Dean Diana Hess
Dean Diana Hess is a leading expert in civic education, discussion, and the teaching of controversial political, constitutional, and legal issues. She wrote “Controversy in the Classroom: The Democratic Power of Discussion,” which won the Exemplary Research Award from the National Council for Social Studies in 2009. Her most recent book, “The Political Classroom: Evidence and Ethics in Democratic Education,” co-authored with Paula McAvoy, won the American Educational Research Association’s Outstanding Book Award in 2016 and the prestigious Grawemeyer Award in 2017. Hess is deeply committed to working with educators to improve the quality of democratic education in higher education and K-12 schools. She is also the principal investigator for The Discussion Project that started at UW–Madison and is now operating on campuses and in secondary school districts across the nation. Previously, in her role as senior vice president of the Spencer Foundation, Hess created the Disciplined Dialogue project. In addition, while serving as the associate director of the Constitutional Rights Foundation Chicago, Hess was instrumental in creating a nationwide program of “youth summits” that brought together high school students from communities that were very different from one another to talk about political issues.
Lynn Glueck
Lynn Glueck is the program director, curriculum designer, and an instructor for The Discussion Project. Glueck will be the senior leader of the Deliberation Dinners, working collaboratively with Hess to develop and launch the initiative. Glueck has an impressive 25-year career in K-12 education and higher education. Her excellent leadership as the program director of The Discussion Project has demonstrated that she knows what it takes to create programs that are educationally sound, exciting, and superbly executed. Lynn has also served as the professional development coordinator and school improvement administrator for the Madison Metropolitan School District, as well as an instructional coach for high school teachers.
Emma Cabrera
Emma Cabrera is the project manager of the Deliberation Dinners and will work collaboratively with Glueck and Hess to develop the initiative and manage its day-to-day activities. She was a social studies teacher in Chicago Public Schools and the Madison Metropolitan School District. In addition, Cabrera taught English in South Korea and Japan, and was a staffer in the U.S. Senate. Cabrera is an alumna of UW-Madison who earned a BA in political science and philosophy in 2014 and a master’s in 2018 from the highly ranked Department of Curriculum and Instruction. She was a student-athlete, competing on the women’s swimming team, during her undergraduate years.
Kate Ullman
Kate Ullman is the curriculum writer for the Deliberation Dinners. A former high school Government, History, International Relations, and Economics teacher, Kate serves as the Director of the Legislative Semester, a high school government and civics curriculum that engages students in a simulation of the legislative process. She also is an instructor at Northland College. Kate holds a BA in International Relations from Stanford University and a MS in Applied Economics from UW-Madison.
