Mary Bacon, Ph.D.

Mary Bacon’s journey from the projects in the South and tenements in the Northeast to the role of consultant was a varied and exciting one. These experiences make her uniquely prepared, both personally and professionally, to address issues related to achieving equity for those who are racially, ethnically, and socio-culturally different, as well as those who come from the challenging circumstances. Educated in elementary and secondary parochial schools in New Orleans and Harlem, she became the first one in her family to graduate from elementary school and understands the challenges of overcoming obstacles to achieve success. Mary earned a B.A. in Secondary Education from Fordham University majoring in Spanish; an M.A. in Guidance and Counseling and a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Stanford University. An experienced teacher, university instructor, counselor, psychologist and school administrator in a variety of educational institutions, Mary has also served as a Probation Officer and as a Field Deputy in the California State Attorney General’s Office.

For the past four decades, she has conducted keynote addresses and seminars for thousands of educators nationally and internationally and has served as a consultant to many school districts related to serving the most challenged and challenging youth and families in our educational systems. Her firm, Images of a Culture, has had single event to multi-year contracts with school districts on a variety of related topics that provide strategies for fostering institutional change that ensures equity and equal access to educational opportunities for all. In her capacity as a State Performance Plan Technical Assistance Facilitator since the program’s inception, Dr. Bacon has been providing services in areas related to eliminating disproportionality, adopting an equity agenda and culturally responsive educational service delivery to several districts including but not limited to: Mt. Diablo, San Francisco, West Contra Costa, San Francisco, Vallejo, Alameda, Berkeley and a host of others over the years. With an emphasis on issues related to equity and incorporating a socio-cultural lens in identifying appropriate interventions to serve culturally diverse students and families, Dr. Bacon emphasizes the identification of needed systems change that can impact the quality of services available to challenged and challenging clients.

Areas of Particular Interest and Expertise:

Step 1: Gather and Inquire

• Gathering Qualitative Data
• Infrastructure Analysis

Step 2: Data and Root Cause Analysis

• Prioritizing Factors Contributing to Significant Disproportionality

Step 4: Implementing and Monitoring

• Support data collection for evaluating effectiveness of interventions 
• Support implementation monitoring