NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. – Gordon A. MacInnes, a former legislator and assistant commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Education, was inducted as a public member of the Board of Governors of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, at today’s board meeting.
MacInnes is a fellow at The Century Foundation and a consultant to the Foundation for Child Development, both in New York. He was a lecturer and senior education policy expert at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School from 2007 to 2009. From 2002 to 2007, as assistant commissioner for Abbott implementation for the state Education Department, he oversaw a division devoted to all elements of the Abbott v. Burke decisions of the New Jersey Supreme Court, including preschool education, instruction and programming, budgets and auditing; and state-operated districts and facilities.
“Gordon MacInnes has devoted four decades to government service and leadership on issues related to education, poverty and urban living,” said President Richard L. McCormick.
“The university and the board will be well served by his expertise in these critical, interrelated areas.”
MacInnes was elected to the New Jersey General Assembly in 1974 and to the state Senate in 1994. He was special assistant to the governor and the commissioner of education from 1968 to 1970 and 1967 to 1968, respectively. He also has been chair and director of the Hunt Corp. of Philadelphia, executive director of New Jersey Network and executive director of The Fund for New Jersey.
MacInnes was president of Planned Parenthood of Greater Northern New Jersey and treasurer for the Jersey Battered Women’s Shelter.
MacInnes is the author of Wrong for All the Right Reasons: How White Liberals Have Been Undone by Race (NYU Press, 1996); Children Who Pick the Wrong Parents and Other Victims of Voucher Schemes; and In Plain Sight: Difficult Lessons from New Jersey’s Expensive Effort to Close the Achievement Gap (The Century Foundation, 1999 and 2009, respectively).
He is a graduate of Occidental College, Los Angeles, and received a master’s degree in public affairs from Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School.
MacInnes replaces Patrick Ryan on the Board of Governors.
Media Contact: Steve Manas
732-932-7084, ext. 612
E-mail: smanas@ur.rutgers.edu