Kathleen Hebbeler, PhD, has more than 30 years of experience in research and evaluation of education, health, and social programs for children and adolescents. She has extensive experience in longitudinal research, having worked on six such studies. Hebbeler has directed large-scale projects involving quantitative and qualitative methods. She has directed evaluations for federal and state agencies and private foundations. She also has provided technical assistance and conducted training for a variety of audiences on such topics as evaluation design, data analysis, and using data for program improvement, with a special focus on identification and measurement of child and family outcomes.

Currently, Hebbeler directs the Center for IDEA Early Childhood Data Systems (DaSy), a technical assistance center that works with state early intervention and early childhood state agencies to obtain and use high-quality data.  She also co-directs the Preschool Development Grant (PDG) B-5 Technical Assistance Center which is supporting state agencies in building high-quality systems of programs and services for young children and their families and serves as principal investigator for a study of the inclusion of young children with disabilities in subsidized child care.

Previously, Hebbeler directed the Early Childhood Outcomes (ECO) Center, a 10-year effort that provided national leadership and built the capacity of states to report high-quality data on outcomes for young children with disabilities and their families. Hebbeler was principal investigator for a project examining the validity of a process for summarizing multiple sources of information on child functioning for outcomes measurement. She also directed the National Early Intervention Longitudinal Study (NEILS), which examined services and outcomes for more than 3,300 infants and toddlers with disabilities in early intervention programs around the United States.

Hebbeler is the author of numerous papers and has presented at many national meetings in the areas of early care and education, child development, early intervention, general and special education, accountability, and community collaboration. She is a nationally recognized expert on accountability for early childhood programs, assessment, and large-scale studies of children with disabilities, serving on national advisory boards and consulting on major evaluations to help create designs that adequately address such issues as oversampling and measurement of disability.

Hebbeler is a recipient of several awards, including The Division for Early Childhood’s Mary McEvoy Service to the Field Award and the SRI Change the World Achievement Award. As a member of the National Research Council’s Committee on Developmental Outcomes and Assessment for Young Children, Hebbeler was a contributing author to the 2008 report Early Childhood Assessment: Why, What and How? She also was a major author of a guidebook for community organizations on conducting evaluations.

Hebbeler earned her PhD in human development and family studies from Cornell University.

Key projects

• Center for IDEA Early Childhood Data Systems (DaSy)
• Preschool Development Grantee B-5 Technical Assistance Center
• Inclusion in California Early Learning and Care
• Enhancement of a K-3 Formative Assessment
• Early Childhood Outcomes (ECO) Center
• Study of Early Intervention Service Intensity in Texas