Dr. Donna Y. Ford did it for her son.
She was single and 18 when she gave birth to Khyle, and he motivated her to aim higher.
An Illinois native raised in Cleveland, Ford enrolled at Cleveland State University and earned a bachelor’s degree in communications and Spanish, a master’s in counseling and a Ph.D. in urban education. Then she embarked on a career in higher education that ultimately landed her at Vanderbilt University as a permanent Cornelius Vanderbilt endowed chair and a professor of education and human development in the department of special education with a joint appointment in the department of teaching and learning.
“I wanted to be a role model for my son,” Ford says, reflecting on a career path that took her from Cleveland State to the University of Kentucky to the Ohio State University to Vanderbilt. “I wanted him to be proud, and I wanted to send a positive message about Black moms who have kids and aren’t married. Everything I did early on was to show my son what it means to be diligent and successful.”
That included making her own decisions.
“I was pushed into engineering,” she recalls, by advisers who told her she was smart and should study that field. But she didn’t like it and soon took a leave from college to deliver her child but returned in a year and graduated on time.
Informed by her life experiences, Ford’s areas of scholarship encompass gifted education with an emphasis on minority children and youth; recruitment and retention of racially different students in gifted education and Advanced Placement programs; closing achievement and opportunity gaps by race and income; equity issues in testing and assessment; and multicultural and urban education.
