Karen Gross

Karen Gross is a Salem MA based educator, author and artist. She has served as an advisor to non-profit schools and organizations and governments across the globe. Her work focuses on student success across the educational landscape and the impact of trauma on learning and psychosocial development. She has dealt with institutions planning for and dealing with person and nature made disasters including the Pandemic, shootings, suicides, hurricanes and floods as well as incidents or patterns of harassment and discrimination.

For 8 years, she served as President of Southern Vermont College and she also served as Senior Policy Advisor to the US Department of Education during the Obama Administration. She has served on several local and national boards of non-profit institutions. Currently, she sits on the Advisory Council for MSI’s at the Proctor Institute, Rutgers Graduate School of Education and on the Champions of Education Workforce at Pen America. She also co-funded and runs the Virtual Teachers Lounge, an online setting where educators connect and engage with each other over current hurdles facing the preK – adult educational landscape.

In addition to her four award winning adult books (including Trauma Doesn’t Stop at the School Door (2020)), she is the author of a children’s book series titled Lady Lucy’s Quest (re-released in 2025 – 2026), several books of which are translated into Spanish. She can often be found reading to children in schools around the world in multiple languages, having read to over 3500 children since the Pandemic. She also blogs regularly on Medium and has authored numerous articles in educational publications.

Her artwork has appeared in juried and non-juried shows in a museum, galleries, magazines and educational institutions. Her work is varied and is commonly textured through the use of common objects like yarn, zippers, envelopes, marbles, thread, buttons and bubble wrap. She has created a public responsive art installation project on detained children’s letters from Dilley, TX, partially funded by the Creative County Initiative (Essex County, MA); it is showing at various locations in Essex County over the next several months, including Salem’s Old Town Hall.