Brooklyn-based Marcy Lab School describes itself as an alternative to college. “In one year, you will unlock the skills, the habits, and the network you need to launch a financially-rewarding, purpose-driven career in tech.”
As someone who worked in public school education, Reuben Ogbonna, co-founder and executive director, explains the motivation behind creating the Marcy Lab School.
“I saw students every year who would go off to college with big dreams and often end up with debt and no degree to show for it. Or debt, and underemployed or unemployed. We thought there has to be another postsecondary pathway for hardworking, motivated students who face financial barriers or those who are least likely to be served really, really well by traditional higher education.”
Ogbonna says the program goes beyond learning tech skills, but also acknowledges students’ life experiences.
He proudly shares a story about a recent graduate whose family arrived in the U.S. from Jamaica. This student’s goal was to land a great job that would allow him to take care of his family. During the pandemic, he interned at a top tech company alongside other interns from prestigious colleges. And was offered a position that pays him $190,000 annually, as well as company stock.
Click here to learn more about Marcy Lab School.
WorkingNation—a collaborating partner of the ASU+GSV Summit—sat down with Ogbonna in San Diego as part of our #WorkingNationOverheard social media series.
Hear from more innovators in education and tech in the public, private, and nonprofit spheres attending the ASU+GSV Summit 2021 here.
Follow the conversation on social media: #asugsvsummit #workingnationoverheard
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Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.
Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.
Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.
Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.
Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.
Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.
