Mid-Atlantic Access Director, Let’s Get Ready

Posted by Let's Get Ready on September 5, 2016

About Let’s Get Ready

Let’s Get Ready addresses the inequalities and obstacles low-income students face in attaining a college education, empowering them to reach opportunity and success. Engaging volunteer college students as tutors and role-models (Coaches) LGR helps students access, transition to and ultimately graduate from college. Since its founding in 1998 by a Harvard undergraduate, LGR has helped more than 25,000 low-income students with the mentoring power of over 8,000 college Coaches.

With its headquarters in NYC and a regional office in Boston, LGR’s service area stretches from Maine to Philadelphia. Our Mid-Atlantic region includes New York, Connecticut and Philadelphia. Built on collaborations with colleges, high schools and community organizations, LGR’s high school access program provides intensive SAT preparation and college admissions counseling. In 2016 LGR Mid-Atlantic will serve close to 1700 low-income high school students in approximately 40 program partnerships.

Serving students of all academic abilities, Let’s Get Ready’s has achieved exciting results:

• Students raise their SAT scores an average of 115 points – enhancing their eligibility for additional financial aid and admission to more selective schools.
• 92% of students enroll in college
• Students graduate college at 5 times the rate for low-income students nationally
• At a cost to Let’s Get Ready of approximately $600 per student, Let’s Get Ready is an extremely cost efficient investment

Because of this strong track record of success, LGR received a watershed grant from the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation in September 2014 to launch a major initiative to ensure that its students graduate from college. LGR’s Transition and Success offerings are presently being rolled out and refined and will support approximately 9,000 students in college with the resources and encouragement they need to stay on stay on track to obtain their college degree. Our goal is to increase college graduation rates for our alumni from 50% to 65% by 2018.

Due to the demand for LGR’s services, the organization is taking its proven and replicable model to scale, aiming to grow its access and success services strategically within the current geographic footprint, especially in Philadelphia and Wester Connecticut, with subsequent expansion to new regions.

Overview of the Access Director Role

Reporting to Mid-Atlantic Executive Director and supervising a team of 4 Program Managers and an Operations Coordinator, the Mid-Atlantic Access Director is responsible for the high quality implementation and growth of the LGR Access programs in the Mid-Atlantic region through people management and partnership development. The Access Director is a member of the Mid-Atlantic leadership team and collaborates with our Chief Program Officer, and peers in the region to effectively implement, assess and refine our model.

Program & PEOPLE Management: Ensure high quality implementation of Mid-Atlantic’s LGR programs

Outcome Based Management

• Guide team to achieve increases in enrollment, attendance retention and quality
• Serve as a positive leader and developer of the Access team – helping them to keep the big picture in mind and focus relentlessly on outcome based management
• Oversee the implementation of a quality Access program that meets or exceeds quality benchmarks for SAT and college knowledge gains
• Provide ongoing feedback to promote Access Team members’ development and use performance evaluations to identify key growth areas

Partnership Management

• Serve as the key liaison with administrators at high school, college and community partners, managing all aspects of the planning, execution and evaluation of site performance
• Collaborate with the NE Executive Director to identify and cultivate senior district level and college leaders in order to ensure Let’s Get Ready has the support and resources it needs for its growth and success at each site and community

Recruitment and Site Stability

• Oversee Program Managers’ successful and timely recruitment and selection of effective Site Directors and Coaches
• Oversee Program Managers’ leadership of timely and comprehensive student recruitment including utilizing and refining outreach systems and tools
• Schedule, organize and facilitate the timely training of Site Directors and college student Coaches

Evaluation

• Oversee collection and reporting of student background and evaluation data
• Support leadership in the roll-out and full adoption of Salesforce for data collection and evaluation purposes
• Collaborate with the National Program Team and Mid-Atlantic Executive Director to analyze program data each semester and annually in order to guide continuous improvement.
• Facilitate regular sharing of student outcomes with partners.
• Contribute to the development of national and regional dashboards

Regional Growth & SUSTAINABILITY Planning

• Collaborate with the Mid-Atlantic Executive Director and Senior Management to develop and implement annual plan for growth and sustainability
• Support Regional and National fundraising efforts by contributing to grant proposals, participating in cultivation meetings and site visits, and providing reporting data and analysis, as needed
• Participate in the Program Committee of the Mid-Atlantic Advisory Board

National PROGRAM Leadership

Contribute to the developing strategy and refinement of multiple organization-wide initiatives, including, but not limited to:

• Creating national training curriculum for all staff and volunteer positions
• Revising Access curriculum to ensure “best in class” SAT preparation and college knowledge activities
• Developing a new annual program calendar responsive to student and organizational needs,
• Building a strategic and sustainable recruitment and retention plan to ensure ability to meet growth targets
• Codification of partnership agreements and management strategies.

Qualifications

• A minimum of 8 years of experience in a mission-driven youth services, college access and/or related non-profit serving historically under-served populations, with at least 3 years of experience as a staff manager
• Well-versed in goals, best practices and current landscape of the College Access field
• Management experience leading teams in a fast-paced and outcome oriented environment
• Demonstrated skill and experience required to develop and maintain high-impact partnerships with schools, districts, colleges and/or communities effectively
• Demonstrated aptitude for training, coaching and inspiring teams and individuals to reach ambitious goals
• Skilled in use of data and technology to drive decision-making, improve operational processes and assess program quality
• Deep commitment to diversity
• Excellent written and oral communication skills.
• Valid driver’s license.
• Weekend and evening trainings and site visits are required.
• Frequent travel to the current and potential college Access sites throughout Mid-Atlantic
• Bachelor’s degree required, Master’s degree preferred
• Salary: Depending on experience, plus benefits.

http://www.idealist.org/view/job/n9FwhTwcpTBD/