INSPIRE

PRE-CONFERENCE
MICHAEL L. WILLIAMS
Commissioner of Education
Michael L. Williams was appointed Texas
Commissioner of Education by Gov. Rick
Perry on Sept. 1, 2012. As Commissioner,
he heads the Texas Education Agency,
which oversees pre-kindergarten through
high school education for approximately
five million students enrolled in both
traditional public schools and charter
schools. During his distinguished career,
Williams has served as an assistant district attorney in hometown of
Midland, a federal prosecutor in the Reagan Justice Department,
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Law Enforcement at the U.S. Department
of the Treasury under President George Herbert Walker Bush, and
Assistant Secretary of Education for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department
of Education. In 1998, Gov. George W. Bush appointed Williams to the
Railroad Commission of Texas, the three-member commission which
oversees oil and gas regulation. Texans subsequently elected him to the
Commission in 2000, 2002 and 2008. The son of public school teachers,
Williams holds a Bachelor’s, Master’s and law degree from the University
of Southern California, and has been married to his best friend, Donna,
for more than 25 years.
62
#AIEConf