Allison Persad

Cahn Fellow 2019

Principal, The Young Women's Leadership School of Astoria

Queens, New York

Allison Persad, Principal of The Young Women’s Leadership School of Astoria has spent nearly 20 years as a teacher, coach, adjunct professor, and now principal of an all girls public school in NYC. She is a graduate of St. John’s University Educational Leadership Doctor of Education Program. Allison was a proud student in NYC public schools for her entire life, growing up in Queens, NY. She has been instrumental in advancing the work of STEM education across her 6-12 all girls model and has created a global audience for the technical and academic work at TYWLS Astoria. Currently, the school offers the a 6-12 Software Engineering CTE Program, one of the instrumental pioneers of the Middle School CTE track in the state of NY, as well as a Digital Media program. TYWLS Astoria has the honor of being one of the only public schools in the state of NY named as Apple Distinguished School, under her leadership, she has been selected to be a part of an Apple Global Innovation Project, 1 of 12 schools in the world, to research innovative strategies that can be replicated across the world. She has worked on securing more than 1.2M of grant funding in 3 years to support her initiatives including AP for ALL, CS for ALL and igniting the passion of young women with a future Innovation Hub, Hydroponics Lab and Film Studio in the works. One of her students was selected among 6 in the world to visit Vatican City and “teach” the Pope his first line of code, while sharing the impact computer science has and can have on communities. After winning this year’s City-Wide Hackathon, she took a small team to meet with the Deputy Mayor in hopes of taking their app to scale and helping to solve issues with sanitation in NYC. Bridging the gap with community solutions and technology has been paramount in her work, students have worked with inmates at Rikers Island to co-create and write films in conjunction with Tribeca Film to portray the shared stories of females across boundaries. Allison shares her vision for STEM, with great intention of reversing the global gender gap with girls in this field. Allison has presented at the National Principals Conference and the Global Forum for Girls Education, she has been named “Principal of the Week for Preparing Young Women in the 21st Century” by DNA Info and interviewed and showcased as a “Power Woman of Queens,” for QPTV. Most recently, Allison has been named a 2019-20 Digital Principal of the Year by the National Association of Secondary School Principals and a winner of the 2019 Excellence in School Technology Award.