Dan Koenig obtained both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education from the University of Toronto. With nearly 40 years of experience in public education, Dan is a highly respected leader in the fields of education and student assessment. He has held various positions with the former Metro Separate School Board and the Toronto Catholic District School Board. He began his career as a classroom teacher and later became a resource teacher, focusing on health and physical education. In this role, he developed performance-based assessments that provided immediate descriptive feedback to students.

As a program coordinator, Dan worked across K-12 schools, collaborating with department heads and educators to align curriculum expectations with assessment practices, particularly in health, physical education and the arts. As his career progressed, Dan took on roles that included Superintendent of Curriculum, Superintendent of Human Resources and Labour Relations, Associate Director of Academic Affairs and Chief Operating Officer of the Board.

A committed and passionate educator, Dan has also volunteered to work with students in rural Kenya, as well as with underprivileged children in Toronto. His student-centered approach to learning and assessment emphasizes the importance of students taking ownership of their education to achieve their full potential.

In 2021, Dan was appointed Chief Executive Officer of the Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO). He views the agency’s mission as supporting students, parents and guardians, educators, education partners and all stakeholders by providing achievement information data and insights for public accountability and for helping to improve the education system at the student, school, school district and provincial levels. He underscores the role that EQAO plays in providing research, data analysis and outreach efforts across the province.

The agency is committed to excellence and has been recognized internationally for its high-quality assessments and research program. As Ontario’s provincial student assessment program has shifted from paper-based to computer-based assessments, Dan highlights the importance of ensuring reliability, validity, fairness, and accuracy while also implementing measures to reduce student stress and anxiety.

Dan recognizes many benefits associated with modernizing assessments, noting that online approaches enhance student accessibility and engagement while decreasing anxiety levels. He highlights the value of providing immediate results to teachers to identify performance gaps and improve instructional practices, as well as the advantages of interactive reporting and dashboards for data sharing. Additionally, he emphasizes the need to raise awareness among educators and parents and guardians through resources such as research reports and sample tests. Modernizing assessments allows for greater flexibility, shorter administration times, and more efficient scoring processes.

Looking to the future of large-scale assessments, Dan acknowledges the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) to improve efficiency and reduce costs while stressing the importance of human involvement. He appreciates AI’s capacity to create high-quality assessment items and score student responses, including constructed-response items. He proposes a trial to analyze the effectiveness of combining human and AI scoring and sees potential for personalizing assessments.

Dan is also interested in developing formative assessments, particularly in mathematics, which would include progress modules that provide immediate results and support student learning improvement. Additionally, he sees opportunities to develop and implement early years reading and math screeners to identify and assist students with learning challenges early in their educational careers.

Dan’s leadership philosophy centres on empowering others to achieve their best within a well-defined culture. He prioritizes team success over individual accomplishments and emphasizes competencies, compassion, and collaboration. His extensive professional experience and achievements reflect his dedication to public education, and his expertise in assessment and innovative leadership has contributed to EQAO’s global reputation as a highly respected assessment organization.

Feel free to reach out to Dan at: dan.koenig@eqao.com.