
Board of Directors
Our Directors are leaders in the fields of banking and investment, technology, education, media, marketing, hospitality, health sciences, entrepreneurship and real estate.
![]() | Brandon Robinson, ChairBrandon Robinson is a Managing Director at Neuberger Berman and is head of Financial Planning & Analysis and the Co-Lead of the multi-year Neuberger Berman “Strengthening Our Core” Global Initiative. Brandon is a member of the Neuberger Berman Operating Committee. He earned a BA from Brigham Young University in political science with a minor in philosophy and holds an MBA from Brigham Young University where he received the top honor of the Hawes Scholar Award. He is chair of the Black Diversity Task Force at Neuberger Berman and is a senior sponsor of the Neuberger Berman partnership with Frederick Douglass Academy II, a public school in Harlem. |
![]() | Roger BlissettRoger Blissett is Managing Director & Deputy General Counsel at MUFG. He was previously Vice President and Branch Manager of the U.S. licensed offices of Royal Bank of Canada, primarily focused on institutional clients and capital markets activities. |
![]() | Randolph NelsonRandolph Nelson is President of Sanguine Gas Exploration LLC. Prior to working at Sanguine, he was a Senior Account Officer at Citibank in the Leveraged Lending Group. |
![]() | Mimi Clarke Corcoran, SecretaryMimi Corcoran is President of the National Center for Learning Disabilities. Ms. Corcoran was previously Vice President of Talent Development at New Visions for Public Schools, and before that she was the director of the Special Fund for Poverty Alleviation at The Open Society Foundations, and served as the Executive Director of the Beginning with Children Foundation, Inc. |
![]() | Kevin Brandmeyer, Treasurer & Vice ChairKevin Brandmeyer co-runs a seven-person coverage team in Goldman, Sachs & Co.’s Investment Management Division and heads up many of the team’s strategic relationships with Endowments, Foundations, Family Offices and owners of private companies. |
![]() | Saskia Traill, PhDPresident & CEOPrior to leading policy and research efforts at ExpandED Schools, Saskia worked to build state systems for early care and education. She has authored and co-authored articles for peer-reviewed journals, policy briefs, reports on a range of issues, and an essay on voter registration in a book about civic service (which included being recorded on a CD with Al Gore). Saskia earned a BA from Columbia University and a PhD in research psychology from Stanford University, and credits winning the Baltimore Science Fair in middle school with bolstering her love of science. She currently enjoys passing along that love of science to her twins. |
![]() | Pam BinghamPam Bingham is an independent art advisor at Bingham Art Advisory and former Director of Business Development for Bonhams. Pam has mentored many of the next generation of art specialists and been a supporter of young people interested in the arts. Pam attended Yale University, where she graduated with a BA in History of Art. |
![]() | Joseph D. BorreroJoseph Borrero is a Vice President in Global Compliance at Goldman Sachs & Co. He manages a team that conducts compliance testing of the firm’s Private Wealth Management division. Previously, he was an associate at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, specializing in antitrust and securities litigation. He is also a Deputy Regional President of the Hispanic National Bar Association and is an advocate for the advancement of minorities within the legal profession. |
![]() | Leon BotsteinLeon Botstein is the President of Bard College. He is also the music director and principal conductor of the American Symphony Orchestra and the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the radio orchestra of Israel. |
![]() | Esther DysonEsther Dyson is Executive Founder of Way to Wellville, a 10-year nonprofit project which operates in five small U.S. communities, helping them to improve their own health. Its mission is "to demonstrate the social and economic benefits of investing in health and resilience, versus trying to fix things with expensive health care when it's too late." |
![]() | Greg FarrellGreg Farrell is the founder and President Emeritus of EL Education (formerly Expeditionary Learning Schools Outward Bound). He came to work at Outward Bound in 1990, after nearly 20 years on the national Outward Bound Board of Directors, during which time he was Executive Director of the Fund for the City of New York, a foundation established by the Ford Foundation to help improve the quality of life in New York City. He graduated from Princeton with a B.A. in English in 1957, and did graduate work at the Rutgers Urban Studies Center and the Harvard Graduate School of Design. |
![]() | Eloner HabtezghiEloner is Managing Partner at 2020 Global Ventures, LLC, an independent advisory and consultancy group specializing in energy and related sectors for Africa & Latin America regions. Previously, she held leadership roles at BNP Paribas Securities and KPMG Corporate Finance. She earned her BS in Petroleum Engineering at University of Oklahoma and MBA from Southern Methodist University. Eloner has been involved with tutoring and mentoring youth and participated in Financial Women’s Association of NY's mentoring program. |
![]() | Timothy L. HarrodTim Harrod is Vice President and Senior Credit Officer at Moody’s. He is responsible for a portfolio of companies in the automotive supplier sector for which he assesses industry, company, management, and corporate financial wherewithal in the evaluation of credit risk. Prior to joining Moody’s he was a Managing Director/Senior Portfolio Manager at HVB Credit Advisors where he was responsible for the risk/return and operational performance of a collateralized loan obligation and co-headed the approval and monitoring process of the company’s assets under management. In addition, he held positions at TD Securities (USA), and Credit Lyonnais (New York) in various leveraged finance and credit roles. He holds a BS in Operations Research from Cornell University and a MBA in Finance from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. |
![]() | Andrew KaufmanAndrew Kaufman is a Vice President of Leveraged Loan and High Yield Syndication at Macquarie Capital, where he is a senior member of a five-person team focused on structuring, pricing, and executing leveraged loan and high yield financing transactions. He has executed transactions in a variety of sectors and his current focus sectors include Industrials, Infrastructure & Energy, Consumer & Retail, and Gaming. Andrew holds a BA in History and Economics from Yale. |
![]() | Michael LevineMichael Levine is the Enterprise Sales Manager at LinkedIn. He has worked in media sales across print, digital, mobile, and social platforms for a number of industry leading organization such as EMEA, APAC, and now North America. He specializes in digital in social networking media, along with consulting on creative marketing solutions for advertisers. Michael holds a Bachelor’s in Communication and Media Studies from the University of Melbourne. |
![]() | Erin McBrideErin McBride is the Head of Display Specialists within the gTech Professional Services organization at Google. In that capacity, she focuses on providing technical support to Google’s display advertising partners. Previously, Erin held multiple roles at Bridgewater Associates in the client service department. Erin has a BA in Economics from Hamilton College and a MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. |
![]() | Justin PeagramJustin Peagram is a Director at Barclays in the Investment Banking Division, working in the Global Natural Resources group. He has spent his career at Lehman Brothers/Barclays, starting out as an analyst in 2007. Justin has worked on numerous M&A, Equity and Debt transactions across the Energy space. Justin holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Babson College in Massachusetts. |
![]() | Shael Polakow-SuranskyShael Polakow-Suransky became the 8th president of Bank Street College of Education on July 1, 2014. Prior to this role, he was the second-in-command at the New York City Department of Education, serving as Chief Academic Officer and Senior Deputy Chancellor. In the nation’s largest school system, he oversaw teaching and learning across more than 1,600 district schools and was a strong advocate for teacher and principal autonomy, balanced accountability, and reforms designed to improve learning experiences for the City's most vulnerable students. Earlier in his career, he worked as a teacher and founding principal of Bronx International High School. He holds a BA from Brown University, and a Master’s Degree in Educational Leadership from Bank Street. |
![]() | Richard RobertsRichard Roberts is Principal and Managing Director of Acquisitions for Red Stone Equity Partners,. He is the founding Managing Director of the Goldman Sachs Urban Investment Group and Chair of the Board for Global Kids. Richard is a graduate of Yale University and Yale Law School. |
![]() | Stella SafoDr. Stella A. Safo is the Chief Medical Officer of the Arnhold Institute for Global Health in the Mount Sinai Health Partners and program lead for the Health System Design portfolio; in that capacity, she leads a multidisciplinary team in the design and implementation of population health care models that are cost-efficient and achieve improved health outcomes for high-risk populations. After completing a dual undergraduate degree in History and African American Studies from Harvard College, she received her medical degree from Harvard Medical School and a master’s degree in public health at the Harvard School of Public Health. |
![]() | Rachel SkaistisRachel Skaistis is a partner with Cravath, Swaine & Moore’s Litigation Department. She serves on the board of New York Lawyers for the Public Interest (NYLPI) and the advisory board for the National Women’s Law Center. In 1999, she served a one year clerkship with Hon. Shira A. Scheindlin of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. |
![]() | Rachel SteinbergRachel Steinberg is an Account Executive of Marketing Solutions at LinkedIn. She has over 7 years’ experience as an integrated account executive, managing hundreds of boutique and blue-chip client accounts across a wide variety of verticals, with a focus on digital/social content marketing and ad-tech. Rachel holds a BA in Journalism & History from New York University. |
![]() | Herbert Sturz, Founding ChairHerbert Sturz is a senior advisor of the Open Society Foundations, where he helped establish NURCHA, which has facilitated the construction of over 300,000 houses in South Africa. Mr. Sturz has served as founding director of the Vera Institute of Justice; New York City Deputy Mayor for Criminal Justice; Chairman of the New York City Planning Commission and founding Chairman of the Center for New York City Neighborhoods. |
Advisory Council
The ExpandED Schools Advisory Council members are select individuals who are committed to our mission of closing the learning gap. Advisory Council members are ambassadors for ExpandED Schools and special advisors to the Board Chair(s) and President.
![]() | Lucy N. FriedmanLucy Friedman is a Fellow at the Pinkerton Foundation. She was the founding President of ExpandED Schools. Prior to founding ExpandED Schools (formerly known as TASC), Ms. Friedman was the founder and Executive Director of Safe Horizon (formerly known as Victims Services), a crime victim assistance and advocacy organization. |
![]() | Annette L. NazarethAnnette L. Nazareth is a partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, leading trading and markets practice within the firm’s Financial Institutions Group. A key financial services policymaker for more than a decade, she was appointed U.S. Securities and Exchange Commissioner in 2005. During her tenure at the Commission, she worked on numerous groundbreaking initiatives, including execution of quality disclosure rules, implementation of equities decimal pricing, short sale reforms and modernization of the national market system rules. |
![]() | Pedro A. NogueraPedro Noguera is a Distinguished Professor of Education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Sciences at UCLA. He serves on the boards of national and local organizations and appears as a regular commentator on educational issues. He serves as an advisor to large urban school districts throughout the U.S. |
![]() | Soledad O’BrienSoledad O’Brien is the Chief Executive Officer of Starfish Media Group, which produces documentaries and scripted and non-scripted series for CNN and other networks. She was an award-winning anchor and special correspondent for CNN/US. |
![]() | Jennifer J. RaabJennifer Raab is President of Hunter College, the largest college in the City University of New York (CUNY) system. Previously she served as Chairman of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. |
![]() | Robert K. SteelRobert Steel is a partner and Chief Executive Officer of Perella Weinberg Partners. Robert is also a member of the Pew Charitable Trusts Task Force on financial reform. He is a graduate of Duke University and the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. |
![]() | Diana TaylorDiana Taylor is Vice Chair of Solera Capital LLC. She previously served as managing director at Wolfensohn & Co., and before that as the New York State Superintendent of Banks and Chairwoman of the New York State Banking Board. She is board chair of ACCION International and Hudson River Park Trust. She is an emeritus board member of the YMCA of New York City. |