Roxann Kriete, executive director of Northeast Foundation for Children (NEFC), retired in December after twenty-six years of service. Roxann has worn more hats than any staff member in the thirty-year history of NEFC, the not-for-profit developer of the Responsive Classroom approach. She has served as a teacher, a development director, an author, and an administrator in a variety of roles over the past three decades. Most importantly, she has been a steady, thoughtful, and inspiring leader who has utilized her many talents to improve the quality of education for children nationwide.

In the 1980s, when NEFC ran a K–8 laboratory school, Roxann served as a teacher and headed the school's development efforts. In the 1990s, she was instrumental in forming NEFC's publishing branch and became its first director. She's written two major books, The Morning Meeting Book and The First Six Weeks of School, and was responsible for launching the first Responsive Classroom website.

Roxann became executive director in the early 2000s. During her ten-year tenure, Roxann initiated the first Responsive Classroom Schools Conference and was responsible for the development of a wide array of services and resources to support schools implementing the Responsive Classroom approach schoolwide. She was also instrumental in expanding the reach of Responsive Classroom practices: in 2011 alone, almost 10,000 teachers from the U.S. and Canada took Responsive Classroom courses.

Roxann has been a long­time champion of developing empirical research to study the impact of the Responsive Classroom approach. Currently, researchers at the University of Virginia Curry School of Education are investigating the effectiveness of the approach through a $2.8 million federally funded study called the Responsive Classroom Efficacy Study (RCES). In addition, a $1 million grant from the National Science Foundation was awarded to study student engagement in the RCES schools. Results of both studies will be available in the spring of 2012.

NEFC staff members note Roxann's remarkable "zest for learning," her "big picture thinking," and her "wonderful ability to listen carefully and ask questions that push one's thinking." She is also known for her "calm and available presence" and her "compassion and sense of humor."

While Roxann is no longer in the office on a regular basis, she continues to be engaged with NEFC in a consultative role. Roxann's daily presence will be sorely missed, but the positive impact she has had on the quality of teaching and learning in schools throughout the country will stay with us for many years to come.