EDUCATION
Nonprofit Organization Dedicated to Expanding Educational Opportunity Ranks No. 82 on Annual List
F
ORTUNE announced recently that Teach For America, the national
nonprofit organization that enlists top college graduates in the movement to end educational inequity, ranks No. 82 on the magazine’s annual list of “Best Companies to Work For.” This is Teach For America’s first time on the list. The organization, which is one of only ten new companies to be included, is the only non profit outside of the health- care industry among this year’s honor- ees.
Teach For America recruits, trains,
and supports promising future lead- ers who commit to teach for two years in urban and rural schools and work throughout their lives to expand edu-
cational opportunity. More than 8,200 Teach For America teachers are work- ing in 31 states and the District of Columbia, and the program’s 20,000 alumni are a leadership force in the movement for educational equity and excellence. Teach For America’s nearly 1,500
staff members play a critical role in the effort to eliminate our nation’s academic achievement gap. Staff mem- bers bring a range of backgrounds and experiences, with approximately half being Teach For America alumni, and one-third identifying as people of color, including 10 percent who iden- tify as African American, and 7 percent who identify as Latino or Hispanic.
More than 600 staff members have earned graduate degrees, and Teach For America is among the top 100 com- panies where M.B.A. students said they would most like to work, accord- ing to CNN. “Our staff members are deeply com-
mitted to our mission. They are work- ing tirelessly every day to foster and support the impact of our corps mem- bers and alumni,” said Wendy Kopp, founder and CEO of Teach For Amer- ica. “We know that ultimately our im- pact is a function of the caliber and di- versity of our team and the strength of our culture, our people-development programs, and our management sys- tems, so we work hard to continuously
Amanda Fernandez Vice President of Teach For America
A
t the end of 2010, Amanda Fernandez was appointed Vice President of diversity and inclusiveness for Teach
for America, a prestigious national teaching corps. Fernan- dez, an 18 year veteran of consulting and in-house human resources will now play a vital role to build and increase diversity and inclusiveness for Teach for America. She will also work to strengthen its efforts be sure each child has an opportunity to attain an excellent education. Teach for America has been around since the early 1990’s
and is now one of the nation’s largest service organization in the U. S. The organization focuses on the recruitment of teachers and staff of multiple backgrounds to serve as teach- ers, role models and mentors to students of disadvantaged communities. Amanda Fernandez will serve as the main li- aison to increase Latino representation at all levels of the or- ganization. “It is a reality in our country that where a child is born, determines the quality of education and their life prospects,” states Fernandez, whose main strategy will be
38 HISPANIC NETWORK MAGAZINE
to raise awareness in order to close the achievement gap. Due to the rapid rise in the Latino population, it is often
quite difficult for students to relate to their teachers. Fer- nandez suggests that “by having teachers that share the same background, the population that we serve will have an additional role for impact.” The organization serves in over 350 schools nationwide by hiring teachers who have recently and successfully graduated from college who have high achieving goals. Among some of Teach for America’s 8,200 current teachers, nearly 600 are Latino. The organi- zation hopes to double its teaching corps to 15,000 Latino teachers by 2015. As the Vice President of diversity and inclusiveness for
Teach for America, Amanda Fernandez has four initiatives to increase diversity for the organization, n “Creating national partnerships with Latino Organi-
zations to help us identify Latino talent for our corps as well as for our staff.
Celebrating 19 Years of Diversity
www.hnmagazine.com
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