New York State Education Department Office of the Commissioner Audio and Video Tapes of Speeches and Interviews of Commissioner…

Arranged into two subseries: 1. Video recordings; 2. Audio recordings

Gordon MacKay Ambach was born in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1934. After graduating from the Providence school system, he went on to attend Yale as an undergraduate, and received several graduate degrees in education from both Yale and Harvard. He taught history in East Williston, New York from 1958 to 1961, eventually becoming President of the East Williston Teachers Association. He later served with the U. S. Office of Education in 1961-1962, and from 1961-1963 was a program planner and legislative assistant for U.S. Commissioner of Education Frank Keppel. In 1963-1964, he served as Executive Secretary to the Higher Education Facilities Act Task Force.

Ambach joined the New York State Education Department first as a Special Assistant, later becoming Assistant Commissioner of Education for Long-Range Planning from 1967 to 1970. From 1970 to 1977, he served as Executive Deputy Commissioner of Education. He was inaugurated as Commissioner of Education and President of the University of the State of New York in 1977, and served in that capacity until 1987. During these years, Ambach, working with the New York State Board of Regents, developed and implemented the Regents Action Plan, the most comprehensive school reform plan in the nation at the time. The Regents Action Plan enacted rigorous graduation standards and more stringent benchmarks for both teacher and school performance.

Ambach's work as commissioner also produced important changes in pre-kindergarten and adult education, as well as education technology. He played an important role at the White House Conference on Libraries and Information Science in 1979 and again in 1991. He also served on the National Commission on Libraries and Information Science from 1980 to 1985. Additionally, he continued the work of his predecessors in increasing access to education for minorities and the disabled.

In 1985, Ambach was elected President of the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO). Consequently, in 1987, he left his post as New York State Commissioner of Education to become the Executive Director of the CCSSO and continued his work in education until his eventual retirement in 2001.

This series consists of audio and video recordings of Commissioner of Education Gordon M. Ambach.

Audio recordings are of speeches and addresses given at Nazareth College and State University of New York at Geneseo, as well as meetings of education-related organizations. These organizations include the New York State School Boards Association, the New York State Council of School District Administrators, the American Association of Museums, and the New York State Retired Teachers Association. Also recorded are two appearances on call-in radio programs in Albany and Schenectady, as well as a Christmas Eve 1979 recording of a bell-ringing ceremony at the State Education Department in solidarity with the American hostages at the U.S. Embassy in Iran.

Video recordings include a number of television programs and portions of television programs intended for broadcast on New York public television stations, and for distribution via videotape through the communications networks of school districts and BOCES. These include appearances by Commissioner Ambach in videos on reading comprehension testing, the selection of district superintendents, school breakfast programs, and the importance of instructional television. Ambach also made a number of videotaped addresses shown at meetings of education organizations, designed to show the potential of video recordings for communication and instruction. Also included are segments and interviews from Albany-area television news programs, including those reporting on Ambach's appointment to the post of Commissioner of Education, and on a 1980 scandal involving the illegal sale of questions from that year's Regents examinations. The series also contains television programs in which in-studio and telephone audiences ask Commissioner Ambach questions about educational issues and NYSED policies. Also included are public service announcements for American Education Week, in which Commissioner Ambach encourages parents to visit their children's schools, and for the Parent Reading Partners program, which advise parents to read to their children for at least 15 minutes a day.

All recordings in this series have been digitized and are avaialble in State Archives Digital Collections.

Series B1829, Gordon M. Ambach Education Policy Papers, contains records from Ambach's other education-related activities, particularly his tenure as Executive Director of the Council of Chief State School Officers.

Series B1054, Photographic Prints and Negatives of Commissioner Gordon M. Ambach and Education Department Staff, dates from 1987, Ambach's last year as Commissioner of Education.

There are no restrictions regarding access to or use of this material.