Lauren Kaufman is currently serving as a district leader for a school district in Long Island, New York. With two decades of experience in education, she has served as an assistant principal, elementary instructional coach, elementary and middle school reading specialist, new teacher mentor coordinator K–12, creativity camp enrichment program supervisor, and second- and fifth-grade classroom teacher.

Lauren is a lifelong learner whose professional passion is to empower teachers to lead so they can share their gifts with others and cultivate lifelong literacy practices in all learners. She has led teams in developing Units of Study in reading and writing, created interdisciplinary curricula, and provided educators with job-embedded professional learning that supports a comprehensive approach to literacy. She has also guided new teachers in acclimating to the culture and climate of their school systems.

Lauren has organized numerous full-day literacy professional learning experiences and has presented at national and local conferences, including ASCD, NCTE, FETC, LIASCD, Molloy University, the Long Island Technology Summit, the Reading Specialists Council of Suffolk, the Long Island Language Arts Council, #NerdcampLI, #LBLit, and the Literacy Matters Conferences.

She is the author of The Leader Inside: Stories of Mentorship to Inspire the Leader Within. In addition to her book, Lauren shares her insights through her blog and has contributed to several publications, including George Couros’ Because of a Teacher, Lainie Rowell’s Evolving With Gratitude, and IGI Global’s Designing Effective Distance and Blended Learning Environments K–12.

Her work has been featured in Education Week and Edutopia and she has contributed as a guest blogger for the Teach Better Team, Future Ready Schools, and Defined. Lauren’s passion lies in leading through a coaching mindset and sharing best literacy and instructional practices with colleagues. She wholeheartedly believes in the importance of developing powerful professional learning communities and networks that foster meaningful, relevant learning and growth.