Barbara Palley

Barbara Palley serves as the Executive Director of Turnaround Arts California, and previously as the Director of Program and Strategy for over six years, overseeing a doubling of our school partnerships statewide and impactful program refinement and iteration in response to community input. Previously at Cool Culture, NYC, Barbara helped narrow the arts education gap through citywide partnerships between early childhood centers and cultural institutions, which engaged families in out-of-school time. She led a federally-funded national leadership grant to bring together 23 NYC museums in a “Laboratory for New Audiences” in which they utilized user-centered design methods to innovate diverse and inclusive educational approaches. Barbara is a recognized leader in the field, with over 20 years of experience in facilitating professional learning communities, advocating for equity and access, and in museum education, program administration and evaluation at a variety of institutions including MoMA, Brooklyn Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, and Harvard Project Zero. Barbara has a BA in Art History, University of Virginia and an Ed.M. in Arts in Education, Harvard Graduate School of Education.