Michael T. Nettles is Senior Vice President of ETS’s Policy Evaluation & Research Center, where he oversees ETS’s public policy research program.  He is also responsible for advancing the application of ETS’s research and information to address critical education challenges. 

Nettles is ETS’s Edmund W. Gordon Chair for Policy Evaluation and Research, a position created by the ETS Board of Trustees in 2004.  

Nettles’ history with ETS dates back to 1984 when he joined as a Research Scientist and was later promoted to Senior Research Scientist in the Division of Education Policy Research.  Nettles left ETS in 1989 to assume the position of Vice President for Assessment of the University of Tennessee Systems.  Before returning to ETS in 2003, Nettles also served for twelve years as a tenured professor of education at the University of Michigan.  

Nettles’ has held several other professional positions.  He served as the first Executive Director of the Fredrick D. Patterson Research Institute of the United Negro College Fund from 1996 to 1999, where he published the three-volume African American Education Data Book series and Two Decades of Progress—the most comprehensive reference books ever produced about the educational status and condition of African Americans in the United States.  From 1978-1984 he worked as Assistant Director for Academic Affairs for the Tennessee Higher Education Commission where his work included academic program review, and college and university performance funding.   

Nettles is a former Trustee of the College Board on which he served on the Executive Committee, and a former member of the National Assessment Governing Board where he served as Vice Chairman.