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Barbara Russell: Creating Options for EducationWhen asked to sum up close colleague and former President of Options Publishing Barbara Russell in a single word or phrase, Paul Crecca, Interim President & CEO of Haights Cross Communications said it couldn't be done. "Like most very successful people, Barbara has many qualities as a person, in business, and as a publisher which make her unique," he said. "But if I could offer anything up, let it be this--name one other woman who has built an educational publishing business from the ground up to be valued at $50 million just 12 years later. I know of no other such woman." Barbara began her professional career in 1969 in a place she has never really left--the classroom. As a sixth grade teacher in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, she found a great deal of satisfaction in touching the individual lives of children and fell in love with the concept of helping people understand that which they did not or could not comprehend before. Four years later, after giving a workshop on developing student writing skills, she was approached by George Moore, the Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum at Wellesley Public Schools and curriculum expert at a small educational publishing house called Curriculum Associates (CA). Moore was interested in hiring Barbara as CA's first full-time employee. "He told me I was just the type of person his company was looking for, but I later realized that he was really looking for someone they wouldn't have to pay very much," she joked. With some encouragement from her husband, Barbara accepted Moore's offer, despite the fact that she knew nothing about publishing. "I was a sixties child, so challenge was not a problem for me," she said. "I was more worried about whether or not I would actually like the job." Initially, Barbara was not sure she had made the right decision. During her early days at CA, she spent long, lonely hours in a basement opening mail and shipping books, which was far from what she enjoyed doing most--interacting with people. But rather than giving up, she took a chance and proposed a new position for herself. "That spring I wrote a 'plan' for sales and marketing which had me out in the field full time. I created the budget and presented it to Frank Ferguson and his two partners," she said. "To their credit, they accepted it. That plan moved me out of the office and into the field. I never turned back." When Barbara left Curriculum Associates in 1992, she was Vice President of Sales and Marketing. The company had grown to 75 full-time employees, in large part due to Barbara's direction and propensity for finding and nurturing new talent, particularly candidates from outside the industry. "A teacher at heart, Barbara always made the opportunity to not only learn what she needed to know, but also to teach others as well," said Randi Brill, President of the Quarasan Group and Barbara's long-time friend and colleague. In 1993, Barbara founded Options Publishing, an actuation of her strong belief in differentiated learning. Built on the premise that teachers must reach out to meet students where they need to be met, not wait for them to make the leap on their own, the company's goal has always been to give teachers the "options" they need to figure out what works best for each individual learner. Thus, a large part of Options Publishing's success was achieved by listening to the needs of the customer, which is, according to Barbara, "the only reason we're around." "You could always find Barbara in her booth [at educational shows like the IRA Conference] talking directly to teachers and administrators," said Rachelle Cracchiolo, president of Teacher Created Materials. "You could see in her products that she was always responding to the needs of the market." As a testament to Barbara's ability as a successful business leader, Options Publishing has had year-over-year double-digit growth since its inception, and 75 percent of Options employees have been with the company for over five years. In 2004, the company was acquired by Haights Cross Communications in a $50 million deal. Barbara stayed on as President of the Options business unit until spring of 2007, when she retired to focus her full attention on the Russell Foundation, a conservation organization she founded with her husband in 2005. She serves on the Board of Trustees at her alma mater, Lesley University, and also at the Crittendon Women's Union, an organization that helps women become more self-sufficient. She has been a member of the International Reading Association, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, Small Business Association, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, American Association of Publishers, Association of Educational Publishers, and Phi Beta Kappa. Questions, ideas, or in need of more information? Please contact Stacey Pusey at 302-295-8349. |
For more information on the Educational Publishing Hall of Fame, please click here. |
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