SUNY Launches New York Cradle to Career Strategic Alliance
February 1, 2013
Albany — State University of New York Chancellor Nancy L. Zimpher today announced the launch of the New York Cradle to Career Strategic Alliance, which will serve as a central support system for cradle to career networks statewide, and work with interested communities to develop new partnerships.
Vanessa Threatte, founding principal of the Brighter Choice Charter Middle School for Girls has been appointed as executive director of the Alliance.
"SUNY's efforts to mend the state’s education pipeline and support every child from cradle to career have resulted in powerful cross-sector partnerships throughout the state and we are committed to bringing this work to scale," said Chancellor Zimpher.
"The Alliance will provide invaluable support to existing partnerships, and to those under development, as communities in every region begin to embrace their capacity to collectively impact the delivery of public education and quality of life in New York. Vanessa is the ideal candidate to lead this charge and we are thrilled that she has joined the SUNY team."
Building upon the comprehensive work within SUNY to strengthen the education pipeline, the Alliance will provide cradle to career partnerships with a cadre of coaches who will work with cross-sector leaders and related staff throughout the state to help them adopt the Strive methodology and its disciplined approach to sustaining a cradle to career network over time. It will also support the collection, management, analysis, and reporting of data that these networks use to drive their actions and efforts to continuously improve what works for children and youth in each community.
Capturing lessons learned from each partnership and sharing them broadly with leaders across the state, the Alliance will work to ensure that common pitfalls are avoided and successes scaled to expedite each community's development of a civic infrastructure. The Alliance will also launch an advocacy agenda to ensure that policies are in place to support network sites and to engage leaders and funders to support strategies that work.
SUNY has helped three New York communities launch cradle-to-career networks already, in the cities of Albany and Rochester, and in rural Clinton County, and is working with school and community officials in Brooklyn, Harlem, Queens, Yonkers, the Mohawk Valley, and on Long Island, to do the same. The Alliance will provide technical and professional support to each of these partnerships and others in the future.
About Vanessa Threatte
Before contributing to the founding of the Brighter Choice Charter Middle School for Girls and joining its leadership team in July 2010, Threatte served as planning principal Nov. 2008 - July 2010) and assistant principal (July 2007 - Nov. 2008) of the Brighter Choice Charter School for Girls. She earned a bachelor's degree from Dartmouth College, a master's degree in Art Therapy from The School of Art Institute of Chicago, and dual master's degrees in Literacy and Special Education from the University at Albany.
About the State University of New York
The State University of New York, which celebrates its 75th anniversary this year, is the largest comprehensive system of higher education in the United States, and more than 95 percent of all New Yorkers live within 30 miles of any one of SUNY’s 64 colleges and universities. Across the system, SUNY has four academic health centers, five hospitals, four medical schools, two dental schools, a law school, the country’s oldest school of maritime, the state’s only college of optometry, and manages one US Department of Energy National Laboratory. In total, SUNY serves about 1.4 million students amongst its entire portfolio of credit- and non-credit-bearing courses and programs, continuing education, and community outreach programs. SUNY oversees nearly a quarter of academic research in New York. Research expenditures system-wide are nearly $1.1 billion in fiscal year 2022, including significant contributions from students and faculty. There are more than three million SUNY alumni worldwide, and one in three New Yorkers with a college degree is a SUNY alum. To learn more about how SUNY creates opportunities, visit suny.edu.
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Holly Liapis
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