Bio
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David Penberg, Ph.D. is an urban and international educational leader who has held executive positions in independent, international, and charter schools, community-based and non-profit organizations. In a career that has spanned three continents, four countries, his work has evolved with each new context centered in the conviction that all learners (children/adults/teachers) have the capacity to make a difference in the world.
Penberg’s expertise as a progressive pre-K-12 educator is in program design, leadership development and coaching, professional developing and in organizational collaborations. He is a change consultant for schools and informal sites that seek to enlarge and enhance learning opportunities for children. His intergenerational vision is rooted in the aspiration to educate healthy, whole, ethical and inquisitive human beings.
He supports a 21st century pedagogy that promotes life-worthy, project-based, and problem-driven learning. He is a proponent of culturally responsive instruction designed to increase intercultural understanding and to broaden students’ perspectives and exposure to multiple frameworks for understanding the world.
Penberg has just completed Headship of Woodstock Day School, where he launched with the Ashokan Center an Environmental Youth Sustainability Summit and is working at building a Saturday program for children and youth in partnership with The Center for Creative Education and Brother’s @Bard.
Penberg has also taught in Pace University’s Teaching Fellows Program and is a contributing writer to The International Educator and Independent Schools Magazine. His educational memoir entitled Deciding to Love the World will be published by Wintergreen Studios Press in 2021.
With the opening of post pandemic possibilities in how we educate, his interests include environmental sustainability and stewardship, STEAM, and projects that are intergenerational and cross-institutional in scope.
He is available for workshops for school leaders and teachers, in-person and virtual coaching and consultations, and keynote presentations.
Penberg lives in the Hudson Valley with the creatures and magic of the Catskill Mountains