Raise DC Staff and Operations

Cortnie Burriss

CORTNIE BURRISS

9th Grade Counts Network co-Lead

Thurgood Marshall Academy
Dean of Students

Cortnie Burriss is the Dean of Students for ninth grade at Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter School and fifteen-year educator in Washington DC’s metropolitan urban education arena with a specialty in designing and overseeing programming that prepares middle and high school students to be lifelong learners and to make choices that liberate them. Through cultivating communities of care within academic spaces, she infuses social emotional learning and trauma-informed teaching practices to amplify the voice and intellect of the whole child and the local communities who love them.

VPP + Raise DC
is now Youth
Invest Partners

In June of 2000, Venture Philanthropy Partners opened it doors, spurred by the efforts of three founders who asked themselves,
“Could the business world provide a different, innovative approach to social change?”

In the years that followed, VPP quickly became a strategic hub for high-impact investments through deep and sustained partnerships with foundations, businesses, government agencies and school systems.

In April of 2020, VPP formed a strategic alliance with Raise DC to build an investment organization capable of driving alignment among communities, and nonprofit, business and regional leaders around systems change. VPP+Raise DC committed to call out and confront policies, practices and systems that contribute to racial inequity.

Today, we recognize the need to do more, be bolder, and act faster. Youth Invest Partners is a call to “dream big and do big” to drive change that will build better futures for Greater Washington youth today and in the days, months and years to come. Our new name and brand reflects energy and focus as we collaborate, innovate and transform.

Join us and learn more