Jill Denner, Ph.D.

Jill Denner, PhD, is a senior research scientist at Education, Training, Research, a non-profit organization in California. She does applied research and evaluation with a focus on increasing the number of women, girls, and Latino/a students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Dr. Denner has also led the development of several after-school programs designed to increase diversity in computing fields. Current projects include a synthesis of research on how children learn while creating computer games, a study of how to build a pathway from high school to community college in information and computer technology fields, an evaluation of a climate change education video game, and studies of the role of peers and families in Latino/a children’s STEM educational pathways. She is nationally recognized as an expert in strategies to engage girls/women and Latino/a students in computer science, in both K–12 and community college, and regularly does peer review of journal articles as well as grant proposals for the National Science Foundation. She has been principal investigator on 20 federal grants, written numerous peer-reviewed articles, and co-edited two books: Beyond Barbie and Mortal Kombat: New Perspectives on Gender and Gaming, published by MIT Press, and Latina Girls: Voices of Adolescent Strength in the U.S., published by NYU Press. She earned her PhD in developmental psychology from Columbia University’s Teachers College.