SILVER SPRING, MD., Dec. 1, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Achieving the Dream President & CEO Dr. Karen A. Stout today announced the appointment of Wes Moore, national bestselling author, combat veteran and co-founder of innovative college completion platform BridgeEdU, to the Board of Directors of Achieving the Dream, a national nonprofit dedicated to strengthening community college student success.
Dr. Stout said, "Achieving the Dream is fortunate to have Wes join our important work. He has first-hand, personal experience of the financial, academic, and social challenges that so many community college students face, and has succeeded at the highest levels. His understanding of students' journeys and his work at a number of Maryland's higher education institutions to help first-generation college students complete higher education will be a rich source of information for ATD's work to create student-focused cultures on all of our campuses."
Wes is the co-founder and CEO of BridgeEdU, an approach to college completion that positions first-year students for success by engaging them in real-world internships and service learning opportunities. BridgeEDU partners with institutions of higher education such as Community College of Baltimore County, an ATD Network college, and Coppin State University, to provide participating students with wrap-around services and an experiential co-curriculum. Wes and his co-founder created BridgeEdU to ensure that more students have the tools and know-how to succeed.
In 2010, Wes published The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates, an examination of the divergent life paths of two boys with same name who grew up without fathers in similar Baltimore neighborhoods and had difficult childhoods. The book became a New York Times bestseller.
More recently, Wes was co-executive producer of a new documentary All the Difference, which premiered in September 2016 on the PBS award-winning POV series. Filmed over five and a half years, All the Difference shows the stories of two determined, promising young black men — Robert Henderson and Krishaun Branch — as they overcome the obstacles of under-resourced homes and high-risk communities in Chicago to attend college. Also in 2016, he was a keynote speaker at DREAM, ATD's annual conference.
Wes graduated Phi Theta Kappa from Valley Forge Military College in 1998 and Phi Beta Kappa from Johns Hopkins University in 2001. While a student at Johns Hopkins he founded STAND!, which works with Baltimore youth involved in the criminal justice system and still exists today. He completed an MLitt in International Relations from Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar in 2004. After graduation, Wes served as a paratrooper and Captain in the United States Army, participating in a combat tour of duty in Afghanistan with the 82nd Airborne Division.
About Achieving the Dream
Achieving the Dream, Inc., is a national nonprofit dedicated to helping more community college students, particularly low-income students and students of color, persist in their studies and earn a college credential. Achieving the Dream is working toward closing achievement gaps and accelerating student success nationwide through an institutional change process based on five founding principles. Conceived as an initiative in 2004 by Lumina Foundation and seven founding partner organizations, today Achieving the Dream is leading a comprehensive non-governmental reform network that includes more than 200 institutions, more than 100 coaches and advisors, and 15 state policy teams working throughout 35 states and the District of Columbia. Achieving the Dream helps more than 4 million community college students have a better chance of realizing greater economic opportunity and achieving their dreams.
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Lynn Reddy, Achieving the Dream (240) 450-3830
