Inspired by Teachers, Preachers, Engineers, Entrepreneurs, and Investors: Difference-Maker and Inclusive Leader Award Winner in K-12, Tom Vander Ark
What is your personal story? How did you find your purpose and your passion?
I grew up working in urban churches fighting food and housing insecurity. My extended family of teachers, preachers, and physicians valued service. A fascination with building things drew me into engineering. Working in the coal fields of West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and Colorado introduced me to rural poverty. My passion for building things turned to business where I had the chance to help build a large national retail chain while teaching business school in the evening.
As a part of this work, I was flying around the country opening two stores a month. One day our CEO encouraged me to get involved in education. I reluctantly joined the Colorado Children’s Campaign and the Denver Metro Chamber education committee. After a few months of visiting schools and reviewing data, the challenge and opportunity of education leadership captured my attention and clarified my purpose: helping communities give the gift of a great education where every learner can dream their own dream. That mission of building community and empowering dreams has animated my life for the last 30 years.
After selling the retail company (visit a Sam’s Club to experience the legacy) and exploring education options, I had the miraculous opportunity to become a public school superintendent in Seattle’s diverse suburbs. The teachers were not impressed and went on strike on my first day on the job, which turned into an opportunity to meet everyone in town very quickly. It also led to a meeting with Bill Gates and support for our school district to implement one of the first blended learning programs and the first online school.
Five years later, I joined the newly formed Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation where I led the investment of $4 billion in new and improved urban high schools and scholarships including The Gates Millennium Scholars Program which paid for more than 20,000 students of color to attend college and graduate school. It also allowed me to visit thousands of schools and learn out loud about the innovation opportunity.
Frustrated by the lack of R&D investment in education, I co-founded one of the first Edtech venture funds in 2008 and that helped catalyze billions of dollars in impact investing over the last 15 years.
What led you to the leadership role for which you are being recognized? Who was instrumental on your path to success?
I married Karen, my high school sweetheart, 44 years ago and she has encouraged and supported me every step of the way. She and our daughter Katie launched what became Getting Smart in 2008. We invited our daughter Caroline to lead the organization in 2010 and she quickly mobilized Digital Learning Now, a policy advocacy initiative that included 100 diverse education advisors.
For 15 years, Getting Smart has been leading campaigns that illuminate the path forward for education leaders. Campaigns are informed by insightful education leaders (including GlobalMindED awardees such as David Miyashiro, Michael Hinojosa, and Mort Sherman) and sponsored by leading foundations including ASA, Gates Foundation, Walton Family Foundation, Carnegie Corporation, Hewlett Foundation, Stand Together, among others.
What does Inclusive Leadership mean to you and what would you like others to know and do as inclusive leaders?
The global pandemic, the climate crisis, and the benefits and threats that come with the rise of artificial intelligence make it clear–we’re all in this together. This new level of interdependence requires an updated sense of mutuality—acting in concert for the common good.
When given the chance to engage in work that matters, young people embrace this new mutuality and are eager to contribute to the common good. They discover that difference-making is the new superpower. It’s the agency and awareness to take action when and where needed. It’s the entrepreneurial mindset to spot an opportunity and the design thinking to deliver creative solutions for a community.
High school and college students today, what Reid Hoffman called Generation AI, have the greatest value creation opportunity in history if we cultivate inclusive leadership. Putting difference-making at the heart of learning creates students, schools, and communities alive with possibility.
How can the GlobalMindED Inclusive Success Network inform, advance, and/or multiply your mission and goals?
GlobalMindED illuminates the path forward by recognizing and celebrating inclusive leaders from education, business, and community.
What is the legacy that you would most like to leave the world?
As an investor and advisor, I’ve had the chance to support more than 500 impact organizations. I hope in the second half of this decade to help another 50 organizations extend their impact.
I’ve had the chance to support more than 1,200 great new schools for learners who most need options. I hope, in the second half of this decade, to inspire and support another 1,000 new schools.
And, through school development and transformation, I hope that by 2030 most American youth will have been able to choose or create their own pathway to opportunity—personalized learning journeys that are purposeful, supported, accelerated, credentialed, and full of difference-making.
