Martha Kanter

Board Member

Martha J. Kanter is chancellor of the Foothill-De Anza Community College District, one of the largest community college districts in the country, serving more than 44,000 students. Dr. Kanter came to California in 1977 after serving as an alternative high school teacher at Lexington High School, the Public Schools of the Tarrytowns, and later at The Searing School in New York City. In California, she set up the first program for students with learning disabilities at San Jose City College. From there, she served as a director, dean and subsequently as the vice chancellor for policy and research of the California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office in Sacramento. Later, she returned to San Jose City College as vice president of instruction and student services. In 1993 she was selected to be president of De Anza College, where she served until becoming chancellor in 2003.

She holds a bachelor's degree from Brandeis University, a master's in education from Harvard University and a doctorate in organization and leadership from the University of San Francisco. Her doctoral research explored the "Relationship of Demographic, Institutional, and Assessment Factors Affecting Access to Higher Education for Underrepresented Students in the California Community Colleges." Over the years, she has been president of several statewide associations: ACCCA, the Association of California Community College Administrators; LARC, the Learning Assessment Retention Consortium; and CAPED, the California Association of Postsecondary Educators of the Disabled. In the Silicon Valley and statewide, she serves on several nonprofit boards. She is co-chair of Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network, Inc., a trustee of the San Jose Museum of Art, and board president of the Community College Leadership Development Institute Foundation.

In addition, Dr. Kanter is a senior fellow of the American Leadership Forum-Silicon Valley. Nationally, she is chair of the Community College Advisory Panel of The College Board. In 1996 she was named Woman of the Year by the 24th Assembly District and Woman of Achievement by the San Jose Mercury News and the Women's Fund. In 1999 she was named "Woman of the Year" for Santa Clara County by the American Association of University Women.

During Dr. Kanter's tenure as president of De Anza, the college consistently ranked among the top five transfer institutions to California's public and private universities. In 1994, Dr. Kanter opened the first Advanced Technology Center in the state's community colleges, a 66,000-square-foot interdisciplinary center for information technology, engineering, arts and science.

As a result of the passage of Measure E by voters within the cities of the Foothill-De Anza Community College District, Chancellor Kanter and her team are leading the complete renovation of district classroom and student service facilities more than 40 years old and building new science, arts and student centers at both Foothill and De Anza colleges. Dr. Kanter is focused on building community excellence as Foothill-De Anza expands its leadership role in educating more than 45,000 students each quarter of the year.

In MentorNet, Martha sees a tool to help De Anza's women students pursuing science and engineering careers. "When I first heard of MentorNet, it was so exciting to me, because at De Anza we have a lot of women in math, science, and technology curricula, and we're concerned about retaining them." she says. "Right away I saw that community colleges would be prime places for MentorNet resources to be applied. Fifty percent of all post-secondary students in the U.S. are enrolled in community colleges; moreover, 80 percent of minority students in four-year schools came from community colleges, and 53 percent of those are women."

Soon after hearing of MentorNet, Martha met Executive Director Carol Muller, and the two began discussing the "pipeline" of community college students that feed four-year schools. That led to them co-authoring a proposal to the U.S. Department of Education's Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education for a pilot program to expand MentorNet's program to a small group of community colleges. The pilot was funded for three years, and De Anza housed the MentorNet program coordinator.

"As we use email for mentoring, we need to monitor, evaluate, and learn if mentored students did get retained, if we do have more women coming into technology jobs and at higher levels, and so on," Martha says. "The MentorNet strategy is being well-researched and well-tested as a retention force for women students, and we need to provide research-and-development leadership on this issue."