BARBARA HUNT
Doctor of Education in educational leadership
Charter College of Education
For Barbara Hunt, learning has been a life-long experience.
At 71, Barbara will be the oldest student to graduate from Cal State L.A. when she receives her Ed.D. As she walks across the commencement stage at Jesse Owens Field, she hopes to inspire others to learn and become engaged with their communities.
“My goal is to continue to encourage students to find the joy of learning, to be critical thinkers, and to be educated and active citizens,” she says.
Barbara has spent more than three decades in education, from teaching toddlers in West Los Angeles to training small-business entrepreneurs as a Peace Corps volunteer in West Africa.
She enrolled as an undergraduate student at Cal State L.A. in 1962—when John F. Kennedy was president. She obtained her bachelor's degree in biological sciences and master’s degree in health and safety from Cal State L.A. She also earned her credentials in secondary education.
Barbara spent several years teaching at Palisades High School before establishing four childcare centers on Los Angeles’ Westside. She served as chief administrator of the centers for 17 years.
When her two children graduated from college, Barbara sold her childcare centers and joined the Peace Corps. She traveled to Ghana, West Africa, where she trained small-business entrepreneurs. The Peace Corps then assigned her to Malawi in East Africa, where she worked at Domasi Teachers College to train elementary school teachers to teach science.
She also finds time to volunteer as a health educator for Homeless Health Care of Los Angeles (HHCLA), a nonprofit agency that provides services for homeless persons on Skid Row in Los Angeles. She is looking forward to putting her education to practical use in the classroom at Woodbury.
“In order to be an effective global educator,” she says, “I needed to understand the current theories and philosophy of education combined with my formal teacher training and my classroom experiences.”