WestEd's Bo De Long-Cotty is a developmental psychologist with more than 20 years of research and development experience in PreK-12 social-emotional and cognitive development and education.

De Long-Cotty has conducted extensive work in youth development and resiliency; health, prevention, and intervention; character education; developmentally appropriate product design and practices (e.g., toys, games, books, activity kits, software); evaluation and assessment; research in educational and instructional technology; teaching; and curriculum development.

Since 1991, De Long-Cotty has worked for WestEd, where she serves as Director of several projects in two WestEd programs - Health and Human Development; and Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. De Long-Cotty served as Director of the Learning and Teaching with Technology initiative for the WestEd Regional Technology Education Consortium.

De Long-Cotty's work includes developing resiliency and character education programs and curriculum; evaluating science and mathematics programs, curricula, and teacher professional development; developing curricula; evaluating and reviewing technology-mediated curricula (youth development, math, science, technology, reading, music, literacy, and health); and evaluating the impact of youth development and prevention programs in schools and community-based organizations.

She also provides information and resources to teachers and families to promote community/home involvement in education; and evaluates and develops parent and teacher professional development programs and projects.

In addition, De Long-Cotty works as designer of preschool through sixth-grade educational content and play (e.g., animation, chapter and activity books; computer, online, and table games) for Life’s Building Blocks, a San Diego-based character education company.

She also has created developmentally appropriate pre- to middle-school social and educational content (health and fitness, social development, reading, music, and mathematics) for Alligator Planet, a San Francisco-based film and animation studio.

She has served as a multimedia curriculum and product designer and character and story developer for language arts, math, and science for Disney Ed Studio and for Holt, Rinehart, and Winston Publishers. She provided a formative review of character and story development and designed take-home activity kits for GALAXY Classroom Science and Language Arts – a multimedia, K-5 educational program.

De Long-Cotty received a BA in fine arts and psychology from Purdue University, an MA in developmental psychology from Teachers’ College/Columbia University, and a PhD in developmental psychology from the University of California, Berkeley.