Marian Thacher

Marian Thacher is a senior researcher at AIR. She currently works with the California Adult Literacy Professional Development Project (CALPRO), the statewide professional development system for adult education in California. She manages the development of communities of practice, online professional development courses, and webinars for adult educators. She is also the project director for a contract with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to provide training on professional learning communities to the education staff from California’s 33 prisons, and previously helped coordinate technical assistance to ten states through the federal LINCS ESL Pro project in 2014-16. In addition, she directs the Texas Adult Education and Literacy Content Standards Rollout, providing training for adult education instructional coaches across Texas.

She has worked in the field of Adult Literacy and English as a Second Language (ESL) since 1981, including teaching ESL and GED classes in Chicago and San Diego, developing and delivering basic skills instruction in the workplace with both face-to-face and blended models, and serving as director of the Outreach and Technical Assistance Network (OTAN), an adult education leadership project in California that provides support and training for technology integration, electronic collaboration, and distance learning. Thacher developed and led OTAN’s Technology Integration Mentor Academy and participated in many federal and state grant-funded projects related to adult education, distance learning and technology integration. She is a frequent presenter at national, state, and local conferences on topics related to professional development and technology in adult education.