Wendy Kopp
Wendy Kopp is CEO and Co-founder of Teach For All, a global network of organizations in 62 countries working to develop collective leadership to ensure all children can fulfill their potential. Prior to launching Teach For All in 2007, Wendy founded and led Teach For America – which has proven to be an unparalleled source of long-term leadership for expanding opportunity for children in the United States – for 24 years. She led the development of Teach For All to be responsive to the initiative of social entrepreneurs around the world who were determined to adapt this approach in their own countries.
Wendy is the author of A Chance to Make History: What Works and What Doesn’t in Providing an Excellent Education for All (2011) and One Day, All Children: The Unlikely Triumph of Teach For America and What I Learned Along the Way (2000). She holds a bachelor’s degree from Princeton University and has honorary doctorate degrees from 15 universities. Wendy is the youngest person and the first woman to receive Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson Award (1993). In 1994, Time Magazine recognized her as one of the forty most promising leaders under 40; in 2006, U.S. News & World Report named her as one of America’s Best Leaders; and in 2008, Time Magazine recognized her as one of the World’s 100 Most Influential People. Wendy is the recipient of numerous awards including the WISE Prize for Education (2021), the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship (2008), and the Schwab Foundation’s Outstanding Social Entrepreneur Award (2003). She has four children and resides in New York City with her husband.
- Visit their website
- Teach For All
- Model
- Hybrid Social Enterprise
- Sectors
- Education; Values
- Headquarters
- USA
- Areas of Impact
- ASEAN, Australasia & Oceania, Greater China, Japan, North America, South Asia, Europe, Middle East & North Africa, Africa
Teach For All
Teach For All exists to address global educational needs and enable students to realize their full potential. A child’s background often determines their educational and life prospects. Poverty, discrimination, social mobility and political structures create challenges for students, and in certain cases, entire societies. Many school systems lack the capacity to help students attain a quality education, and prevailing beliefs have not led to the necessary policy investments to address these issues.
Teach For All supports a network of partner organizations that are growing leaders within their countries to ensure all children have access to an excellent education. These network organizations are enlisting outstanding university graduates to commit two years to teach in areas of educational need; providing significant training and ongoing support to enable these teaching participants to succeed with students; and fostering a community of alumni who become leaders in the classroom and education, to effect the fundamental changes necessary to ensure educational opportunity for all.
In fiscal year 2012 alone, the Teach For All network will collectively field more than 14,000 teachers who will impact the lives of nearly one million students. Meanwhile, a force of roughly 26,000 alumni are now serving as advocates for educational equity, working from across professional sectors to ensure all children have the educational opportunities they deserve.
awardees
Our awardees
John Mighton
Jordan Kassalow
