Sarita E. Brown

Sarita E. Brown is the President of Excelencia in Education, a 501(c)3 working to accelerate Latino success in higher education by linking research, policy, and practice to serve Latino students. She started her career at the University of Texas at Austin by building a national model promoting minority success in graduate education. Coming to the nation's capital in 1997 to work for educational associations, Ms. Brown was appointed as Executive Director of the White House Initiative for Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans under President Bill Clinton and U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley. Maintaining her commitment to improving the quality of education, Ms. Brown applied her talents and experience to the not-for-profit sector as Founding President of the Hispanic Scholarship Fund Institute and, since 2004, as Founding President of Excelencia in Education.

Ms. Brown currently serves on the Board of Directors for ACT Inc., the National College Access Network (NCAN) and on advisory committees for Univision Communications Children’s Programming, the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) Educational Fund, and the Journal of Hispanic Higher Education. She holds a bachelor's of arts in ethnic studies and a bachelor's of science and master's of arts in communication from The University of Texas at Austin. In 2009, she will receive an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters Degree from North Carolina State University.