Nancy Burvant, Charter Board Development Director

Nancy Burvant is a native New Orleanian. After working in office administration for several area law firms, she earned a B.A. in English from the University of New Orleans in 1998. While at UNO, she worked as a volunteer at the Women’s Center and was on the board of the UNO Children’s Center as student liaison. She was also a member of the UNO English Department’s Grade Appeal Committee. For her literary analysis, Nancy’s work was twice nominated for the Catherine B. Mackin award for writing excellence. Nancy later attended Uptown Professional Real Estate School and for several years worked as a real estate agent while managing a condominium building in the Warehouse District of New Orleans. As a volunteer, she tutored public school second graders with the organization S.T.A.I.R. (Start the Adventure in Reading), reviewed grant recipients for United Way, and delivered Meals on Wheels to the homebound elderly through a local community outreach group. In 2006, she joined New Schools for New Orleans, and is thrilled to be contributing to the reform of public schools in her home town.

Matt Candler, Chief Executive Officer

Matt Candler has been involved in the charter school movement for the past ten years and has taught and coached and at the elementary, middle, and high school levels. Matt worked for Paul Vallas in Chicago on the nation's first large scale program designed to combat social promotion, co-founded a K-5 charter school in North Carolina and started a consulting practice specializing in start-up support for charter school founders. In 2001, Matt joined the KIPP Foundation in San Francisco as the Vice President of School Development. His team established 37 new charter schools across the country and was responsible for recruiting school leaders, securing contractual and charter relationships with school districts, and securing facilities and financing for each school. In 2004, Matt became the Chief Operating Officer of the New York City Center for Charter School Excellence, where he managed a $40M endowment to help open, operate, and sustain successful charter schools throughout the City. He joined New Schools for New Orleans as the CEO in October of 2006. Matt has an MBA from Kellogg University with a concentration in education management, managerial economics, and decision making.

Melissa M. Carollo, Operations and Technology Director

Melissa M. Carollo attended Loyola University in New Orleans, studying both English Literature and Business Administration. With 10 years experience in office administration, and five in management, Melissa, a native of New Orleans, sought to find a niche for her skills in the rebuilding of New Orleans. She found that niche in supporting the great educational minds that have come together to form New Schools for New Orleans. Melissa has an Associates Degree in Business Administration, along with Office Software certifications and graphic and web design skills.

Morgan Carter, Development and Communications Director

Sarah Morgan Carter received her undergraduate degree in Psychology and Education from Bates College in Lewiston, Maine and graduated from Stanford University in June 2007 with a Masters in Education. Her graduate studies focused on Policy, Organization, and Leadership. Morgan's educational background has enhanced the broader interest she has long held, which is to improve the public education systems in our country. Morgan joined New Schools for New Orleans in June of 2007 as the Development and Communications Director.

Lisa Daggs, New School Development Director

Lisa brings over sixteen years of experience in business and education. She is currently responsible for New School Development for New Schools for New Orleans. She is leading the design and implementation of the training program for the school leaders receiving New Schools for New Orleans incubation grants. Prior to moving to New Orleans, Ms. Daggs was the Director of Program Development for Stanford University's Educational Leadership Institute (SELI), where she led the redesign of their charter school leaders' training program. Prior to joining Stanford, Lisa served as the Chief of Staff at the KIPP Foundation for almost five years. She was a founding team member responsible for marketing, public affairs, fundraising, school information and all human resources functions. She was also responsible for providing support to the KIPP school leaders in California. During her tenure with the foundation the number of KIPP schools expanded from two to forty-six. Before joining KIPP, Lisa helped start the New Schools Venture Fund, where she led the evaluation and investment strategy for school based ventures, including charter schools. Prior to New Schools, Lisa was a Manager at Deloitte Consulting focused on reengineering and change leadership consulting in the health care industry. Ms. Daggs is a Teach for America alum. She taught elementary school in Oakland, CA. Lisa holds an MBA, a Masters in Education and a bachelor's degree from Stanford University.

Neerav Kingsland, Human Capital and Partnerships Director

Neerav Kingsland is a recent graduate of Yale Law School. As a law student, he co-wrote an amicus brief to the United State Supreme Court, was director of the Education Adequacy Project legal clinic, worked as a legal assistant at a war crimes tribunal in Sierra Leone, and drafted a human rights report on the state of democracy in the Tibetan Government In-Exile. Neerav was first drawn to education reform as an undergraduate at Tulane University, where he tutored students at Woodson Middle School and taught creating writing to illiterate adults at the Y.M.C.A. After Hurricane Katrina devastated the city, Neerav and two other law students formed the Hurricane Katrina Legal Clinic, which assisted in the creation of New Schools for New Orleans. Neerav serves as the Human Capital Director at New Schools for New Orleans.

Adrian Mendez, School Support Manager

Adrian has been a resident of New Orleans since he was ten years old. He attended New Orleans public schools. He graduated in 2005 from the University of Chicago with a major in political science and a minor in Latin American Studies. In Chicago he developed an interest for education, particularly college attainment for low-income communities. While in college he created a community service organization dedicated to helping Chicago public school students get into college. After college, he helped his family and community recover from the hurricane, and later moved to New York to work at a corporate law firm. Adrian returned to New Orleans because he deeply believes in the future of the city.

Aesha Rasheed, Parent Organizing Network Founder

Aesha Rasheed is a public education advocate focused on parent and community involvement in school reform. She is the coordinator of the New Orleans Parents' Guide to Public Schools and founder of the New Orleans Parent Organizing Network, both projects designed to help parents better navigate public schools and empower themselves to access high quality public schools. She covered education for The New Orleans Times Picayune for five years and was project manager for New Orleans Network, an information sharing and collaboration hub for grassroots organizations in post-Katrina New Orleans.

Maggie Runyan-Shefa, Instructional Leadership Director

Maggie Runyan-Shefa has worked to increase excellence in public schools for the past ten years. Maggie founded and led KIPP STAR College Prep Charter School in Harlem and is a graduate of the KIPP School Leadership Program. Under her leadership, KIPP STAR was amongst the highest performing open enrollment public schools in Harlem and its graduates gained acceptance into some of our nation's finest college preparatory high schools. She was recognized by the Robin Hood Foundation with its Hero's Award in 2004. Maggie participated in the selection and training of new KIPP founders and school leaders and developed KIPP's national model for professional development for middle school writing. She joined New Schools for New Orleans in 2007 as the Instructional Leadership Director. Maggie is a former Teach for America corps member (Mississippi Delta '97) and holds a B.A. in International Affairs from the George Washington University.

Renita Thukral. Advocacy and Policy Director

Renita Thukral, a New Orleans native, recently has returned from New York City to join the New Schools for New Orleans team as the Director of Policy and Advocacy. After receiving her law degree from Yale University in 2001, she spent the next six and a half years practicing criminal defense law in Manhattan, working as a public defender in New York State courts and as appointed counsel, on trial and appellate cases, in Manhattan and Brooklyn federal courts. Her passion for education reform began when she was a high school student at Isidore Newman School, and led her to pursue a bachelor's degree in American Studies at Stanford University, where she specialized in the intersection of race, class and education and authored an honors thesis on the San Jose Unified School District's struggle with desegregation. Upon graduating from Stanford, she was a seventh and eighth grade math teacher and coach; and now that she is back home, she is delighted to be serving the students of New Orleans.

Sarah Newell Usdin, Founder & President

Sarah Newell Usdin has spent the last fifteen years in education reform. In 1992, after teaching in Germany on a Fulbright Scholarship, she joined Teach For America, a national corps of recent college graduates who teach in our nation's lowest-income communities. Usdin spent the next three years teaching in Baton Rouge before becoming Teach for America's Executive Director in Louisiana. Believing that more needed to be done to systemically impact the quality of teachers in public schools, she became a Partner with The New Teacher Project, a national nonprofit teacher recruiting and training organization. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Sarah formed New Schools for New Orleans to assist in the recovery and reformation of public education. Because of an early interest in social justice, Sarah majored in religion and German at Colgate University. Sarah also holds a Masters in Curriculum and Instruction from Louisiana State University. She has two children, Lyle (5) and Cecile (1), and is married to Tommy.