Strategic Policy Advising: Bridging the gap between policy design and on-the-ground implementation to deliver actionable, sustainable solutions
Using Research to Drive Change: Interpreting complex research and data to create actionable insights and user-friendly tools for educators and leaders
Organizational Design and Strengthening Systems: Enhancing structures, processes, and capacity to improve effectiveness and impact
Partnership Development and Stakeholder Engagement: Fostering collaboration among policymakers, practitioners, and communities to co-create solutions and accelerate learning
Strategy & Consulting – guiding priority-setting, theory of action, goal setting, implementation plans
Research & Data Insights – rapid evidence synthesis, dashboards, tools to guide strategic decisions
Project Design & Facilitation – convenings, workshops, communities of practice
Systems Analysis & Design – gap analysis, capacity scans, accountability structures
Bringing deep expertise at the intersection of strategy, data, and policy
Erin O’Hara brings more than two decades of experience driving education policy and research from preschool through postsecondary. A trusted state and national leader, she is recognized for asking incisive questions and challenging assumptions, bridging research and policy to build partnerships, and creating data systems and insights that drive meaningful change in schools and systems.
State Policy Leadership: Served across gubernatorial transitions as Education Policy Advisor to Governor Phil Bredesen and Assistant Commissioner under Governor Bill Haslam, shaping accountability, assessment, and research systems and leading Tennessee’s first federal accountability waiver.
Systems Change Strategy: Played a central role in Tennessee’s $501M Race to the Top grant—designing and overseeing one of the nation’s most comprehensive education reforms, credited with driving the state’s fastest academic growth in the country.
Research-to-Practice Leadership: Founded and led the Tennessee Education Research Alliance (TERA), a nationally recognized partnership between Vanderbilt University and the Tennessee Department of Education, translating research into actionable policy on school leadership, improvement, and educator diversity.
Multi-Level Government Experience: Bridging federal, state, and local perspectives across PK–12 and higher education through roles at the Tennessee Higher Education Commission, Tennessee Department of Education, collaboration with the U.S. Department of Education, and now as an elected member of the Metro Nashville Board of Education.
Data & Insight Infrastructure: Built data systems to inform state and district decision-making and directed the Tennessee Educator Survey for more than a decade, ensuring educator voice shaped policy.
Erin has a Master of Public Policy from Vanderbilt’s Peabody College of Education and a Bachelor of Arts in American government and African and African American studies from the University of Virginia. She lives in Nashville with her husband and two children.
erin@erinoharaconsulting.com