Redwood City, CA. (January 5th, 2023) – The Board of Directors of BUILD.org is pleased to announce the appointment of Bill Taylor as the next Chief Executive Officer. Bill has extensive experience in scaling different organizations, including NAF where he helped grow the organization from 3,000 students served to over 120,000 today.

Taylor succeeds Ayele Shakur, who spent over 12 years with the organization. His appointment comes after an extensive selection process by the Board.

On behalf of the Board, I’m beyond thrilled to announce Bill Taylor as BUILD’s next CEO”, says Roy Hirshland, Chairman of BUILD’s National Board of Directors. “We look forward to Bill’s leadership in continuing to expand BUILD’s footprint in high schools across the nation and have positive life outcomes for our students.”

Bill Taylor joins BUILD after a 22-year journey at NAF, a national educational nonprofit focused on providing experiential learning for students from high need communities. Last year, BUILD trained nearly 500 educators in over 100 cities across America and served over 8,000+ youth through BUILD’s digital challenges and in-school entrepreneurship programming. In his role as CEO he will lead an effort to bring entrepreneurship education to more underserved communities across the United States.

“I am honored to join such a fantastic group of people who share my passion for developing and inspiring the next generation of leaders.”, says Bill Taylor, incoming CEO of BUILD. “I believe that we are at a critical moment in the U.S., confronted with deep partisan divisions roiled by populism, racism, and other dividing forces. Now more than ever, our country needs an organization committed to helping underserved youth develop the entrepreneurial skills that will empower them as leaders of innovation and agents of change”.

Bill Taylor is deeply aligned with BUILD’s mission, drawing also on his background as a high school educator in New York City. He graduated with a sociology degree from State University of New York, Geneseo located in Geneseo, NY.

About BUILD.org
Founded in 1999, BUILD.org is a national nonprofit organization whose mission is to use entrepreneurship to ignite the potential of youth from under-resourced communities to build Career success, Entrepreneurial Mindsets, and Opportunity. BUILD utilizes entrepreneurship education to elevate youth and propel them to academic and career success, while empowering them to become the CEO of their own lives.