A recipient of Stanford’s dual Master’s degree in education and business, Zachary Levine has always been interested in cross-disciplinary approaches to solving social problems. He sees ElevatED drawing together many different aspects of his expertise, including his experience as a management consultant and political organizer, and, most important, his tenure in education reform where he developed a clear sense of the need for teacher talent. As director of human capital for Green Dot Public Schools, one of the largest charter school organizations in the United States, he and his team reviewed some 1500 applications a year and interviewed hundreds of candidates. “That experience taught me the difference between an average and an exceptional teacher, and reversed my conceptions of what it meant to be one,” Levine said. “Top teachers knock your socks off and are extraordinary leaders in any organization.”

Despite the fact that Green Dot was considered a desirable employer and attracted “the best of the best,” Levine still found himself struggling to fill the last quarter of the available positions in the subjects of science and math. “I’ve been in classrooms where the teachers are changing the life trajectories of the students, and I’ve been in classrooms that made my stomach turn, because you could tell the teacher had lost the students. And that meant so much wasted potential,” he says. “I knew we needed to change this equation. We need more exceptional teachers available in the pool so we have nothing less than one in every classroom.”

A former political science major at Stanford and a management consultant for the Boston Consulting Group, Levine found himself reflecting back on his own college experience and the fact that he had not given teaching a second thought. “I have come to realize that in fact teaching is an intellectually stimulating and incredibly rewarding profession, and I knew I wanted to give today’s college students a chance to undo their misconceptions much sooner than I did,” he says. The seed for ElevatED was planted.

“Our best teachers have the capabilities of leaders in any field, and if we can shine a light on that fact, then more talented individuals will aspire to become the next high-impact teachers,” he says. “We can’t afford to let myths and stereotypes stand in the way of improving our teacher talent pipeline, because teacher talent is the central element determining the quality of our school system.”