Board of Directors
Ethan Beard, Director of Platform Partnerships, Facebook
Alexandra Bernadotte, Founder & CEO, Beyond 12
Natasha Dolby, Philanthropic Consultant
Deborah McGriff, Partner, NewSchools Venture Fund (Board Chair)
Scott Morgan, CEO & Founder, Education Pioneers (Board Secretary)
Adam Park, Vice President Business Development, Exponent Partners
Eric Schwarz, Co-Founder and CEO, Citizen Schools
Natalie A. Walrond, Education Consultant (Board Treasurer)
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Ethan Beard serves as Director of Platform Partnerships for Facebook, where he oversees worldwide partner relations for companies building on Facebook Platform, including apps on Facebook and Facebook Connect for mobile and web. He previously served as Director of Business Development at Facebook and led the team responsible for creating and managing strategic partnerships. Ethan joined Facebook from Google, where he served as Director of Social Media and Director of New Business Development. Prior to Google, he spent several years as Director of Business Development for MTV Online. Earlier in his career, Ethan co-founded BigSoccer, an online community for soccer fans and spent time structuring derivatives at Bank of America. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics from the Wharton School of Business and an MBA from NYU Stern. Originally from New England, Ethan now resides in San Francisco with his wife and two children. |
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Alex, Founder & CEO of Beyond 12, has more than 15 years of executive management and strategic development experience in both the nonprofit and private sectors. Before creating Beyond 12, she served as an associate partner at NewSchools Venture Fund, where she oversaw the firm's work to build community and share knowledge among its entrepreneurs, and also guided the organization's efforts to ensure that its portfolio organizations prepare students to not only attend college, but to persist and graduate. In 2009, Alex became an Entrepreneur in Residence at NewSchools, where she developed the business plan for Beyond 12. Alex's previous professional experience includes serving as executive director of The Princeton Review's Silicon Valley office, co-founder and vice president of marketing and online strategy at educational travel startup Explorica, director of operations at EF Education, and operations manager at the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, where she coordinated the efforts of an international youth substance abuse prevention foundation. Alex was also the executive director of Foundation for a College Education (FCE), a nonprofit in East Palo Alto, California, whose mission is to increase the number of students of color who enroll in and graduate from college. She recently completed a 3-year term as president of the FCE board of directors, currently serves on the FCE advisory board and is a volunteer mentor for a group of FCE college students. Alex received her undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College and earned a master's degree with a concentration in policy and organizational leadership from the Stanford University School of Education. |
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Natasha's career in the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors spans over a decade, with extensive experience in marketing and communications, volunteer engagement, corporate development, and financial and programmatic analysis, in San Francisco, New York, and Washington, D.C. For the last four years, Natasha worked as a Program Officer at Pacific Foundation Services, where she helped a number of Bay Area foundations plan, execute, and oversee their strategic giving in a multitude of portfolio areas including access to college, basic needs, workplace and vocational skills, substance abuse prevention and healthy living, environmental education and cultural enrichment. In addition to her MBA from The Stanford University Graduate School of Business, Natasha holds her MA in Education from The Stanford University School of Education and her BA in Journalism from Hofstra University. Originally from Brazil, Natasha is fluent in Portuguese and has an affinity for languages. Natasha is part of Stanford's Alumni Consulting Team (ACT) providing pro-bono consulting services to Bay Area nonprofits. |
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Deborah McGriff is a partner at NewSchools Venture Fund, where she leads the firm's Academic Systems Initiative, and contributes to investment strategy and management assistance for a variety of its portfolio ventures, including charter management and school turnaround organizations. In addition to Beyond 12, she serves on the board of directors of Black Alliance for Educational Options, DC Prep, Friendship Public Charter School, National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, and Leadership Public Schools. Deborah has been committed to transforming the lives of underserved urban school students for almost four decades. In 1993, Deborah became the first public school superintendent to join EdisonLearning (formerly Edison Schools). There, she held numerous positions at the company, including President of Edison Teachers College, Executive Vice President of Charter Schools, and Executive Vice president of several external relations functions. Prior to joining EdisonLearning, Deborah served as the first female General Superintendent of the 200,000-student Detroit Public Schools. Crain's Detroit Business named her Newsmaker of the Year for 1992. Before that, she was the first female Assistant Superintendent in Cambridge, Massachusetts and the first female Deputy Superintendent in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She was a teacher and administrator in the New York City Public Schools for more than a decade. Deborah has never supported the status quo; she has always been an advocate of parental choice, quality teaching, and high-performing schools for all children. Deborah is former President of the Education Industry Association, the leading professional association of education service providers. She currently serves on the board of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, where she also is an executive committee member, as well as founder and national board member of the Black Alliance for Educational Options. She also serves on the advisory boards of the National Council on Teacher Quality and of the Program on Education Policy and Governance at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, as well as the Technical Working Group for a national evaluation of the Federal Charter Schools Program being led by WestEd. She holds a bachelor's degree in education with a minor in history from Norfolk State University, a master's degree in education with a specialization in reading pedagogy from Queens College of the City University of New York, and a doctorate in Administration, Policy and Urban Education from Fordham University. |
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Scott Morgan is the founder and CEO of Education Pioneers, a national nonprofit that recruits and trains a new generation of education leaders dedicated to transforming education. Scott began his career teaching social studies and leadership at St. Jude High School in Montgomery, Alabama, where he won an Excellence in Teaching award. Upon graduation from Stanford Law School, Scott put his legal skills and training to use in the education sector as the legal counsel for Aspire Public Schools, a California nonprofit that builds and operates high-quality public charter schools to prepare urban students for college. After seeing the power of professionals with diverse skills, experiences, and perspectives working to improve urban education, Scott founded Education Pioneers in 2003 to develop a national network of leaders focused on devising and implementing creative solutions to our nation's most pressing educational problems. |
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In his role as Vice President of Business Development, Adam leads Exponent Partners' sales and marketing efforts. He brings extensive leadership experience at both early stage and mature technology companies. Prior to Exponent Partners, Adam was the President and COO of Beyond 12, a national nonprofit organization that provides technology solutions to help underserved students succeed in college. Previously, he was the President and a Board Member of Embark, a leading provider of cloud business solutions for university admissions offices, and the VP of Operations at The Princeton Review, where he led the operations of all business lines within the Admissions Services Division. Adam received his bachelor's degree in mass communications with highest honors from the University of California, Berkeley and his master's in management from the Stanford Graduate School of Business. |
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Eric Schwarz is the Co-Founder and CEO of Citizen Schools, a leading education nonprofit that partners with middle schools to expand the learning day for low-income children across the country. Citizen Schools was awarded Fast Company magazine's Social Capitalist Award in 2004, 2006, 2007, and 2008, and the Skoll Foundation's Skoll Award in Social Entrepreneurship in 2005. Schwarz has been tapped to speak about education reform and expanded learning time at numerous conferences across the country, and has served as a member of the Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education's Task Force on 21st Century Skills, the Center for American Progress working group on Expanded Learning Time, the transition team of Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, and the Social Entrepreneur Advisory Board for New Profit's Gathering of Leaders. He is the author of "Realizing the American Dream: Historical Scorecard, Current Challenges, Future Opportunities," a widely cited essay examining social change efforts and the role of social entrepreneurs, and co-editor of The Case for Twenty-First Century Learning. Previously, Schwarz served as a Public Service Fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, as executive director of City Year Boston, and as a vice president at City Year. He also served as national student director for Gary Hart's 1984 Presidential campaign and as a journalist and columnist at The Oakland Tribune and The Patriot Ledger, where he won two national awards and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Schwarz earned his B.A. at the University of Vermont and his Masters in Education at Harvard University. |
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Natalie A. Walrond is a founding board member of Beyond 12 and serves as the treasurer for the organization. She brings to the organization extensive experience in education, finance, and strategy. Most recently, Natalie was an associate partner at NewSchools Venture Fund, where she co-founded and managed the firm's academic systems work. Prior to joining NewSchools, Natalie served as chief financial officer and treasurer of Creative Commons Corporation. She also spent four years in investment management at Northwestern Mutual Life, where she was responsible for the emerging markets public equity portfolio, and five years in investment banking, where she worked as a senior equity research analyst conducting deep primary research on business services, particularly those in the education sector, including K-12, post-secondary, and corporate education software companies. Natalie earned a bachelor's degree in international studies and international business from Trinity University and an MBA from the University of Chicago, with concentrations in analytic finance and policy studies. She is also the chair of the board of directors of Envision Schools, a charter school management organization that aims to bring high-quality college preparatory education to communities with the greatest need; The Generation Project, an education philanthropy that allows donors to become actively involved in their giving; and Live Oak School, an independent K-8 day school in San Francisco. |
