Sarah-SoonLing Blackburn, Ed.D.

Sarah-SoonLing Blackburn, Ed.D. is Vice President for Research, Learning, and Impact. She leads the strategy for evidence, learning, and impact measurement in service of MDC’s mission and priorities so that leaders, teams, funders, and partners can make better decisions grounded in rigorous analysis, community-informed learning, and measurable progress.

Sarah-SoonLing was born in Bangkok, Thailand into a mixed-race Malaysian Chinese and white American family. A classic “third culture kid,” she grew up moving between various East and Southeast Asian countries and the Washington DC area. Sarah-SoonLing moved to the Deep South in 2009, and she has now lived there longer than anywhere else. Her experiences first as a classroom teacher and later as a teacher educator inform her beliefs about the role that education can and must play in the realization of social justice.

Sarah-SoonLing taught third and fourth grade in Arkansas and Mississippi. In 2011 she was Teacher of the Year at Lakeside Upper Elementary School. After leaving the classroom, Sarah-SoonLing worked as a trainer of teachers, a classroom culture specialist, and in various education nonprofit roles.

Outside of her work in education, Sarah-SoonLing has been a speaker, professional trainer, and coach who focuses on organizational cultures, communication skills, leadership, and belonging. She particularly enjoys working with AAPI groups on topics of solidarity, inclusion, and how understanding history can help to shape a better future. Sarah-SoonLing is the author of Exclusion and the Chinese American Story, a Junior Library Guild Gold Medal selection.

Sarah has a B.A. from Haverford College, an M.A. in Social Justice and Education from University College London’s Institute of Education, and an Ed.D. from Johns Hopkins University. An avid crossword puzzler, she lives in Oxford, Mississippi.