EDUCATOR AND ORGANIZATIONAL LEADER WITH MORE THAN 20 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE IN OPENING, LEADING, AND GROWING SOCIAL IMPACT ORGANIZATIONS
I focus on Transmuting White Supremacy and Patriarchy in my own practice, in my day-to-day engagement with the community, and in my work as a consultant for organizational development and systemic transformation. I have been a high school teacher and principal in Oakland, CA., a Chief Operating Officer of a national racial equity organization, and a lead facilitator and coach for equity with executive teams, boards, and staff at a variety of social impact organizations. As a community member, I’ve been a Police Commissioner and organizer with local groups dedicated to ending police violence against marginalized communities, specifically Black people who are exponentially targeted by state terror. After more than 20 years of work in education and supporting social impact organizations focused on racial justice and intersectional leadership, I feel even more strongly that we must engage tirelessly in our governmental and educational systems with an emphasis on interrupting our personal and systemic perpetuation of historical disparities. Using the tools of Cultivating Intersectional Leadership is my commitment to a lifetime of brainwashing to undo.
Maureen Benson, M. Ed
EDUCATION
University of California, Berkeley
Master of Arts in Education, Behring Fellow, Principal Leadership Institute
Emory University, Atlanta, GA
Bachelor of Arts in English, Minor in Education
HIGHLIGHTED WORK EXPERIENCE
Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Education is a Vital Sign
Leading a movement to powerfully honor the teaching profession, Education Is A Vital Sign is an emerging think tank of educators, economists, policy makers, community organizers and teacher union leaders working to create the highest levels of qualified teachers and partnering with cities to significantly increase quality of compensation and working conditions that make exceptional results the norm.
Chief Operating Officer and Director of Summit, Pacific Educational Group
"Founded by Glenn Singleton in 1992, Pacific Educational Group is committed to achieving racial equity in education. We engage in sustained partnerships with educational organizations to transform beliefs, behaviors, and results so people of all races can achieve at their highest levels and live their most empowered and powerful lives."
Founding Principal, Youth Empowerment High School; Oakland, CA
"The community of Youth Empowerment School applies the principles of Personal and Academic Empowerment, Social Empowerment, and the development of Critical Communication and Critical Consciousness to create a healthy learning community that fulfills our vision and evolves positive social change. YES is a school where students, staff and community have significant roles in the governance, planning, decision making, advising and processes of continual improvement that is embedded in the culture. It is a place where all people feel safe to commonly reflect on and challenge current practices, promote the expectation of constant learning for everyone, and incorporate the valued input of the multitude of cultures and lenses in our school family. This principle will allow students and family members to see the power of their communal input and of each others' ideas and strengths, while pushing us forward at all times. Students will feel supported and successful as they apply their learned skills to empowerment projects in the local area that will challenge them, enhance literacy and numeracy skills, develop critical thinking habits, set goals, time lines and benchmarks and prepare them for a successful post-secondary experience as they will have learned the techniques necessary to achieve their goals."
Reform Coordinator, Fremont HS; Oakland, CA
"In 1999, a group of mothers from the flatlands of East Oakland saw their children languishing in overcrowded, chaotic schools while their peers in the hills received a far different kind of education. Through Oakland Community Organizations, an alliance of community and religious leaders, those concerned mothers and thousands of others pushed for the creation of new, small schools — excellent schools, with innovative practices and high expectations — in their own neighborhoods. At that time, a movement to create small schools was beginning to catch fire in urban districts across the country. Small schools were touted as a tool to curb sky-high dropout rates and the growing "achievement gap" between poor, often minority students and their middle-class counterparts. John C. Fremont High School was one of the first schools in the United States to have been divided into a campus of separate small autonomous schools. The purpose of the small school is to allow personalization of instruction, due to concern that students may become academically lost in a large, or augmented, campus."