Diana Hess

University of Wisconsin-Madison

Professor, Senior Leader of the Discussion Project and Deliberation Dinners, Principal Investigator of The Discussion Project Research

Diana E. Hess is a professor of Curriculum and Instruction and the senior leader of The Discussion Project and Deliberation Dinners at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is also the principal investigator of a mixed-method study of The Discussion Project funded by the Mellon Foundation and the Chancellor and Provost's Office of UW-Madison. The Discussion Project is a professional development program that aims to help instructors create inclusive, engaging, and academically rigorous discussions in higher education courses and in secondary schools. Currently on a research leave (2024-25), Dr. Hess was the dean of the School of Education at the University of Wisconsin (UW)–Madison and the Karen A. Falk Distinguished Chair of Education from 2015-2024. Dr. Hess's research focuses on civic and democratic education. Her first book, Controversy in the Classroom: The Democratic Power of Discussion (Routledge, 2009), won the Exemplary Research Award (2009) from the National Council for the Social Studies. Her second book, co-authored with Professor Paula McAvoy, titled The Political Classroom: Evidence and Ethics in Democratic Education (Routledge, 2015) won the American Educational Research Association's Outstanding Book Award (2016) and the Grawemeyer Award (2017). Dr. Hess is currently writing a book (co-authored by Lynn Glueck) that examines what institutions of higher education could do to harness their deliberative assets, help students develop the skills to meaningfully engage in high quality discussions and deliberations, and reduce the most harmful consequences of political polarization. Dr. Hess received the Jean Dresden Grambs Career Research in Social Studies Award from the National Council for the Social Studies (2017). In 2019, Dr. Hess was elected to the National Academy of Education. Her research has been funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Spencer Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation. Formerly, Dr. Hess was the senior vice president of the Spencer Foundation, a high school teacher, a teachers' union president, and the associate executive director of the Constitutional Rights Foundation Chicago. Dr. Hess received her Ph.D. from the University of Washington, Seattle, in 1998.