Hilderbrand Pelzer III is an award-winning educator with three decades of wide-ranging experience. Having served as an assistant regional superintendent, a principal, an assistant principal, and a teacher, Pelzer is highly familiar with the interconnected pathway of educational problems and solutions from the classroom to the district level.

As the author of Unlocking Potential: Organizing a School Inside a Prison, Pelzer has earned a national reputation for his achievements in expanding opportunities in highly challenging schools and educational environments. Among his many notable accomplishments is the creation of an evidence-based school model for incarcerated youth in Philadelphia’s correctional facilities. His passion for education and disadvantaged youth has equipped him to meet the needs of the most underserved students, demonstrated in his achievement of numerous national and local awards.

Pelzer is also a speaker. His presentations highlight the intersection of education and incarceration. His TEDx talk “What Incarcerated Youth Can Teach Teachers” illuminates issues related to inadequate reading instruction, educational inequities, and illiteracy in the juvenile justice system. Pelzer’s education perspective is defined by incarcerated youths’ experience with school failure and the belief that their insights can strengthen educators understanding of when and how to raise the academic bar while teaching.