A Message from Angelica Towne Amporo
After almost 15 incredible years, I’ve made the bittersweet decision to transition out of my role as Chief Strategy & Innovation Officer at Educate! at the end of 2022. As difficult as it is to leave an organization and team I’m so passionate about and proud of, I’m excited that in 2023 I will be joining the organization Youth Impact to launch Teaching at the Right Level in my current home country of Namibia. This is a cause close to my heart and working in the education system here in Namibia is something that I feel called to pursue at this moment in my life.
I’m grateful to feel confident in pursuing this path right now because I know Educate! has the vision, leaders, and teams in place to take things forward boldly and successfully without my day-to-day involvement. I’m both very proud of and very humbled by the growth Educate! has experienced since I helped launch this organization many years ago. I also can’t take credit for the massive impact we’ve created - that credit goes to the excellent team we’ve built together which I know has the talent, drive, and knowledge to carry forward Educate!’s vision into its next big chapter.
I am staying in my current role through the end of 2022 and will be supporting the transition to new leaders who I know will bring new strengths to drive our next stage of growth. One of these leaders is Charlotte Jones, who will join us in November as our Chief Education Innovations Officer. Charlotte has spent the last five years leading R&D for Education Development Trust, a $100-million-dollar organization recognized as a leader in education systems change globally. Charlotte’s experience innovating for impact in partnership with governments across the world is staggering, and I’m excited to see our education systems work continue to grow under her leadership.
I’m also helping with the search for a product leader (Chief Product Officer or Director of Product) to keep building our capabilities in product development, especially in the out-of-school youth space (if you know of anyone you think would be a great fit, please refer them to us!). In the short to medium term, we’re lucky to have Seth Trudeau, former VP of Product at African Leadership Group, as Interim Director of Product to make sure there are no gaps through my transition period.
As confident as I am in the team carrying our work forward, Educate! feels like a part of me and I’ll always be a part of Educate!. I intend to stay engaged in 2023 and beyond as an advisor and co-founder, and may even be back in the future in a different role.
There’s so much more I could say about my almost 15 years with Educate! and the incredible people and teams I’ve had the privilege of working with, but I won’t make the goodbyes premature - I’m still here until the end of the year! Looking forward to many big things ahead for Educate! and feeling very excited about the future.