Wendy Kopp has not joined FLAPSS and has not endorsed it. This page is a reference record assembled from published interviews and public remarks. Every answer below is a direct quotation with the source and date shown next to it.
Founder of Teach For America; chief executive of Teach For All
United States · b. 1967
American educator who proposed a national teaching corps in her Princeton undergraduate thesis and founded Teach For America in 1990. She later founded Teach For All, a network of independent organisations running comparable programmes in dozens of countries.
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I applied to one firm in every sector. This was the most half-hearted job search. “I’ll apply for that management consulting firm and this investment bank…” and I applied for five jobs altogether, because my heart wasn’t in it. And thankfully… I’m so glad I didn’t get any of those big jobs! Because that made this decision easier.
Recorded Academy of Achievement recorded interview, American Academy of Achievement, 17 September 2013 source ↗
The Fountainhead , I think, pretty much saved me in the initial years of Teach For America. I loved that book, but I’m not sure books were the seminal thing that guided my path. ... I think it was sort of about “the creator against the world,” and I was probably feeling at that point that I was up against lots of boulders, to pull off the big idea of Teach For America.
Recorded Academy of Achievement recorded interview, American Academy of Achievement, 17 September 2013 source ↗
And the most fulfilled, centered, grounded, happy people I know are people who made the choice to be part of an effort to actually make the world a better place. ... I would say, to me, the path of least regrets is to at least make a short-term commitment to say, “Let me work to make a real difference in the world.” The worst that could happen is you decide to move into something else later, but you’ll always take with you what you’ve given and what you’ve gained through that experience.
Recorded Academy of Achievement recorded interview, American Academy of Achievement, 17 September 2013 source ↗
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