Linda A. Shevitz

Linda A. Pollack Shevitz is a national leader in the areas of gender equity, women's history, multicultural education, and social justice, and has been active in these areas for more than three decades. Nationally, she served as Chair of the Association for Gender Equity Leadership in Education (AGELE), an organization of advocates for equity in education from pre-school through postsecondary programs, and Vice Chair of the National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education, a consortium of 50 national organizations promoting gender equity. She is a recipient of the Activist of the Year Award presented by the Women Educators of the American Educational Research Association, and received an award from the Governor of Maryland for Outstanding Contributions in Assuring Equal Opportunities for Students and Educators in Maryland.

In her professional position as Equity Office Director at the Maryland State Department of Education Ms. Shevitz has monitored the implementation in Maryland of Title IX (of the Education Amendments of 1972), the federal law prohibiting sex discrimination in Education. Fulfilling this responsibility for 30 years, she became the longest serving Title IX Coordinator of any state in the nation. She received the National Shirley McCune Award for Outstanding Contributions to Gender Equity and was a participant in White House Commemorations of the Anniversaries of Title IX. She has been a consultant to the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Justice on issues related to Gender Equity and to Sexual Harassment.

Linda coordinated the Maryland Women's History Project since the early 1980's, a collaboration between the Maryland State Department of Education and the Maryland Commission for Women. The project developed annual resource kits that were distributed to libraries and all schools throughout the state. These kits provided information about Maryland women's contributions in areas such as the Arts and Literature, Science and Technology, Young Women's Leadership, the Suffrage and Civil Rights Movements, Law and Politics, Education, and a Maryland Women's History Trail Book and map, noting women's history sites in the state. The History Project led to the establishment and 2010 opening of the Maryland Women's Heritage Center in Baltimore to honor the work of historical and contemporary Maryland women of diverse cultures and backgrounds. Linda is a founder, Board member, and Program Chair of the Center, the first state-based, comprehensive women's leadership center and history museum of its kind in the nation.

Linda has coordinated a statewide network on multicultural education and student achievement, composed of representatives of all twenty-four Maryland school systems, which addresses issues of discrimination and disparities in areas such as race, national origin, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and disability. She has been named a Top 100 Maryland Woman, and received Dorothy Lloyd Women's Rights Award from the Maryland State Educators Association. She was the 2012 recipient of the National Award for Social Justice Advocacy, presented by the National Association for Multicultural Education.

Linda is an honors graduate of the University of Maryland, College Park, where she was listed in Who's Who, served as president of the Education Honorary, and was named Outstanding Senior Woman. She has graduate degrees in Human Development Education.