Jill Beale is an education researcher and learning designer. Her research bridges the learning sciences and arts education, using qualitative methods to explore the critical thinking practices young people cultivate through artistic production.
For two decades, she has designed and directed arts education programs in New York City and Los Angeles. As the Director of Youth Media Education at BRIC in Brooklyn, she designed programs in over 30 NYC public schools and created Brooklyn's first-ever youth media festival, Concrete Stories. In Los Angeles, she worked in many roles, including educational consultant, curriculum developer, and producer. She co-designed curricula with Warner Media, AFI, Young Storytellers, Get Lit Words Ignite, and many other community arts organizations and industry partners. She produced an Emmy-nominated documentary series for PBS about the importance of arts education, a city-wide youth film festival at The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and the first-ever Youth Creativity Summit. Jill also served on the California State Board of Education's Visual and Performing Arts Curriculum Framework committee and co-authored the media arts framework.
Jill received a B.A. in Art and Social Change from New York University and an M.A. in Media Studies from The New School University. She is currently a Ph.D. Candidate (ABD) at New York University, where she has received multiple awards, including the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development Doctoral Fellowship and two Doctoral Research Grants. She lives in Pasadena, CA, with her husband and daughter, and is writing her dissertation while working on research projects funded by the National Science Foundation and National Endowment for the Humanities.
