Maia Heyck-Merlin has over a decade of experience juggling high-volume roles in results-oriented organizations. She most recently served as Chief Talent Officer and Chief Operating Officer for Achievement First, a charter school management organization running 20 schools in Brooklyn and Connecticut. During this time, she oversaw teams that led recruitment, human capital, operations, and development and evaluation of school leaders and teachers at Achievement First.
Prior to joining Achievement First, she worked at Teach For America in a variety of capacities. Maia began as a corps member in South Louisiana where she taught fourth grade for two years and was named Teacher of the Year for her school and selected as a Fulbright Memorial Fund recipient. She then shifted to teach fifth grade at Children’s Charter School and directed Teach Baton Rouge’s first summer training institute for The New Teacher Project. In 2002, Maia returned to Teach For America as the Executive Director in South Louisiana, overseeing programmatic efforts for a corps that had doubled in size. She then served for three years as the Houston Institute Director, leading training and development for the incoming corps. In her last role at Teach For America, Maia founded and led the National Institute Operations team, which managed national operations for all five summer training institutes.
In 2007, Maia founded The Together Group, a business focused on training educators on topics such as time management, prioritization, organization, and efficiency. In 2011, she wrote The Together Teacher: Plan Ahead, Get Organized, and Save Time published by Jossey Bass in June of 2012.
Maia holds a B.A. in child development from Tufts University. She lives in the DC area with her husband Jack (a middle school English teacher), their energetic preschooler Ada, slightly more mellow baby boy Reed, and two unruly cats. In her free time, she enjoys swimming slowly, eating Oreos on the couch, and trying to keep up with her farm share deliveries.
These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in or filling in forms. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not then work.
These cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.
These cookies allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and improve the performance of our site. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site. If you do not allow these cookies we will not know when you have visited our site, and will not be able to monitor its performance.
These cookies enable the website to provide enhanced functionality and personalization. They may be set by us or by third party providers whose services we have added to our pages. If you do not allow these cookies then some or all of these services may not function properly.