Board of Directors Biographies

Michael Ragheb

Founder, President, Chief Executive Officer
CEO, POMDOCS, LLC.
Term Served: 1

Email: [email protected]

Biography

After graduating from Johns Hopkins University in 2013, Michael accepted a position working in fixed income finance for BNP Paribas in New York. In fall of 2014, Michael accepted a position at University of Miami Miller School of Medicine’s Master of Public Health program. While completing this two-year program in one year, Michael initiated a study investigating the bacterial origins of infectious hydrocephalus (a neurological disorder) in Port Au Prince, Haiti, while also working with a youth organization in Liberty City, Miami. After graduating with his Master of Science in Public Health degree, Michael founded Knowledge of Careers, Inc. in August of 2015. Michael currently serves as President and CEO of Knowledge of Careers™. He is also a member of the WLRN Community Advisory Board, the Delta Omega Honorary Society in Public Health and continues to conduct research in Haiti.

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Andrew Tripodo

Vice President, Chief Operations Officer
Curriculum Designer – Civics, Democracy Prep Public Schools
Term Served: 1

Email: [email protected]

Biography

After graduating from Kenyon College in 2012, Andrew joined Teach For America, a program that gave him the opportunity to teach English, Creative Writing, Special Education, and Law Studies at a large, predominantly low-income public high school outside New Orleans. He left full time teaching in 2014 to pursue a graduate degree in American Political Theory from NYU. During this time he also coached debate and developed and instructed a class called the Senior Seminar in American Democracy at Democracy Prep Charter High School, a high performing public high school in Harlem that is part of Democracy Prep Public Schools, a 17 school network.

He graduated from NYU in May and is currently the Social Studies Curriculum Specialist for Democracy Prep Public Schools. He joined Knowledge of Careers™ in February, 2016.

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Bianca Kenworthy

Chief Marketing Officer
Senior Account Executive, BeccaPR
Term Served: 1

Email: [email protected]

Biography

Bianca Kenworthy is a Public Relations professional currently working with BeccaPR, a lifestyle + hospitality-focused PR firm located in Soho, Manhattan. A Brooklyn native and graduate of Johns Hopkins University, Bianca went on to work internationally in Tanzania for a children’s nutrition clinic and in Naples, Italy, for artisanal pasta company Pastificio dei Campi before returning to New York. At BeccaPR, Bianca manages key restaurant, chef, and hospitality accounts in New York, Miami and Los Angeles maintaining high-level media relationships in key markets across the United States + abroad in an effort to expound upon and grow her passion for the hospitality industry, sharing her love of all things culinary through storytelling. Bianca joins Knowledge of Careers to lead media + social strategy, and bring to life the possibilities of culinary careers for its students. When not cooking or devouring travel magazines, Bianca can be found karaoking, checking international destinations off her bucket list, and running across the Brooklyn Bridge.

Sam Villoldo

Secretary, Chief Learning Officer
Teacher, Ben Gamla Charter School
Term Served: 1

Email: [email protected]

Biography

In 2009, Sam enrolled in the University of Florida Honors College on full scholarship. While there, he received dual degrees in Mathematics and Economics, focusing on set theory, probability, and foundational mathematics. After graduating, Sam pursued a career in teaching, privately tutoring high school and college students in a wide variety of classes. It was here he gained his expertise in curriculum making, creating coursework designed to fit the needs of individual students. Beginning in August 2016, Sam will be teaching mathematics full time at Ben Gamla Charter School in Hollywood, FL. He joined Knowledge of Careers™ in January 2016 and is acting Secretary and Chief Learning Officer.

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Michael Anderson

Chief Financial Officer
Development Strategist, Deloitte LLP
Term Served: 1

Email: [email protected]

Biography

Michael P. Anderson graduated from the University of Miami in 2013 and began a career in public accounting shortly after.  He now works as a development strategist for Deloitte LLP, the US firm of the world’s largest professional services network. This role is responsible for developing corporate, business unit, and industry sector strategies and helping to monitor strategy execution across key businesses and locations.

Mr. Anderson is current completing his M.Sc. in Applied Economics at the Johns Hopkins University and is a CFA Level III Candidate. He started his relationship with Knowledge of Careers™ as a volunteer at Booker T. Washington in Miami’s Overtown neighborhood. In 2016, he accepted a position as a Board Member and currently uses his financial management and accounting experience to support the organization’s administration and growth as Chief Financial Officer.

Scott Galvin

Board Member
City of North Miami Councilman
VP of Education, Junior Achievement of Greater Miami
Term Served: 1

Biography

First elected in 1999, Scott Galvin is the longest-serving Councilman in North Miami’s ninety-year history. Professionally, he serves as the Vice President of Education for Junior Achievement of Miami. He also serves on the board of directors for the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, a global nonprofit organization providing cutting-edge medicine and advocacy to more than 640,000 people in 36 countries. He joined the Knowledge of Careers™ Board of Directors in January 2016.

Take Our Kids to Work Day

Taking up a timely topic, Richard V. Reeves of the Brookings Institute asks us to rethink the goals behind Take Your Kids to Work Day. What if it was renamed Take Our Kids to Work Day? On this day, professionals would take kids who are not regularly exposed to interesting and compelling careers into the office with them. Rather than focusing exclusively on our own children, Take Our Kids to Work Day would provide an opportunity to introduce kids to professions that would otherwise remain invisible to them, and therefore beyond their young ambitions. The author identifies socioeconomic immobility as the grievous problem - for the nation, for communities, for schools, and for our kids - that it is, and notes how we might take small steps towards bridging the divides that pervade our nation and undercut its fundamental promise to provide opportunity for all. We work every day to give our students the opportunities and skills they need to explore the new professions that will ignite their curiosity and passions, and are grateful that Mr. Reeves shares our enthusiasm for poking holes in the walls that separate society, keeping us from learning from one another. Link to article: https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/theres-a-better-way-to-celebrate-take-your-kids-to-work-day-taking-someone-elses-kid-instead/?utm_campaign=Brookings%20Brief&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=51237898 --
We are very excited to introduce an ongoing series that will display the research of elite think tanks, social scientists, and journalists who are engaged in the same important work as KOC. We consider these researchers to be our partners. Their data gives us guidance, and our programs bring their data to life.
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Miami Senior High School Year 1 Updates - March 2017

The past few weeks have been filled with some great presentations for our first freshman class at Miami Senior High School. Our students have been learning about law, education, digitl marketing, and even geology. As the weeks pass new topics and ideas are being introduced, and our students are learning more about new professional possibilities.   Our students started off with a presentation by lawyer Marissa Leichter. With a focus on family law and child protection, she discussed the law’s involvement with the foster care system and nonprofit systems that provide child care. Marissa also detailed the complex juvenile detention system. For her activity, the students developed their own ideas for nonprofit companies and drafted a mission statement.   Digital marketer Bryan Lozano visited our class to speak on the value of online marketing and social media management. As the digital marketer for a large, south Florida law firm, Bryan manages the online presence of the firm and maintains a positive corporate image. Bryan described to our class the importance of establishing a difference between the online persona of a company or corporation and one of a person. As such, as part of his activity, each of our students started their own blog which they have been updating regularly.   A week later we were visited by Kyle Mullan, teacher and dean at Cushman High School. Kyle recounted his storied path to teaching and showed our class the many steps it takes to reach a professional goal. As a dean and teacher, Kyle crosses the line between educator and administrator, and helped explain to our class the multifaceted ways he must face an issue. Additionally, we were treated to a detailed description of Kyle’s many travels and volunteer work, which prompted a concluding informal discussion about world travel, geopolitics, and the need for selflessness. Lastly, geologist and professor Ta-Shana Taylor came to our class with a bucket of rocks! However we quickly learned that these were not just rocks, but also a mix of ancient fossils and minerals. Ta-Shana explained in-depth the inner workings of archaeology and the scientific fields, gradually revealing throughout the lecture signs and techniques to classify all of the samples she had brought with her. By telling us stories of her visits to the Museum of Natural History as a teenager, her dig sites in college, and her current work at UM, we seemed to learn more and more about classification and study as her timeline progressed. As we reached our current day in her story, we compared how we had sorted the samples to how the student did initially and saw firsthand how much we had learned in such a short period.
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Booker T. Washington Year 1 Updates - March 2017

As the school continues our freshman class at Booker T. Washington High School continues to have engaging presentations from a variety of professionals. Our last series of presentations have covered disciplines from all walks of life, professions, and academics, and have given our students an experienced outlook into the working world.   We started off the month with aesthetician Elizabeth Canler who spoke on her training and experiences in the beauty industry. Elizabeth drew from both scientific and aesthetic viewpoints in her presentation, speaking on the methodology behind products and techniques used in the modern beauty and cosmetological industries. Elizabeth brought in a number of ingredients used in facial masks which can be found at home and had the students design and create their own masks.   Dr. Angie Laird is a professor and neuroscientist from Florida International University who discussed with our students the benefits and uses of MRI technology in the medical field and how she uses it to study brain function. Dr. Laird focuses on the differences between active and inactive regions in the brain, and discussed with our class the differences between the two and how she differentiates between them based on MRI feedback. For an activity she had our students perform various critical thinking problems and exercises to stimulate brain activity and explained how she would measure which portions of the brain was being activated based on the type of question.   Entrepreneur Tony Thomas was next to speak with the class. He discussed the benefits of branding, personal marketing, and wealth management, both personal and professional. Mr. Thomas has a number of companies and holdings including athletic training and management, and discussed strategy behind balancing budgets and efforts between them, while maintaining separate and effective brands. As class drew to a close Tony had the students create personal fictional brands for causes or issues important to them.   To round out the month we had Dr. John Davies come speak with our class. An experienced leader in the south Florida academic field, he has been Head of School for the local Miami Country Day School for nearly 20 years. Documenting his path towards education and administration, Dr. Davies discussed how high school-level academia has evolved over past decades, how teaching styles can be altered to best suit different students, and the many opportunities and career paths involved in following an education in teaching.
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March 2017 Ambassador Updates

Over the past month our Ambassadors have had some of the most productive and educational weeks yet! Between large strides being made in their Community Impact Projects and developing their professional skills, they have been working tirelessly to improve themselves and the neighborhoods around them. Within the last month our Ambassadors presented their projects at our first annual Knowledge of Careers Pitch Presentation, where they were judged independently and the winner received seed funding for their project!   The Ambassador’s Community Impact Projects have been developing rapidly over the past few weeks. With each unique project taking realized form, our Ambassadors have been creating business models, competitor analyses, and financial projections, as well as ensuring their positive impact on the Overtown community and surrounding areas. Their work on their projects this semester culminated in our First Annual Knowledge of Careers Pitch Night, where the Ambassadors pitched their projects to an independent panel of judges: Melitsa Waage, Oro Padron, Hannah Anokye, Naureen Rizvi, and Sally Guzik. We’d like to extend a huge thank you to them for evaluating the programs and giving their feedback! At the end of the night our Ambassadors Donna and D'eria from their project Diamonds In The Rough edged out the other competitors; In Between, the program run by Kimneisha and Jonathan, and Beat The Odds, Chris and Marquise’s Community Impact Project.   Donna and D’eria won a well-deserved prize of an initial $250 funding towards their project, which will be implemented in May along with the other Ambassadors’ projects. The projects will be continued throughout the rest of the year, when they will undergo an unbiased, professional evaluation to see which projects have room for future growth and development. In the meantime the Ambassadors will continue the Knowledge of Careers curriculum into their Junior years, developing their programs further, and focusing on SAT and ACT preparation and internships.
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    • Jesica Doe
      “[After starting Knowledge of Careers] I know that math is a lot more important than I thought it was, I’m trying harder in it now.”
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      “[K.O.C. showed me that] you need to work hard to achieve your goals.”
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      "[After starting Knowledge of Careers, I am] more interested in school in general, trying harder across the board.”
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      “The program helped me [learn about] more careers. At first I only wanted to do one thing, now I want to try something else.”
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      “You have to work hard to get a job, I didn’t think it was hard to do before [the program]. If you need to look longer than you thought you would to get a job, that’s okay.”
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      “[Knowledge of Careers] helped me [learn about] more careers and jobs that need more challenging steps. This program makes you want to do better in your classes for your future.”
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      “[K.O.C.] gave me a good inside view on every different job, it [shows you] different things that are good jobs and it makes you want to expand your horizons."
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      “[Knowledge of Careers makes you] open your mind to different stuff, like if you didn’t know what you wanted to be it gave you different [careers].”
      K.O.C. Student
    • Jesica Doe
      “[Before K.O.C. I thought getting a job was easy.] You get your degree and go see if they have any spots open, show your resume and you get the job. The perception has changed, you have to work hard.”
      K.O.C. Student