About
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Ben is the third president of the Colorado League of Charter Schools. The League serves and represents 250+ public charter schools educating 115,000 students with the vision of bringing high-quality, publicly funded options to all Colorado students. Ben spent the past 23 years advancing the systemic reform of PreK-12 education nationally. For 11 years, he started and ran charter schools for historically underserved populations in Chicago, East Portland, Little Rock and Minneapolis. From 1997 to 2001, he was director of the Chicago International Charter School. From 2010 to 2016, he was founding CEO of Exalt Education, a non-profit charter school network in Central and Southwest Little Rock. From 2005 to 2010, Ben served as founding partner of the Charter School Growth Fund (CSGF). He was a program officer at the Walton Family Foundation and a program director at the Kern Family Foundation. In early 2017, he developed a county-wide education reform plan for the Metro Milwaukee Association of Commerce. Ben is an accomplished researcher and writer. From 1995 to 1997, he worked for a publishing and consulting firm that tracked entrepreneurial education activity, from child care through corporate training and development. As Lead Writer of The Education Industry Report, he wrote over 100 articles on education trends, companies and newsmakers. Ben graduated from St. John's University / College of St. Benedict in Minnesota. He holds an MBA from University of Colorado, Boulder. He lives with his wife of 18 years and their 6-year old son in Lakewood, Colorado. He is a Fellow of the 20th class of the Pahara-Aspen Education Fellowship and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.
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