About
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Title and Organization:
Executive Director, Teach For America- Greater New Orleans/Board Member, Louisiana State Board of Education, Teach For America
Bio:
Kira Orange Jones is executive director of Teach For America, Greater New Orleans. She has overseen an unprecedented expansion, managing the program through one of Teach For America's most ambitious growth plans, scaling the region from 100 teachers to 500 teachers in a 2 year time period. At this scale, the Teach For America-Greater New Orleans region is currently the second largest corps in the nation with its alumni base more than tripling in the next two years, making the size of this group of talented and dedicated leaders the largest per capita concentration of Teach For America alumni in any community in the country. With over 500 teachers and 300 alumni working across six districts and in over 70 independently run district and charter schools, corps members and alumni in Greater New Orleans currently impact 1 in every 3 students in the region. In addition, she has worked tirelessly to further the understanding of the achievement gap throughout the local community, and has been recognized for these efforts with several awards, including being named a Young Leadership Council Role Model, as well as being a City Business Woman of the Year nominee. Her efforts have also been highlighted in such noted publications as the New York Times Magazine, Harvard's University's Ed. Magazine and TIME Magazine. Before joining Teach For America as Executive Director of the Greater New Orleans region in 2007, Kira served as Vice President of New Site Development. In this capacity she spearheaded the opening of regions in three new communities and raised 10 million dollars in start-up funding towards our efforts. Prior to her tenure on staff with Teach For America, Kira founded and served as Executive Director of Right Quick Productions, a nonprofit media organization in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, dedicated to amplifying community voices through documentary filmmaking and media education. In this capacity, she oversaw the development, production, and distribution of feature films intended for classroom and general audiences. Kira also served for four summers as a school director at Teach For America's Houston and Philadelphia institutes. She holds a BA from Wesleyan University with a concentration in filmmaking and an MEd focused in school leadership from Harvard University. A Bronx, New York native, Kira began her career in education as a South Louisiana corps member and taught fourth grade at Eden Park Elementary in Baton Rouge. She is a Fellow of the third class of the Aspen Institute-NewSchools Fellowship and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.
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