Barbara Oakley

Barbara Oakley, Ph.D., is a professor of engineering at Oakland University and a leading authority on cognitive science and learning. Once terrified of math, she failed it repeatedly in high school before joining the U.S. Army, where she worked as a Russian translator in Antarctica. Determined to overcome her “math phobia,” she relearned mathematics as an adult, eventually earning advanced degrees in electrical engineering and systems engineering.

Oakley co-created the world-famous online course “Learning How to Learn,” taken by over four million students worldwide. Her other books include Mindshift, Learning How to Learn for Kids, and Uncommon Sense Teaching. She is a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering and a passionate advocate for democratizing learning through neuroscience. Her journey from failure to expertise embodies the very lessons she teaches: with persistence, curiosity, and the right mental approach, anyone can rewire their brain for success.