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Ashley Williams
Vice President, Innovation and Specialty Services
Ashley Williams is the vice president of innovation and specialty services with Public Impact® and serves on the executive leadership team. She leads the management team responsible for Opportunity Culture® certification and validation services, professional learning and coaching services, Opportunity Culture® portal development, and data services. Additionally, she heads the innovation team at Public Impact®, focusing on strategic initiatives to expand Opportunity Culture® models to more schools nationwide. Before joining Public Impact®, Williams served as a data specialist for the accountability office within Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. She was among the first in the country to serve in the Multi-Classroom Leader® role, where she led a team of English language arts teachers responsible for 370 students. Under her leadership, the team’s students dramatically increased their end-of-grade reading scores, which contributed to the school achieving the fourth-highest reading growth index out of more than 160 schools in 2014–15. Williams also was the director for the Teacher Leadership Continuum for the Piedmont Triad region of Teach For America. She holds an M.A. in educational leadership from Queens University of Charlotte and a B.A. in broadcast journalism from the University of Kentucky.
Example projects: Williams’ recent work includes launching the remotely located Multi-Classroom Leader® role, in partnership with The Innovation Project, with a cohort of North Carolina districts; co-designing the Self-Driven Design™ modules in the Opportunity Culture® portal; and leading Opportunity Culture® design and implementation in five North Carolina districts and another in Virginia. She also led and supported similar work in Chicago Public Schools and the districts of Midland and Ector County in Texas. She previously cultivated professional learning experiences for the school district of Palm Beach County, Florida, and for turnaround school leaders with the Tennessee Department of Education.