Gary D. Fenstermacher '61, PhD '70, is Professor Emeritus in the School of Education, University of Michigan. Previously, he was professor in the Department of Educational Studies from 1996-2007.
Fenstermacher has been a national leader and an internationally recognized scholar in the field of education. In addition to the formal leadership roles he has held in higher education, he has served in a number of advisory capacities that have allowed him to contribute to the improvement of teacher education programs.
Fenstermacher first served as an instructor in the School of Education at New York University. After earning his doctorate in the Philosophy of Education from Cornell University in 1969, he started his career at the University of California, Los Angeles, as Director of Teacher Education and Head of Supervised Training. While at UCLA Fenstermacher was promoted to an Associate Professor and became Head of the Program in History and Philosophy of Education, a position he held from 1974-1977.
Next, he taught at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University as Chair of the Graduate Program in Education and then Director of the Northern Virginia Graduate Center. The Center houses a number of graduate programs from Virginia Tech and other graduate programs throughout Virginia.
He then was appointed Dean of the College of Education at the University of Arizona, Tucson where he provided leadership for five years. He continued on with the university for an additional five years as a Full Professor of Education. In 1996, he joined the faculty at the University of Michigan. During his term at Arizona and his first years at Michigan he was selected as Senior Associate for the prestigious Center for Educational Renewal and also served as a Senior Fellow for the Institute for Educational Inquiry, both located at the University of Washington.
Fenstermacher is well-respected researcher in the field of education. His research articles appear in leading journals and in books edited by major scholars in the field. His studies and writings in recent years have addressed such topics as the moral dimensions of classroom teaching, democracy and education, school renewal, and the public purpose of education and schooling. In addition he has been the lead author, with Jonas Soktis, on three editions of Approaches to Teaching, published by Teachers College Press, has been translated into Chinese, Spanish and Polish. Among the many honors and awards that he has received, Fenstermacher was awarded the College of Education Certificate of Teaching Excellence from Virginia Polytechnic Institute in 1980 and the William E. Wine Award for Excellence in Teaching in 1981.
Balancing the demands of formal leadership positions and productive research, Fenstermacher has also been or is a member or leader of key professional and learned societies, including the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, the American Educational Research Association, The National Society for the Study of Education, the Philosophy of Education Society, the California Association for Philosophy of Education, and the California Council on the Education of Teachers.
In 1999, Fenstermacher served as the Team Leader for and External Review of the Department of Education in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. The review was launched at a time when the Department of Education was experiencing severe problems on several fronts and its future was of great concern to the College administration. Fenstermacher engaged fully with the faculty members as they completed their self-assessment and also with the external review team. He served so well that Dean Susan Henry asked him to serve as Chair for a Special Advisory Committee (SAC), which oversaw the Department of Education's reorganization.
Fenstermacher has been noted for his exuberance, optimism, intelligence, sense of humor, and has been called "the quintessential scholar and mentor." He is an exemplary alumnus, giving back to his alma mater by sharing his skills and wisdom.
Fenstermacher lives in Tucson, Arizona with his wife, Virginia Richardson.