Ross Santy

Ross Santy was named the Chief Data Officer (CDO) at the U.S. Department of Education in October 2023. Santy leads ED’s Office of the Chief Data Officer (OCDO), which oversees data governance, open data initiatives, and data analytics aimed at enhancing the Department’s capacity to harness data as a strategic asset.

Prior to this role, Santy served as the Associate Commissioner of the Administrative Data Division within the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the primary federal entity responsible for collecting and analyzing education-related data. At NCES, Santy oversaw IPEDS, EDFacts, the Common Core of Data, NCES’s contributions to the Civil Rights Data Collection, and other programs. Santy’s 20 years of service at ED also included his roles as the Director of the Performance Information Management Service (a previous component of the ED’s Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development) and as a Deputy Assistant Secretary for Data and Information.

Before joining ED, Santy co-founded the non-profit Just for the Kids – California. He also worked for Los Angeles County Office of Education, directed instructional technology at the Browning School in New York City, and taught history at a public high school in New Jersey. Mr. Santy has earned a master’s from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and an undergraduate degree in Educational Psychology from Princeton University.