Gordon & Heller, Inc. is a California corporation comprised of two businesses that provide educational services aimed at improving teaching and learning. Originally, the two divisions of the company were separate sole proprietorships owned and operated by Ann Gordon, PhD, BCET and Joan I. Heller, PhD. Because of their common goals and their ongoing contributions to each other’s work, the two partners decided to create a joint venture focusing on the delivery of their combined range of educational services.

In the spring of 2000, the two businesses merged and incorporated as Gordon & Heller, Inc. with these two partners as corporate officers, and moved into a suite of offices near Lake Merritt in Oakland. The two divisions of the corporation function independently, serving quite different clientele and purposes. The directors and some personnel do, however, collaborate on many of each business’s projects and activities, and administrative operations are centralized.

Educational Services Associates (ESA) provides consultation for parents, educators, and professionals around children's learning needs; referrals for students in need of support to Educational Therapists and Specialists sharing as well as ouside of ESA's office suite; and supervision for Educational Therapists and interns working on completing their required supervisory hours. Click here for more information about Dr. Ann Gordon and her background and services.

In 1983, Ann founded the first ESA in Chicago, Illinois. Dr. Gordon was responsible for developing the company from a solo practice to a group of learning specialists. The company grew from providing approximately 35 hours of services a week to approximately 100 hours a week, with a caseload of up to 70 students. In 1990, Ann relocated to California and soon thereafter founded the west coast branch of Educational Services Associates. The Oakland ESA originally operated as a group practice as well, until its recent restructure; click here for a letter to clients explaining the changes. The Chicago office of the company continues to operate independently under the direction of Nan Freund, MEd.

Along with her educational therapy practice, Dr. Gordon has also conducted and managed educational research projects at the University of Illinois at Chicago and at the University of California, Berkeley to investigate the effects of innovative instructional methods on teaching and student learning. It was through this work that she and Joan Heller began to collaborate on the delivery of educational services.

Heller Research Associates (HRA) is an educational research and development firm directed by Joan I. Heller. The company grew out of a private consulting practice established by Dr. Heller in 1990. With a background in cognitive instructional psychology, Joan brings expertise in analyzing school-based learning and thinking to the formative and summative study of educational innovations for teachers and students. Evaluation studies conducted at HRA combine quantitative and qualitative methodologies to assess the impact on teachers, classrooms, and students of teacher professional development programs, as well as classroom curricula and instruction for students.

HRA has evaluated publicly and privately funded projects aimed at improving teaching and learning in a variety of subjects including mathematics, science, and the visual and performing arts. The firm also develops and validates surveys, questionnaires, performance assessments, clinical interviews, and test items for use in research, educational settings, and state testing programs. Areas of specialization include:

About the Directors

Follow this link for information about Ann Gordon's background and services.

Joan I. Heller earned her M. and PhD in educational psychology in 1979 from the University of Pittsburgh where she did doctoral and post-doctoral work at the Learning Research and Development Center. For the next decade, Joan taught in a graduate program and directed several educational research projects at the University of California, Berkeley. On these projects she designed and assessed instructional materials, and conducted research evaluating teacher and student learning in response to experimental classroom interventions. In 1992, Joan joined the Center for Performance Assessment at Educational Testing Service where she conducted research on projects involving performance assessment. She founded Heller Research Associates in 1999 to devote all of her professional efforts to addressing the needs of educational improvement projects.