Fernandez Will Strengthen the Organization’s Ongoing Efforts to Increase Its Diversity and Build Its Impact in the Movement to Close the Academic Achievement Gap
For Immediate Release
Contact: Danixa Lopez | Teach For America
305.467.5592 | danixa@santacruzpr.com
NEW YORK CITY, October 11, 2010—Teach For America, the prestigious national teaching corps, has announced the appointment of Amanda Fernandez as vice president, diversity and inclusiveness. In her new position, Fernandez will play a vital role in building on the organization’s work to increase diversity and inclusiveness and strengthen its efforts to reach the day when all children in the United States will have the opportunity to attain an excellent education.
Fernandez will serve as the main liaison between Teach For America and Hispanic organizations, working to increase Hispanic representation at all levels of the organization. In addition, she will lead initiatives to raise awareness of Teach For America through partnerships with national organizations such as the National Council of La Raza, the Hispanic Scholarship Fund, and the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities.
Fernandez will also oversee efforts to expand Teach For America’s recruiting efforts at Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs) and the recruiting of Latino college graduates more broadly. Among Teach For America’s 8,200 current teachers are nearly 600 Hispanic teachers. Teach For America also has more than 1,200 Hispanic alumni. By 2015, the organization hopes to nearly double its total teaching corps to 15,000—tripling the number of Hispanic teachers to 1,500—and reach more than 900,000 low-income students annually.
Among her responsibilities, Fernandez will implement strategies that raise awareness about the educational achievement gap between low-income students and their higher-income peers. This gap greatly affects Hispanic students, who have a very high drop-out rate from high school. According to the Pew Hispanic Center, 41 percent of Hispanics of age 20 and older do not have a regular high school diploma.
Fernandez’s professional experience includes more than 18 years in consulting and in-house human resources and a track record of achieving results for organizations focused on attracting, retaining, and advancing diverse talent. Prior to joining Teach For America, she was director, organizational consulting, for the Bridgespan Group. In that capacity, she was the lead advisor to clients on issues related to talent and organizational development.
Fernandez has also worked for Sodexho as division diversity director, and at Deloitte, where she served as national diversity manager and senior human capital consultant. She holds an M.S. in human resources education from Fordham University and a B.A. in journalism and communications from Western Illinois University.
About Teach For America
Teach For America is the national corps of outstanding recent college graduates who commit to teach for two years in urban and rural public schools and become lifelong leaders in expanding educational opportunity. Today, more than 8,200 corps members are teaching in 39 regions across the country while 20,000 Teach For America alumni continue working from inside and outside the field of education for the fundamental changes necessary to ensure educational excellence and equity. For more information, visit www.teachforamerica.org.
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