Our Boards

Board of Trustees

Every charter school is governed by a Board of Trustees that holds the school’s charter and is responsible for ensuring the financial well-being of the school, hiring the school leader, and adhering to the terms of the charter’s accountability plan. The Boston Collegiate Charter School Board allows for up to 22 voting members and terms that rotate every three years.

Board meetings for the 2022-2023 school year are listed below.  For more information about our Board of Trustees, including details about meeting minutes, or for public record inquiries, please contact Jenna Ogundipe, Executive Director.

2022-2023 Board of Trustees Meeting Schedule

  • Tuesday, September 13th, 8:30 – 10:00 am, Hybrid, Meeting Agenda
  • Tuesday, October 25th, 8:30 – 10:00 am, Hybrid, Meeting Agenda
  • Friday, October 28th, 7:50 – 8:00 am, Virtual, Meeting Agenda Meeting Agenda
  • Saturday, December 3rd, 8:00 am – 12:30 pm, In-Person Board Retreat, Meeting Agenda
  • Tuesday, January 31st, 8:30 – 10:00 am, In-Person (Lower School Campus), Meeting Agenda
  • Tuesday, March 28th, 8:30 – 10:00 am, In-Person (Lower School Campus), Meeting Agenda
  • Tuesday, May 9th, 8:30 – 10:00 am, In-Person (Lower School Campus), Meeting Agenda
  • Tuesday, June 13th, 8:30 – 10:00 am, In-Person (Lower School Campus), Meeting Agenda

Nicole Chang | Chair

Financial and Operations Professional

Nicole Chang is a Financial and Operations professional with experience in both corporate and Non-profit companies. At her last position as a Business Manager at Education Development Center (EDC), her focus is on budget creation and monitoring, as well as contract compliance to monitor contracts/awards issued to EDC as well as those contracts and awards that EDC subcontracts.  Her expertise is in Business financial and administrative operations.  She is a graduate of Tufts University and has an MBA from Babson College. 

Jose Brandao | Vice Chair | Finance Committee Member | BCCS Parent

Vice President, Business Technology Risk, State Street Corporation | Boston, MA

José Brandão is a Vice President of Business Technology Risk at State Street Corporation a financial services firm in Boston. He is responsible for developing, directing, and managing the overall technology risk management program for the Investor Services Americas (ISA) business unit. Previously he also held roles at State Street in IT Regulatory Compliance, IT Operations, and Internal Audit at Liberty Mutual Insurance. Jose received both his B.S. in Finance & Management Information Systems and his MBA in High Technology Management from Northeastern University.

Robert Harris | Clerk, Governance Committee Chair

Chief Practice Group Management Officer, Hinckley Allen | Boston, MA

Robert Harris is responsible for all activities related to the training and development of lawyers and paralegals on issues of professional capability and client service at Hinckley Allen. His primary focus is to manage training initiatives for all Practice Groups and to develop, implement, and oversee training and development programs that grow and enhance the knowledge, skills and abilities of our attorneys. He graduated from Boston University School of Law, and received his undergraduate degree from Swarthmore College.

Prescott Taylor | Treasurer, Finance Committee Chair

Head of Finance, Gupta Media | Boston, MA

Prescott Taylor is the Head of Finance of Gupta Media, a digital performance marketing agency focused on driving sales results for its global client roster.  Previously, he was Finance Director of MarcoPolo Learning and Head of Finance at Cambridge Biomarketing Group, a biotech communications agency. He also previously served as SVP, Director of Finance for PR agency, Feinstein Kean Healthcare. In addition to five years at Boston-based Arnold Worldwide, Prescott spent three years as VP, Capital Planning at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, the Boston-based K-12 educational publisher. He earned a B.A. in economics from Colgate University and an M.B.A. from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.

Bridget Adam | Leadership Advisory Committee Member

Sixth Grade Math Teacher and Co-Grade Level Leader, Boston Collegiate Charter School | Boston, MA

Bridget Adam is a 6th grade Mathematics teacher at Boston Collegiate Charter School’s (BCCS) Lower School.  She has been working at BCCS since 2003.  Bridget has participated in many of BCCS’s collaboration projects around the state and oversees the school’s Mathletes program and the annual trip to the Farm School in Athol, Massachusetts.  She attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  Bridget is married to Anthony Adam and has two lovely children, Stuart and Corrina.

Liz Bride | Development Committee Member

Director of Investor Relations, Berkshire Partners | Boston, MA

Liz Bride joined Berkshire Partners as Director of Investor Relations in 2018.  Previously Liz spent nine years on the global Investor Relations team at Bain Capital and also served as COO of Guidepost Growth Equity.   Earlier in her career, she was a consultant in the private equity group at the Parthenon Group and on the research team at Cambridge Associates. Liz received a B.A. from Hamilton College and an M.B.A. from the Tuck School of Business Administration at Dartmouth College.

Ayden Cardoso

Student, Boston Collegiate Charter School | Boston, MA

Bio forthcoming.

Tanya Chakmakian

Senior Account Executive, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts | Boston, MA

Tanya Chakmakian is a Senior Account Executive for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts working with cities and towns to manage existing health care programs, implement new programming as well as targeting pilot programs and emerging solutions.  As such, she is responsible for account meetings and account-related activities such as analytic presentations, funding analysis, member education, requests for proposals and information, operational assessments, tours, and client relationships.

Tanya is a graduate of Stonehill College and lives in Boston with her husband and their two sons.

Paul Gordon | Development Committee Co-Chair

Portfolio Manager, MFS Investment Management | Boston, MA

Paul Gordon is a Portfolio Manager at MFS Investment Management, a global investment manager.  Paul has 19 years of investment experience, and currently manages the MFS Growth and Mid Cap Growth products for retail and institutional clients.  He is a first-generation college student and graduate of Babson College.

Bill Heiden | Development Committee Member

Retired Pharmaceutical/Biotechnology Executive

William Heiden is an experienced pharmaceutical/biotechnology executive, having served as a chief executive and a board member in several public and private companies in the Boston-area over the last eighteen years until his retirement in 2020.  He spent the preceding fifteen years in leadership roles in the US and internationally at Merck & Co.. Mr. Heiden holds an M.B.A. from Cornell University’s Johnson Graduate School of Management, a Master’s degree of International Management from the University of Louvain (Belgium) and a B.A. degree in finance from the University of Florida.

Dina Model

Agios Pharmaceuticals | Cambridge, MA

Dina Model is the head of Financial Planning & Analysis at Agios Pharmaceuticals, a biopharmaceutical company pioneering therapies for genetically defined diseases. Previously, she held roles at Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Baxalta. She started her career in investment banking at Miller Buckfire, a division of Stifel Financial. Dina received her M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and her B.S. in Finance and a minor in Psychology from New York University.

Ali Nuger | Development Committee Co-Chair

Chief Operating Officer and a Managing Director, A-Street | Boston, MA

Ali is currently the Chief Operating Officer and a Managing Director at A-Street, an investment fund focused on investing in K-12 education.  Ali was previously head of Boston Operations and Strategic Initiatives and a Consulting Manager at Bain & Company, and she was a Senior Manager at The Bridgespan Group. Ali has a B.A., magna cum laude, in Chinese Language and Literature from Dartmouth College and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Caroline Page | Finance Committee Member

Partner, HighVista Strategies | Boston, MA

Caroline Page is a Partner at HighVista Strategies, a boutique investment firm in Boston that manages assets for institutions and private investors. Previously, she was a management strategy consultant at Bain & Company and spent a number of years at Goldman Sachs in various advisory and institutional sales & trading businesses.  She has a B.A. in economics from Princeton University, summa cum laude, and an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School.

Scott Utzinger | Governance Committee Member

Partner, Crawford Fund Management, LLC | Boston, MA

Following 13 years in equity research and portfolio manager at Wellington Management Company and Fidelity Investments, Scott Utzinger became a co-founding partner of Crawford Fund Management, an alternative investment management firm, where he leads the firm’s client activities.  Scott started his career as a strategic management consultant for New England Consulting Group and Booz Allen & Hamilton.  Scott did his undergraduate studies at The University of Pennsylvania, where he earned a B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School of Business and a B.A.S. in Systems Engineering from the School of Engineering and Applied Science, both summa cum laude.  Scott holds an M.B.A. from Stanford University Graduate School of Business, where he was an Arjay Miller Scholar.  He also serves on the board of Commonwealth Shakespeare Company.

Natalie Velasquez is a Delivery Manager at Mulesoft where she is responsible for handling all aspects of the post-sale services engagement across a vast portfolio of customers and projects that vary in size, complexity, and industry domain across their entire lifestyle.

Prior to this role, Natalie worked at State Street Corporation where she managed strategic initiatives for the Enterprise Data Governance and Management group. Natalie is a former Board Member of ALPFA (Association of Latino Professionals for America) where she served on the Programming Committee for the Boston Chapter. Prior to joining State Street, she worked for BBVA in Madrid, Spain within their Talent Development group through the Fundación Consejo España-Estados Unidos program. Natalie is a first-generation college student and holds a B.A. from College of the Holy Cross.

Karen Walker Beecher | Governance Committee Member

Advisor, The Bowdoin Group | Waltham, MA

Karen currently is an Advisor to several companies, including The Bowdoin Group where she served as its Chief Operating Officer since 2012, and led its transformation to become the 5th largest retained executive search firm in Massachusetts.  Prior to Bowdoin, Karen was Vice President, Sales Strategy and Global Operations at Pegasystems Inc., the leader in BPM and CRM software solutions, and where she led its global expansion from 130 to 400+ people in sales, alliances, product and operations.  Prior to Pega, Karen was the Chief Financial Officer and Head of People Operations for Boston Communications Group, Inc. (bcgi), a real-time transaction processing SaaS technology company. Karen led bcgi from VC-backed start-up through its IPO, growing to over 1,500 employees globally in 6 years.  Karen is a graduate of Boston College and serves as the Co-Chair of the Boston College Technology & Entrepreneurship Council.

Foundation Board

Charles Cassidy, President

Chris Churchill

Susan Fortin

Josh Fredberg

Haven Ladd

Rob Lawrence

Nickie Norris

Brett Peiser

Carroll Perry

Nina Ross

Shannah Varón

Collegiate Council

Hayley Bacon, Co-Chair

Parth Khare, Co-Chair

Peter Bearse

Tim Devlin

Ben Feinglass

Jeremy Harchelroad

Tom Hoff

Maddie Koelher

Charles Li

Grant Manon

Andrew Neary

Mark O’Leary, ’11