Associate Partner, Innovative Public Schools

Innovative Schools - United States (Remote)

United States (Remote)

Innovative Schools

Full-Time

Mid-level

$120,000 to $150,000

Nationally recognized nonprofit venture philanthropy seeks to hire an Associate Partner on the Innovative Public Schools Team to find, fund, and support leaders designing the next generation of innovative, future-ready public schools in K-12 education.

is a venture philanthropy that builds a better education system by connecting people, resources, and ideas. We bridge the gap between those with capital and those with the courage to put that capital to work on the front lines of K-12 education. We envision an education system that keeps its promise to all students. That's why we invest in the ideas and energy of education leaders and entrepreneurs who are advancing innovative solutions that expand the definition of what works.

There's a better way to advance education through philanthropy-one that is more equitable, more collaborative, and more courageous-and we're proving it every day.

The Innovative Public Schools (IPS) team at New Schools Venture Fund seeks an Associate Partner (AP) to lead our work finding and supporting school founders building future-ready school models. In this role, you will hold a portfolio of up to 10 public school teams in the design phases, roughly two years before opening, and lead our new work supporting AI-native and AI-supported fresh start schools.

You will spend meaningful time in the field learning how innovation is showing up in schools and bringing that learning back to evolve our strategy. You will report to Ariana Valenzuela, Partner, and may work remotely from anywhere in the U.S. This role requires up to 25% travel for in-person team meetings, retreats, and school site visits.

Your legacy at New Schools will include:

• Own the recruitment strategy for founders building future-ready models - AI as core infrastructure, college and career pathways, talent and time redesign, and models for historically underserved students.
• Build and continuously refine a national pipeline of innovative founders across charter and district schools, using pattern recognition to identify promising models before they're fully formed.
• Shape funding application and selection criteria that distinguish founders with genuine model ambition from those who use the language of innovation without the substance.
• Bring an innovation lens to application review, due diligence, and selection alongside the IPS team.
• Author investment recommendations for leadership and the board, making the case for which founders merit early-stage capital and why.

• Serve as the strategic relationship owner for up to 10 school teams in their earliest design phase (two years before opening), diagnosing where each founder's model is strong, underdeveloped, or at risk, and shaping the support plan accordingly.
• Coach founders through the hardest design decisions - instructional coherence, AI integration, talent and staffing, authorization, launch readiness - bringing judgment on what distinguishes a genuinely differentiated model from one innovative in name only.
• Design and lead adult learning experiences - cohort convenings, design sprints, school visits, peer consultancy - differentiated by stage and model, curating outside experts and exemplar schools where that accelerates a founder's thinking more than internal coaching can.
• Partner with other associate partners to ensure strong handoffs and learning arcs across the Y00-Y3 trajectory.

• Serve as the IPS lead for identifying, selecting, and supporting AI-native and AI-supported fresh start schools, setting the bar for what counts as AI built into a model's core design versus AI used as an added tool.
• Manage and evaluate relationships with AI implementation partners, matching founders to the right technical support and holding partners accountable for the outcomes they're meant to enable.
• Contribute to New Schools' AI learning agenda with the Research and Learning team - which approaches to AI integration are most promising, what they require in staffing, scheduling,…