Meet the National Summer School Initiative team dedicated to helping districts, charter, and independent schools across the nation to deliver uncommonly engaging and exceptionally effective instruction.
Ellie Bridges
Ellie is the director of ELA at NSSI. She spent the first fourteen years of her career teaching History, ELA, and reading intervention at Achievement First Bushwick Middle School in Brooklyn. In addition to Ellie's teaching responsibilities, she served as grade-level chair, department chair, curriculum writer, and coach. In 2022, Ellie's students posted the highest percent proficient on the New York Common Core English Language Arts exam in the network. Ellie was named a Stage 5 Master Teacher, the network’s highest distinction, awarded for student achievement, student character development, quality of instruction and planning, and contribution to team achievement. Ellie currently works as a special education coordinator supporting and advocating for over 100 students with IEPs. Ellie earned her B.A. in developmental psychology at George Washington University and an M.A. from Relay Graduate School of Education.
Jeff Feinman
Jeff is the chief of partnerships at NSSI. Most recently, Jeff served as the vice president of partnerships at Springboard Collaborative, where he helped to scale both revenue and students served by 10x during his leadership tenure. Previously, Jeff served as the executive director of Mission Graduates, a nonprofit that partners with SFUSD to increase the number of K–12 students in San Francisco who are prepared for and complete a college education. Early in his career, Jeff founded The DJ Project, a first-wave hip-hop education program designed to connect high school youth to higher educational pathways and career opportunities. Jeff also chairs the board of trustees at Mt. Tamalpais College, an accredited institution serving incarcerated students at San Quentin State Prison. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in English from the University of California, Berkeley, and received his Masters in Nonprofit Administration from the University of San Francisco.
Robert Hawke
Robert Hawke is NSSI's senior director of math. Robert began his career at Episcopal High School in Houston teaching Spanish. He then joined KIPP Academy in Fresno as a founding fifth-grade and seventh-grade math teacher, where he was awarded the KIPP Excellence in Teaching Award, one of only ten recipients nationwide. Robert became the founding principal at KIPP Impact Middle School in Jacksonville, Florida, which, under his leadership, ranked first out of 57 KIPP middle schools nationwide in reading and math growth. Robert then joined Elm City College Prep in New Haven, Connecticut, where he served as STEM academic dean, then principal and humanities dean. Robert later served as the director of middle school math at Achievement First in New Haven. He earned his B.S. in mathematics, linguistics, and Spanish from Rice University and his M.A. from National-Louis University.
Keri Hubbard
Keri is NSSI's chief of program. After teaching high school math in Charlotte, North Carolina as a Teach for America corps member, Keri joined the Achievement First charter school network. Teaching seventh-grade math and eighth-grade algebra at the network in Brooklyn, she led her students for two consecutive years to 100 percent proficiency on the New York State exam, with 97 percent of eighth-graders passing the Algebra Regents exam. Later, she joined KIPP in Austin, teaching sixth-grade reading, and rose to become assistant principal and director of curriculum and professional development. Keri was formerly the director of math at NSSI, where she supported an incredible team of teachers, PD leads and curriculum developers tasked with providing rigorous, math instruction to students across the country. Keri holds a B.A. in economics and sociology from Duke University.
Maddy Levine
Maddy is NSSI's senior director of operations. Maddy was most recently the senior manager of community partnerships & outreach at Girls Who Code, where she worked to foster strong partnerships with school districts, library networks, and community-based organizations so that every girl has the opportunity to gain the confidence and skills they need to succeed in the 21st century. Previously, Maddy served as an assistant principal at Success Academy Charter Schools, where she managed instruction and teacher development in science, math, and literacy for grades K-4—achieving results in the top 1% of all New York state public schools. She first became passionate about education while serving as an AmeriCorps member in an urban education fellowship program in Boston, Massachusetts. Maddy received her BS in Psychology and History from Union College and holds a Women in Leadership Certification from Cornell.
Nancy Livingston
Nancy Livingston is the CEO of NSSI. She has over two decades of experience in driving academic excellence and talent development in K-12 schools. As the former Chief of Schools for KIPP Nashville, she oversaw the expansion of the network from five to seven schools while building the core infrastructure to support teaching and learning. At KIPP NYC, Nancy led a significant realignment of curriculum, assessment, and professional development strategies, resulting in substantial gains in student performance. Her career also includes leadership roles at Achievement First and KIPP Foundation, where she focused on scaling talent programs and academic systems. She was a founding teacher of KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy in Denver, CO and a TFA Corps Member in New Orleans. Nancy holds an MBA from the Yale School of Management and graduated Phi Beta Kappa and cum laude from Davidson College. She lives in Nashville, TN with her husband Steve and son Ulysses.
Doug McCurry
Doug is a senior advisor at NSSI. He is the former co-CEO and superintendent of Achievement First, which operates a network of 40 public charter schools educating 14,000 students in New Haven, Bridgeport and Hartford, CT; Brooklyn, NY; and Providence, RI. Achievement First is consistently one of the highest performing charter networks in New York City. Prior to co-founding Achievement First in 2003, Doug was one of the founders of Amistad Academy and served as the school’s instructional leader for three years. Achievement First Amistad High is ranked the number one high school in Connecticut.
Marla Ross
Marla is the operations manager at NSSI. She began her career in education teaching English to university students in Bogotá, Colombia through a Fulbright fellowship. Marla then recruited and supported students with QuestBridge, a national nonprofit which connects some of the most exceptional, low-income youth with leading colleges and opportunities. While in college, she served as the director of Troy Camp at USC, a student-led nonprofit offering after-school programming and a free, week-long summer camp to K-12 students in the Los Angeles Unified School District. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in cognitive science and teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) from the University of Southern California.
Jessica Wagner
Jessica is the associate director of operations at NSSI. Most recently, Jessica was the director of special projects at PAVE Schools. Prior to that she spent five years as the director of talent acquisition at PAVE, where she was responsible for facilitating the full recruitment process across four programs annually. She began her career in school operations as a founding special projects coordinator at Uncommon Schools, and was subsequently the founding operations manager at PAVE Academy Charter School and a network operations manager at Success Academy Charter Schools in New York City. Jessica graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. from Trinity College (CT) in educational studies and anthropology and an Ed.M. from Harvard University.
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