Sylvia Acevedo
Twitter handle: @SylviaAcevedo

Sylvia Acevedo has earned worldwide recognition for adapting her work to address one of society’s most vexing challenges – universal access to education. As an award winning CEO, Sylvia is known to create significant market opportunities for clients through analysis and strategies that capitalize on changing demographic market patterns and trends.

President Obama named Sylvia to the White House Commission for Educational Excellence for Hispanics where she serves as Chair of the Early Childhood subcommittee. The President of Mexico honored Sylvia with the Ohtli award, its most prestigious civil rights recognition for non-Mexican nationals. US News and World Report recently named Sylvia one of the top 100 American Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM).

In 2007, Sylvia began using her engineering expertise as a social entrepreneur to create scalable solutions in education and health, especially for English Language Learners. Sylvia created a curriculum for PreK readiness used in 22 schools to train Spanish only speaking mothers and their toddlers. Her consulting work and strategies highlight the benefits of dual language in education and for a student’s career. In 6 years, Sylvia created national mobilization campaigns that drew over 225,000 attendees and created scalable systems that gave 250,000 books, 25,000 toothbrushes, 15,000 playground balls and 1000 pairs of eyeglasses to children in need. One of her educational campaigns in Los Angeles, won an Emmy award for her client.

Sylvia has enjoyed a broad business career, serving as an executive for several Fortune 100 companies, such as IBM, DELL and Apple. She started her career literally as a rocket scientist at the Jet Propulsion Labs. Sylvia holds a master’s degree of science in Industrial Engineering from Stanford University, and her undergraduate bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering from New Mexico State University.

Sylvia has received many awards and recognitions for her innovative, social entrepreneurial work and is an in demand corporate and conference speaker as a visionary thought leader, including speaking at TEDx.

Sylvia currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Girl Scouts of the United States. She has been very involved in philanthropy, recently serving as the Chair of the Austin Community Foundation before moving to Santa Barbara, CA.