Richard D. Kahlenberg is a Senior Fellow at The Century Foundation, where he writes about education, equal opportunity, and civil rights. He is the author of four books:

• Tough Liberal: Albert Shanker and the Battles Over Schools, Unions, Race and Democracy (Columbia University Press, 2007). The Wall Street Journal called the book "a thoroughly researched and engaging biography," while Slate called it a "stirring account." The book was written with the support of the Hewlett, Broad and Fordham foundations.
• All Together Now: Creating Middle Class Schools through Public School Choice (Brookings Institution Press, 2001). The book, labeled “a clarion call for the socioeconomic desegregation of U.S. public schools” by Harvard Educational Review, was said by the Washington Post to make “a substantial contribution to a national conversation” on education. One author called Kahlenberg "the intellectual father of the economic integration movement."
• The Remedy: Class, Race, and Affirmative Action (Basic Books, 1996). The book was named one of the best of the year by the Washington Post and William Julius Wilson’s review in the New York Times called it “by far the most comprehensive and thoughtful argument thus far for...affirmative action based on class.”
• Broken Contract: A Memoir of Harvard Law School (Hill & Wang/Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1992). The book, which details the way in which idealistic liberal law students are turned to corporate law, was called “a forceful cri de coeur” by the L.A. Times. In 1999, the book was reissued by University of Massachusetts Press with a new afterword. The book has also been translated into Japanese and Chinese.

In addition, Kahlenberg is the editor of four Century Foundation books: America’s Untapped Resource: Low-Income Students in Higher Education (2004) (Editor); Public School Choice vs. Private School Vouchers (2003) (Editor); Divided We Fail: Coming Together Through Public School Choice. The Report of The Century Foundation Task Force on the Common School, Chaired by Lowell Weicker (Executive Director) (2002); and A Notion at Risk: Preserving Public Education as an Engine for Social Mobility(Editor) (2000). Kahlenberg's articles have been published in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the New Republic, and elsewhere. Kahlenberg has appeared on ABC, CBS, CNN, FOX, C-SPAN, MSNBC, and NPR.

Previously, Kahlenberg was a Fellow at the Center for National Policy, a visiting associate professor of constitutional law at George Washington University, and a legislative assistant to Senator Charles S. Robb (D-VA). He is also a nonresident senior fellow at Education Sector. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1985 and cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1989. Between college and law school, he spent a year at the University of Nairobi School of Journalism as a Rotary Scholar. He lives with his wife, Rebecca, and four daughters outside Washington, D.C.