Board of Directors

“KIPP’s outcomes are critical for the world to see. They instill confidence and promote a culture of success. They have a structured approach that is really caring in addition to giving students personalized attention—all in a public school setting.”

Maria Anguiano is the Executive Vice President of the Learning Enterprise at Arizona State University, which advances universal access to opportunity for learners at every stage in life. As a first-generation college graduate, her early experience in the heart of the finance industry (Barclays Capital, Deloitte) has given her an edge in envisioning scalable models for higher education that benefit the most underserved communities. An experienced Board member, she is the Vice Chair of the Board of Regents for the University of California system and serves on the boards of the James Irvine Foundation and KIPP Foundation.

Maria holds an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a BA from Claremont McKenna College.

“In the early days of KIPP, there was a perspective that valued some level of entrepreneurship in the classroom. That included a willingness to admit if something was not working, and a willingness to try something different. These early lessons got us to scale, and were hugely beneficial. Now we realize that more standardization is necessary for quality, but you need a bit of both to continue to grow.”

Emma Bloomberg is founder and CEO of Murmuration, a non-profit tech company that works with local organizations to amplify the power of civic engagement by providing the data, tools, and research necessary to build healthier and more equitable communities.

Bloomberg has been working with communities and leaders for over 20 years to tackle some of our country’s most pressing challenges and believes deeply in community driven change. From working in the New York City mayor’s office to fighting poverty in New York, Bloomberg has worked with communities across the country to marshal the support needed for America to live up to its founding ideals. She founded Murmuration with the fundamental belief that the collective power of community-driven civic engagement can affect sustainable systems change.

Bloomberg is a board member of Bloomberg Philanthropies, KIPP Foundation, National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, UndauntedK12, and LEE. She also runs, with her sister, the Emma and Georgina Bloomberg Foundation, a private charitable foundation supporting education and animal rights groups. She has been an advisor to the Mayoral Leadership in Education Network at Harvard Kennedy School and chair of the Stand for Children Leadership Center. Bloomberg holds an A.B. from Princeton University, an MPA from The Harvard Kennedy School, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

“When you walk into a KIPP school, you see educators consistently giving their very best. The learning is rigorous and student centered, and the joy is palpable. KIPP is constantly learning and growing—getting better every year, especially through intentionally recruiting and investing in best-in-class talent. Our model creates a really great school experience, one that achieves learning goals and fully develops student identity and potential.”

Katherine Brittain Bradley founded and chairs CityBridge Foundation, an education-focused enterprise based in Washington, D.C. Katherine serves as a board member for the National Geographic Society, the D.C. College Access Program and CityTutor DC. She graduated in 1986 from Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs and served for 12 years on the Princeton University Board of Trustees. Katherine and her husband David Bradley live in Washington, D.C., and have three adult sons.

“KIPP’s teachers demonstrate everyday that all children can succeed, proving that demography does not define destiny.”

John Fisher is the Executive Vice Chairman of Pisces Inc., and Co-Founder of Sansome Partners, which are the family office and investment group, respectively, for the Fisher Family, founders of The Gap. The Doris & Donald Fisher Fund focuses on education reform and charter schools, and was founded by Doris Fisher and the late Donald Fisher.

In addition to serving on a number of corporate boards, John helped found and continues to serve on the board of Charter School Growth Fund and Silicon Schools Fund, and is a Special Advisor to the Doris & Donald Fisher Fund. He holds an AB in Politics from Princeton University and an MBA from Stanford University Graduate School of Business.

“When you invest in KIPP, you are investing in a learning organization to pioneer the public schools we need. KIPP is doing great work, achieving great results, and they are respected as the leading network of nonprofit schools. The case for KIPP is that it is delivering on the American dream of opportunity. Our challenge is, how do we grow to a more substantial scale so that more kids benefit?”

Reed Hastings became Executive Chairman of Netflix in 2023 after 25 years as CEO. He co-founded Netflix in 1997. In 1991, Reed founded Pure Software, which made tools for software developers. After a 1995 IPO, and several acquisitions, Pure was acquired by Rational Software in 1997. Reed is an active educational philanthropist and served on the California State Board of Education from 2000 to 2004. He is currently on the board of several educational organizations including KIPP and Pahara. Reed is also a board member of The City Fund and Bloomberg. He received a B.A. from Bowdoin College in 1983, and an M.S.C.S. in artificial intelligence from Stanford University in 1988. Between Bowdoin and Stanford, Reed served in the Peace Corps as a high school math teacher.

“What is the so-what of our work? That we will have thousands of young leaders of color who want to run the country, who will run the world and, in the process, change it. Leaders who are smart, prepared, as well as able to teach character as a core value. We will be able to rest easy because the country will be in good hands.”

Shavar Jeffries has been an advocate for social justice and educational equity for more than two decades. He joined the KIPP Foundation as CEO in January 2023, a culmination of his many years as a champion for KIPP schools. Shavar was founding board chair of KIPP Newark in 2001; joined the KIPP Foundation Board in 2019; and is a proud KIPP parent, as his two children graduated from KIPP Spark Academy and KIPP Team Academy in Newark. His commitment to improving education stems directly from personal experience. As a first-generation college graduate, he understands implicitly the life-changing power of a high-quality education.

Prior to joining the Foundation, Shavar was President of Education Reform Now, where he led the organization in passing well over 100 policies at the federal and state level that expanded educational opportunities for low-income students of color. Throughout his career, Shavar has practiced law, worked as an assistant attorney general in New Jersey, and served as the elected president of the Newark school board. Among many career highlights, Shavar, as school-board president, led Newark Public Schools in implementing systemic changes that produced historic gains in student outcomes; as state assistant attorney general, executed a strategy shifting juveniles from detention centers to community-based programs that produced nation-leading reductions in recidivism; and, as a civil-rights lawyer, litigated numerous class-action cases that released hundreds of millions in education funding, rescinded racially discriminatory tracking of students of color to remedial classes, and provided special-education services to tens of thousands of children.

Shavar graduated from Duke University and Columbia Law School, where he concentrated on civil rights law and policy. He has been recognized broadly for his work—by the NAACP, the National Bar Association, and the Congressional Black Caucus, among others.

“As a philanthropist, KIPP has provided a tremendous ‘return on investment’—fostering meaningful access to quality education and all the positive outcomes that follow therefrom. I have been involved personally with KIPP long enough to see the entire arc of success, from kindergarten through college graduation and beyond, watching students launch meaningful careers, many becoming advocates themselves and, at the same time, empowering their families and communities."

Martha Karsh, a University of Virginia and Virginia Law School graduate, has practiced law, co-founded an architectural and design firm, and devoted over 25 years to philanthropy after launching the Karsh Family Foundation with her husband Bruce in 1998. To date, the Karshes have committed over $400 million to support their three priorities: education, community and democracy.

Martha has served since 2012 on the national KIPP Foundation Board; she co-chairs UVA’s bicentennial “Honor the Future Campaign;” is a Trustee Emerita of Virginia Law School Foundation; and sits on the advisory Board for the Institute of Democracy at UVA.

In higher education, the Karshes have supported financial aid, professorships, and student and alumni life. They have established major scholarship programs at Duke, Virginia Law School, University of Pennsylvania, Howard, Spelman, and Brown; two programs—at Howard and Virginia Law School—are top merit scholarships. They are major supporters of UNCF and, at the K-12 level, of KIPP, Teach for America, and Charter School Growth Fund. The Karshes led KIPP’s growth in Southern California from 2 to 20 schools.

In 2023, both Bruce and Martha were awarded Honorary Doctorates at Howard University’s 155th commencement. In 2024, UNCF honored them with the President’s Award at its 80th Anniversary Gala.

To support their community, they founded the Karsh Social Service Center at Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles in 2016, providing essential services and a food pantry to those in need. They are also major supporters of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, the LA Mayor’s Fund, Painted Turtle Camp, Jewish Federation, and Skirball Cultural Center, among others.

Determined to promote and strengthen American democracy, the Karshes founded the Center for Law and Democracy at Virginia Law School in 2018, and the University-wide Institute of Democracy at UVA in 2021. To date, their commitments to UVA for education and democracy are approximately $100 million.

KIPP has the ability to speak to policy makers, to community members, to union leaders across the political spectrum. We like to share what we learn with other educators, and learn from their experiences, to bring about a deep collaborative understanding of what it takes for students who frequently face economic hardship and those that are first generation to flourish.”

After graduating from Yale University in 1992, Dave Levin joined Teach For America where he taught fifth grade in Houston, Texas. In 1994, Dave won Teacher of the Year honors from his school in Houston, the Jefferson Award for outstanding community service in the city of Houston, and an outstanding teaching award from Teach For America.

Dave co-founded KIPP, the Knowledge is Power Program, in 1994. KIPP began as a college-preparatory program with 47 fifth graders and is now a national network of PreK-12 public charter schools serving more than 175,000 students and alumni.

Dave has been awarded the Presidential Citizen’s Medal, our nation’s second highest presidential award for a private citizen; Thomas Fordham Foundation Prize for Valor; the National Jefferson Award for Distinguished Public Service by a Private Citizen; the Charles Bronfman Prize; the Ashoka Fellowship; the McGraw Hill Prize; and the National Community Service Award from Spelman College.

Dave holds an honorary doctorate of Humane Letters from both Yale University and Duke University. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Yale University. Outside of KIPP, Dave helped co-found five organizations: Relay Graduate School of Education, Zearn, the Character Lab, nXu, and Array Education, an innovation studio. Dave currently splits his time between KIPP and Array Education, where he serves as a partner. Dave lives in New York City with his wife, two sons, and three dogs.

“There are different ways to live a meaningful and rewarding life, and not all involve going to an elite college. KIPP supports all of our students and gives them the space to find out who they are and their place in the world. We strive to tell the stories of students who take another path to excellence—of students who go into the military, or who decide that they’re going to become frontline workers in a crisis.”

As President and Chief Executive Officer of the United Negro College Fund (UNCF), Dr. Michael Lomax heads the nation’s largest and most successful minority higher-education assistance organization. Immediately before joining UNCF, he served seven years as president of Dillard University in New Orleans.

Michael came to Dillard after thirty years in Atlanta, where he pursued simultaneous full-time careers as a university professor and public servant. Michael is a member of the founding Council of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture and is a member of the Boards of Directors of Teach For America and the Studio Museum in Harlem.  He is a former trustee of Emory University and the High Museum and was the founding chair of the National Black Arts Festival.

A’Dorian Murray-Thomas is the Founder and CEO of SHE Wins Inc., an organization that offers a free leadership and social action program for middle and high school girls who have been affected by violence in Newark, New Jersey. A’Dorian founded SHE Wins to create a pipeline of college, career, and community ready young women leaders using an early intervention and long-term engagement model in the city where she was born and raised. A trauma-informed program, SHE Wins consists of a Summer and Afterschool Leadership Academy where girls hone their leadership, literacy, and self-regulatory skills through mentorship, project-based learning, and service-learning opportunities. At 23 years old, A’Dorian became the youngest woman ever elected to the Newark School Board, the largest school district in state of New Jersey.

A’Dorian has been recognized as one of President Barack Obama’s 2016 White House “Champions of Change for College Opportunity”, a Glamour Magazine “College Woman of the Year”, a Youth Service America “Everyday Young Hero”, a Thomas Jefferson Governor’s Award recipient, and one of “The Root” Magazine’s 25 Young Futurists for her work in education and youth development. A’Dorian and her SHE Wins scholars have been featured in ESSENCE Magazine’s ‘Black Girl Magic’ docuseries, ABC’s “Here and Now” talk show, The New Jersey Star Ledger, USA Today, Positive Community Magazine, and Fox Nightly News.

A’Dorian formerly served at the Newark Opportunity Youth Network, where she empowered overaged and under-credited youth to reconnect to educational options, and supported restorative justice-based interventions for students on school suspension. A’Dorian is a 2016 graduate of Swarthmore College and holds a B.A. in Political Science and Educational Studies.

“I’d say our strongest asset is the incredible group of people who work for KIPP. Any one of the foundation’s leaders or the regional executive directors could have chosen different paths and would have been successful. You just can’t believe how extraordinary they are. We need to be attentive moving forward, making sure that our people get what they need.”

Mark Nunnelly is the former secretary of the Office of Technology Services and Security for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Previously he served as commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Revenue and special advisor to Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker for technology and innovation competitiveness. During his tenure, he has led a significant modernization effort across the Commonwealth’s diverse digital and technology services platform. In addition to his work for the Commonwealth, he serves on the board of directors for Dunkin’ Brands and Genpact.

From 1989–2014, he was a managing director at Bain Capital, a leading global private investment firm with approximately $70 billion of assets under management. Mark led the firm’s private equity business and served in a number of leadership roles. He also provided strategic leadership charting the firm’s expansion into multiple alternative asset classes and geographies. Prior to Bain Capital, Mark was a partner at Bain & Company. He has worked at Procter & Gamble in product management and he has been an entrepreneur.

Mark is an active supporter of a number of charitable organizations. He serves on the board of directors of New Profit (where he was the founding board chair), a national venture philanthropy fund providing social entrepreneurs with financial and strategic support. He also serves on the boards of Boston Medical Center, the Bridgespan Group, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

Mark earned an M.B.A. with distinction from Harvard Business School and a B.A. from Centre College.

“KIPP really believes in the student, and that belief has a transformative effect. All children have unbelievable potential, and, at KIPP, we support students to see that in themselves. It is not simply changing the external circumstance. It is changing the internal narrative.”

Carrie Walton Penner is an education and youth mental health advocate and owner of the Denver Broncos.

With an extensive background in education research, evaluation and philanthropy, Carrie has advised many non-profit organizations on high-impact strategies to achieve positive social change.

Through Fiore Ventures, she invests in founder-led, early-stage companies, non-profit organizations and policy initiatives focused on mental health access. Her work producing documentary films, including COVID Diaries NYC and Nuclear Fallout, has elevated voices often unheard in media.

In her role as Owner of the Broncos, Carrie is involved in all matters related to the National Football League franchise on both a team and ownership level. The Board Chair of the Denver Broncos Foundation, Carrie is actively engaged with the Broncos’ community impact, alumni relations, player wellness and organizational culture initiatives. She also serves on the NFL Foundation Board and DEI committee.

Carrie is the former Chair and current member of the Walton Family Foundation board, where she leads the K-12 Education Program Committee. Additionally, she serves on the boards of The Aspen Institute and KIPP Foundation and is a member of the Stanford University Board of Trustees.

Carrie holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and history from Georgetown University and dual master’s degrees in program evaluation and administration & policy analysis from Stanford’s Graduate School of Education.

Marsha Reeves is KIPP Baltimore’s Executive Director, providing ultimate guidance and oversight of the organization’s vision, operations, talent, and budget. Before assuming this role in 2016, Marsha served as the Chief Growth and Operations Officer for KIPP Baltimore.

Prior to pursuing her passion towards equity in public education,  Marsha was an accomplished leader in the private context, including twenty years of broad legal experience in Fortune 500 companies and both start-up and public emerging technology companies.  Reeves began her career as an associate at Latham & Watkins and served as Associate General Counsel for Technology and e-Commerce Practice group at Fannie Mae. She then became the Vice President and General Counsel for Bill Me Later and successfully led their sale to PayPal, where she continued to lead the legal team until 2014.

Marsha‘s non-profit leadership also includes serving on the boards of the Baltimore Community Foundation and the Maryland Alliance of Public Charter Schools, as well as the National Council for Arts & Sciences of the Columbian College of Arts & Sciences at George Washington University.  Reeves was a part of the 2018 class of LEADership Baltimore and was a recipient of the 2020 The Daily Record Maryland’s Top 100 Women award. Reeves holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from George Washington University and a juris doctorate from Harvard Law School.

“I serve on the board of KIPP Columbus as well as the Foundation. In Columbus, we work hard to gain the trust of families, because having families participate in their children’s school leads to greater success for everyone. We are thrilled, for example, when we host a kindergarten pancake breakfast and several hundred family members show up. That’s a sign we are creating community. For me, it is about always asking ‘how do we serve families better?’”

Abigail S. Wexner, lawyer and community volunteer, is involved in philanthropic work nationally and locally, with a particular focus on children’s issues.

Mrs. Wexner is the CEO of Whitebarn Associates, a private investment company. She serves on the boards of L Brands, Inc., The Ohio State University, Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Environmental Defense Fund, the National Veteran’s Memorial Museum, the Columbus Downtown Development Corporation, the Columbus Partnership, Pelotonia, The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, The Wexner Foundation, The Wexner Center Foundation, and the United States Equestrian Team Foundation. She is founding board member and vice chair of the board for KIPP Columbus, founder and chair of the board for The Center for Family Safety and Healing and a past chair of the Governing Committee of the Columbus Foundation and Nationwide Children’s Hospital. Mrs. Wexner also held a presidential appointment to The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

From 2005 through July 2012, Mrs. Wexner served as chair of the board of directors for Nationwide Children’s Hospital. Under Mrs. Wexner’s leadership, Nationwide Children’s completed the largest pediatric expansion in our nation’s history and has been named to U.S. News & World Report’s America’s Best Hospitals list every year since 2006.

Prior to moving to Columbus, she practiced law from 1987 to 1992 with the London and New York offices of Davis Polk & Wardwell. She is a graduate of the Dwight School, New York City; Barnard College at Columbia University, Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa; and New York University School of Law.

Mrs. Wexner is married to Leslie H. Wexner, chair emeritus and founder of L Brands, Inc. They are the parents of four children.