Our team

Staff Growth and Change

2021 was full of hellos and goodbyes. In January, we hired Paige Hoffman as In-House Programs Manager, a role our Executive Director Nina had filled for the previous six months. When Paige left the role in April due to a family emergency, we were fortunate to hire Assemble Studio Coordinator and Teacher Devon Dill as our new In-House Programs Manager. Devon stepped into the role even as they continued to teach our virtual afterschool program.

"An organizational chart of Assemble as of December 2021. The key shows three text colors that indicate staff type: dark purple for full-time staff; lilac for part-time staff; and orange for intern/volunteer positions. Top level: Executive Committee, Board of Directors (volunteers). Second Level: Connecting to the Executive Committee box is the Executive Director, Nina Barbuto (full-time). To the right, connecting only to the Executive Director, is the Assistant to Director (intern/volunteer). Third level: connecting up to the Executive Director are three Managers, all full-time staff: In House Programs Manager, Devon Dill; Offsite Programs Manager, Ja'Sonta Roberts; and a Marketing and Development Manager, TBA. In a column connecting up to the In House Programs Manager are: Camp Coordinator + Teacher, Leah Lavrinic-Borowski(full-time); Studio Coordinator + Teacher, Evelyn Glaze (full-time); Monthly Programs Coordinator + Teacher, Samira Mendoza (full-time); and College volunteers/Interns (interns/voluteers). In a column connecting up to the Offsite Programs Manager are the Assemble Teachers (part-time): Alex Aleco, Aubrey Thompson, Nola Mims, Veronica Green, Victoria Jennings, Tany Haynes, Jacquea Mae Olday, Cameron Evans, Jr., and Ricardo Davis. The Assemble Teachers also connect to the In House Programs Manager. A full-time Americorps Keys Member also connects up to the Offsite Programs Manager. In a column connecting to the Marketing and Development Manager, TBA are the Development Associate, Kiera Cullen(full-time); Outreach/Marketing Associate (unamed volunteer/intern) and Development Assistant (volunteer/intern). "

We welcomed many other new faces to the Assemble family. Evelyn Glaze, previously a part-time teacher, joined as our Studio Coordinator. In June, we hired our first-ever Development Associate, Ana Garcia-Maunez, but left the position just a month later for a role at the National Endowment for Humanities. We were able to fill the Development Associate position again in October when Kiera Cullen joined the team. That same month, Marketing and Development Manager Andrea Petrillo left Assemble. Our Executive Director and In-House programs Manager covered the role until January 2022, when we hired Dale Crawford.

So many talented teachers Assembled with us during 2021. We welcomed Nola Mims, Alex Aleco, Ricardo Davis, Maya Gardner, Royce Robertson, Victoria Jennings, Emily Johns, Sean O’Connor, Tany Haynes, Leah Riley, and Carolyn Normile as new teachers. Past teachers Jacquea Mae Olday and Tori Craig rejoined Assemble in the summer of 2021. Aubrey Thompson continued to help with offsite programs, organizing program documents, schedules, and curriculum development. Takumi Davis left teaching at Assemble to focus on a master's degree in Architecture at Carnegie Mellon University.

We also welcomed past Assemble participants as teachers and staff. Cameron Evans, Jr, a past Hack the Future participant, joined us as a part-time staff member after working with us as an Americorps Keys Member. Veronica Green, a long-time Assemble participant, joined the team as a part-time teacher. Though many of our teachers work with us just for the summer, we were excited to have a full-time team for the fall semester as we started in-person programming again.

S.E.E.D. Committee Retires

How did we raise funds before we hired a Development Associate? For ten years Assemble’s S.E.E.D. committee worked passionately on grants and funding applications. Among the many generous and talented board members who ended their terms in 2021, a special thank you goes to Akwasi Opoku-Dakwa for his excellent work leading the SEED committee for the last two plus years.

Race & gender representation

Collecting demographic and identity-descriptive data about our staff, board, and Assemblers is one way for our organization to hold ourselves accountable to our values of inclusion and belonging. By collecting this data, we are better able to understand more about the community of learners whom we serve. It also allows us to move more intentionally towards our goal of recruiting and retaining staff and board members who directly reflect the learners who come through our doors, and more broadly, our community in Pittsburgh. We believe that to create a space and community where all folks feel they can truly belong means that we have to examine the way our biases, conscious or unconscious, may show up - this can include our institutional practices of hiring, recruitment, program design and delivery, fundraising, and program evaluation. We are committed to doing this learning alongside our community because it enables us to build true, authentic and long-lasting partnerships, and is a core part of our vision and mission.

Race

Data show that our board is disportionately White or European American (79%) when compared to Assemble staff (43%) and to Pittsburgh (65%).

Ethnicities without representation on our 2021 board included: American Indian or Alaska Native; Hispanic or Latina/Latino/Lantinx; and Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander.

Ethnicities without representation on our 2021 staff included: Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander.

US NonProfit Board data sourced from BoardSource 2021 Leading with Intent Report (pg. 28). Pittsburgh population data sourced from the US Census Bureau's Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Quickfacts.

Gender identity

Although the proportion of people identifying as female on the board (63%) was above the national non-profit average (53%), the 2021 board lacked any transgender, gender-nonconforming, or non-binary representation.