Penelope Pak McMillen is the senior director of formal learning at the KIPP Foundation, where she designs and leads the national professional learning strategy for principals and principal managers. Her work centers on building the systems, structures, and capacity so that leaders can coach and manage towards instructional academic excellence and equitable student outcomes.

Penelope began her career in the classroom as a high school english teacher at a charter school. She later became the school’s principal, leading a bold transformation from a traditional instructional model to a personalized learning approach built to meet the needs of diverse learners. Under her leadership, instructional systems strengthened, student engagement deepened, and student outcomes remained consistently high.

After her principalship, Penelope turned her focus to scaling impact nationwide as the national director of school and district success with Summit Learning. She helped expand the innovative school model she once led to 380 schools across 40 states, reaching more than 80,000 students. She coached state, regional, and district leaders to implement high-quality, project-based learning curriculum, social-emotional learning, and blended learning with clarity, coherence, and measurable results. At Transcend, she also partnered with schools and districts to redesign traditional schools and support the model implementation journey. With a community-driven school redesign process, Penelope supported the development and execution of a multi-year school redesign plan to transform traditional schools and implement high-quality instructional materials, blended learning, and high-dosage tutoring.

Penelope holds a master’s degree in education from Teachers College, Columbia University and dual bachelor’s degrees in mass communications and political science from University of California, Berkeley. She lives in the Washington, D.C. area with her family.