Dr. Margaret Honey, President & CEO

Dr. Margaret Honey joined the Scratch Foundation as the organization’s President & CEO in January 2024. She is widely recognized for her work using digital technologies to support children’s learning and brings decades of non-profit leadership experience and expertise to the Scratch Foundation.

Prior to joining the foundation, Dr. Honey led the New York Hall of Science (NYSCI) for 15 years, where she leveraged the museum as a platform for innovation in STEM education and developed NYSCI’s distinctive Design-Make-Play approach to STEM learning. That hands-on approach to STEM learning and engagement was infused into everything from Design Lab, one of the largest design and engineering spaces in the nation, to the long-running World Maker Faire that NYSCI hosted, to the Playground Physics app and curriculum, to Connected Worlds, one of the first and largest digitally immersive exhibits in the world. Under Dr. Honey’s leadership, NYSCI also formed a deep and lasting partnership with families, educators, and other non-profits in the Corona and East Elmhurst communities of Queens, building a STEAM-themed preschool on the NYSCI campus that brings high quality STEM learning to more than 300 3 and 4-year-olds each year.

In addition to her tenure at NYSCI, Dr. Honey also served as a Vice President of the Education Development Center and Director of EDC’s Center for Children and Technology. While at EDC, Dr. Honey was the architect and overseer of numerous large-scale projects funded by organizations including the National Science Foundation, the Institute for Education Sciences, The Carnegie Corporation, The Library of Congress, the U.S. Department of Education, and the U.S. Department of Energy. She Co-Directed the Northeast and Islands Regional Education Laboratory, a 40 million dollar federally-funded initiative designed to help educators, policy makers, and communities improve schools by helping them access and leverage the most current research about learning and K-12 education.

A graduate of Hampshire College with a doctorate in developmental psychology from Columbia University, Margaret Honey has helped to shape the best thinking about learning and technology with special attention to ensuring that all young people have access to high-quality creative learning opportunities. From her early involvement in the award-winning and ground-breaking public television series The Voyage of the Mimi to her decade-long collaboration on the education reform team for the Union City (NJ) school district, she has led some of the country’s most innovative and successful education efforts.

Dr. Honey has shared what she’s learned before Congress, state legislatures, and federal panels, and through numerous articles, chapters, and books. She has chaired multiple National Academy of Sciences consensus studies, working closely with the Board on Science Education. She is a member of the National Academy of Education and serves on the Boards of Bank Street College of Education, Post University, and Sphero.