Executive Producer and Director

Educational Program Development

Colonial Williamsburg Foundation

Education:       Ph.D. American Studies, College of William and Mary 1998

                                B.A. History, Christopher Newport University, 1975

Bill White has been engaged with museum education for more than thirty years.  He began his career working with the public and with school children as a musician and costumed interpreter for Colonial Williamsburg.  Over several years he assumed increasing supervisory and administrative responsibilities. 

From 1985 to 1998, White served as a director for various aspects of Colonial Williamsburg’s Historic Area programming including the Director of the Company of Colonial Performers, Director Historic Area Presentations and Tours; Director Historic Trades, and Director of Historic Area Programs and Operations. 

Since 1998 White has led Colonial Williamsburg’s K-12 Education Outreach Initiative.  Concerned about the quality of history education around the nation, Colonial Williamsburg committed its resources to improve materials, quality, and teacher instruction.  As the Executive Producer and Director, Educational Program Development, White heads the Colonial Williamsburg Teacher Institute.  The Teacher Institute provides a weeklong experience for teachers in the museum experimenting with living history techniques and collaborating with peers on how those techniques can be successfully integrated into classroom instruction.  White is also the Executive Producer for Colonial Williamsburg K-12 media including the Day in the Life and Becoming Americans instructional video series.  He is the Executive Producer for the award winning Colonial Williamsburg Electronic Field Trip series, integrating video, print, and Internet technologies in an interactive experience for students and teachers.  Colonial Williamsburg’s Education Outreach Initiative also includes an extensive publishing initiative providing lesson plans, primary sources, and activity kits for the classroom.

 Colonial Williamsburg, in Williamsburg, Virginia, is the world’s largest living history museum—the restored 18th-century capital city of Britain’s largest, wealthiest, and most populous outpost of empire in the New World. Here we interpret the origins of the idea of America, conceived decades before the American Revolution. The Colonial Williamsburg story, “Becoming Americans,” tells how diverse peoples, having different and sometimes conflicting ambitions, evolved into a society that valued liberty and equality. Americans cherish these values as a birthright, even when their promise remains unfulfilled.

In Colonial Williamsburg’s 301-acre Historic Area stand hundreds of restored, reconstructed, and historically furnished buildings. Costumed interpreters tell the stories of the men and women of the 18th-century city—black, white, and Native American, slave, indentured, and free—and the challenges they faced. In this historic place, we help the future learn from the past.