secondary mathematics teacher, high school instructional coach, and K–12 mathematics specialist.

W. Richard Smith is former deputy superintendent of Sanger Unified School District in California. He has been involved in public education for more than 37 years.