Executive Director Search | Atlas Scholars
The Organization
Atlas Scholars is a Houston-based youth development and education organization focused on college access, workforce development, and expanding opportunity for young people. For more than 14 years, the organization has built a strong program reputation through a highly personalized model designed to support students as they prepare for college, careers, and long-term success. Scion Executive Search had previously partnered with Atlas Scholars on its 2024 Executive Director search. During the following two years, the organization doubled both revenue and student cohort size, strengthened its internal infrastructure, and positioned itself for continued expansion.
The Leadership Challenge
Following the departure of its Executive Director, Atlas Scholars returned to Scion during another pivotal stage of organizational growth. The Board recognized that the next leader would need to build on recent momentum while creating a more sustainable foundation for the future. Atlas Scholars remained an extremely lean organization with only two full-time employees and significant reliance on founders and board-affiliated funding sources.
The incoming Executive Director needed to diversify revenue, transition important donor and community relationships, strengthen brand awareness throughout Houston, build strategic partnerships, and create the operational scalability necessary for continued cohort growth without sacrificing the personalized student experience at the heart of the organization’s mission.
What Success Looked Like
Scion worked with Atlas Scholars to define three primary outcomes for the incoming Executive Director’s first 12 to 18 months:
- Increase and diversify fundraising through grants, corporate partnerships, individual giving, and institutional support.
- Successfully transition key donor, community, and corporate relationships while strengthening Atlas Scholars’ visibility and brand presence throughout Houston.
- Build operational scalability to support continued cohort growth, long-term sustainability, and future expansion opportunities.
The organization needed a hands-on executive who could balance visionary leadership with day-to-day execution, including fundraising, partnership development, board engagement, financial oversight, community visibility, and organizational operations.
Scion’s Approach
Scion began with extensive stakeholder discovery involving founders, board members, staff leadership, the outgoing Executive Director, and human resources leadership.
These conversations helped uncover the true success profile behind the position. While the initial mandate included a broad range of leadership responsibilities, the discovery process clarified that fundraising capacity, relationship development, and long-term organizational sustainability were the most critical priorities.
Scion recalibrated the search accordingly, targeting leaders with demonstrated success across fundraising, community engagement, workforce development, youth-serving organizations, and nonprofit growth environments.
- Deep stakeholder discovery and calibrated success profiling
- Targeted candidate mapping across relevant nonprofit and community leadership markets
- Intentional diverse slating and inclusive process design
- Weekly reporting and stakeholder alignment across a layered governance structure
- Evaluation of financial stewardship, operational leadership, political acumen, and culture-change capability
- Reference, background, and offer calibration
The search required a rare combination of executive capabilities. Atlas Scholars needed a leader who could think strategically about growth while personally executing many of the activities necessary to achieve it.
Scion therefore evaluated candidates not simply on prior titles, but on demonstrated ability to secure funding, cultivate community relationships, build systems, manage budgets, lead programs, engage boards, and operate successfully in resource-constrained environments.
Particular emphasis was placed on identifying leaders who understood Houston’s nonprofit, education, workforce development, and philanthropic landscape and who could immediately begin expanding Atlas Scholars’ network and visibility.
Finding a Builder and Fundraiser
The Selected Leader
Atlas Scholars selected a candidate who most recently served as Chief Program Officer for SERJobs, where they provided executive leadership across programs, operations, partnerships, facilities, and fundraising activities.
Previously serving as Director of Advancement, they helped expand organizational funding by more than 40%, secured multimillion-dollar grants, led fundraising events, supported board engagement, and cultivated strategic partnerships throughout the Houston community.
Across their experience, the candidate had overseen multimillion-dollar budgets and secured more than $5 million in grants and institutional funding, directly aligning with Atlas Scholars’ priorities around fundraising diversification, community visibility, and sustainable growth.
The candidate brought the rare combination of fundraising success, operational leadership, nonprofit management experience, Houston-area relationships, and mission alignment that Atlas Scholars required. Their personal connection to educational access and economic mobility, paired with proven experience securing funding, managing complex programs, building partnerships, and leading organizational growth, positioned them to guide Atlas Scholars into its next phase.
The selection committee was particularly impressed by their fundraising accomplishments, extensive Houston network, executive leadership experience, and authentic commitment to supporting underserved youth. Reference checks further validated their relationship-building strengths, operational leadership, fundraising potential, and readiness to step into their first Executive Director opportunity.
Strong alignment among the Board, founders, and key stakeholders ultimately solidified their selection. They are scheduled to begin as Executive Director on June 22, 2026.
Why This Leader Was the Right Fit
The Impact
The Atlas Scholars search demonstrates the value of combining deep organizational discovery with precise candidate calibration during a leadership transition.
Scion’s work helped the organization move beyond a broad leadership profile and focus the search on the capabilities most essential to its next stage: fundraising growth, strategic partnerships, community visibility, operational scalability, and long-term sustainability.
The selected leader enters the role with a track record of expanding funding portfolios, securing multimillion-dollar institutional support, managing complex operations, and building strategic relationships across Houston, providing Atlas Scholars with the leadership foundation needed to build on its recent growth.
Why Scion Executive Search
Atlas Scholars’ decision to return to Scion for a second Executive Director search reflects a continuing executive search partnership across multiple stages of organizational growth. Scion Executive Search partners with education, youth development, workforce development, and mission-driven organizations nationwide to identify transformative leaders who strengthen fundraising, expand organizational capacity, and position programs for sustainable long-term impact.
