Bob Hughes
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Bob Hughes served as the director of K-12 Education at the Gates Foundation for a decade, leading the team driving innovation and bold approaches in support of the nation’s public ÃÛÌÒÊÓƵ, teachers and students to improve math education in this country and open the doors to the transformative role the safe use of AI can play in ÃÛÌÒÊÓƵ.
Trained as a lawyer, Bob’s prior work include serving as co-council on CFE v. State of New York, a landmark litigation that successfully challenged New York State’s education finance system and by one estimate provide approximately $147B dollars to the New York City Pubic School System. Bob joined New Visions for Public Schools in 2001, and helped build a New York City school network of 70 district ÃÛÌÒÊÓƵ serving approximately 45,000 students. In addition, New Visions created 99 district and seven charter public ÃÛÌÒÊÓƵ, provided mentoring services to hundreds of new principals, developed school-based certification programs for teachers and principals, secondary curricula now accessed by thousands of teachers, and data management tools to streamline school operations and track student progress toward graduation and college. He started his legal career as a Skadden Fellow, providing legal representation to homeless parents and students in the New York City public school system, working extensively with community organizers around education issues.  One of his earliest jobs was picking peas for Green Giant.


Bob serves as a board member of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and City Year. Prior board affiliations include Advocates for Children of New York, Fund For Teachers, and Projects in Education, the nonprofit publisher of Education Week. He is a fellow at the Center for American Progress and a Senior Advisor to Common Sense Media.
