Program Administration Team Senior Staff

www.eqfund.org

As a seasoned investment banker, charter school executive, and senior leader of a large philanthropic organization, Anand is passionate about solving educational inequalities, creating efficient financial markets, optimizing school financial models to send more resources to classrooms, and using philanthropy to do so in a scalable and sustainable manner.

Prior to founding Equitable Facilities Fund, Anand led the Structured Finance Group and ran the Facility Fund for the Charter School Growth Fund, where he helped identify the nation’s best schools and invest in them. Prior to CSGF, he served as Chief Financial Officer of KIPP Austin Public Schools. Prior to KIPP, Anand spent more than a decade in senior investment banking roles, financing more than $10 billion in public projects including state revolving funds and K-12 schools with a specialty in credit ratings & quantitative structuring.

Anand is a graduate of the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and the Education Pioneers Fellowship.

Michelle is charged with building Equitable Facilities Fund’s credit platform and leading a thorough credit diligence and approval process for each charter school loan. Additionally, she leads the loan closing, loan servicing and portfolio management processes.

She brings with her nearly 30 years of professional experience, including 18 years at Nuveen Asset Management. During her time at Nuveen, Michelle developed and refined their charter school investment methodology and implemented it via analysis of over 300 charter school organizations to determine viability and credit worthiness for investment. Michelle has also served as an Internal Auditor for the Coca-Cola Company and an External Financial Auditor with Deloitte & Touche.

Michelle earned a BS from Auburn University and an MS from the University of Houston. She is also a CPA in the states of Illinois and North Carolina.

Wendy is a facility financing specialist with deep credit expertise. At Equitable Facilities Fund she conducts bond market research, builds and leads our internal underwriting process, and works closely with our Chief Credit Officer on greenlighting transactions and due diligence efforts. For the past decade, Wendy has focused on the evolving charter school sector, where she has been a thought leader in improving credit standards for the burgeoning market.

She has authored or co-authored several comprehensive publications on the sector, including the LISC Charter School Bond Issuance: A Complete History Volumes I, II, and III along with numerous articles on the ever-changing charter school facility finance landscape.

Wendy has consulted with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the New York State Housing Finance Agency, the Local Support Initiatives Corporation, the State University of New York Charter Schools Institute, and the Arizona State Board of Education. She was also a senior credit analyst at Moody’s Investors Service.

Wendy received a BA and MPA from the Rockefeller College of Public Administration at the University of Albany. During her career, Wendy has held Series 7, Series 53, and Series 63 licenses.

Marc is charged with sourcing loans and developing Equitable Facilities Fund’s pipeline. He works closely with partner schools to evaluate and guide them through our internal credit and underwriting process.

Marc brings 20 years of impact investing and nonprofit management experience. Formerly a Senior Executive and Analyst at Aeris, Marc conducted in-depth analysis and ratings of more than 70 Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) throughout the U.S. and the U.K. Prior to Aeris, Marc worked as an independent consultant, managing development finance projects in Southeast Asia, including impact assessments and operational and financial evaluations of microcredit and savings programs, as well as designing microfinance initiatives to facilitate rural populations’ access to solar products. Marc’s international work was preceded by extensive lending and program management experience in the CDFI sector, working with NFF and Hope Enterprise Corporation.

Marc holds a BA from the University of Minnesota in Central European and Russian history and an MA from Fordham University in international politics and economic development.

Mr. Vastola supports charter leaders and school communities in building stable, permanent facilities that affirm student worth and create the conditions for learning.  As Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Vastola guides EFF’s financial strategy and brings a deep understanding of real estate finance, risk management, and organizational growth.  He is passionate about ensuring schools can focus on teaching and learning rather than worrying about their buildings.  Before joining EFF, Mr. Vastola spent more than a decade at KIPP Public Schools Northern California, where he served as Chief Financial and Operating Officer.  In that role, he oversaw finance, real estate development, operations, data, technology, and facilities, leading a team of 40 and stewarding an annual budget of $170,000,000. Mr. Vastola led the financing and construction of seven school facilities, negotiated long-term ground leases to provide permanent homes for schools, and closed four tax-exempt facilities loans with EFF totaling $80,000,000. He also helped KIPP Northern California grow from 7 to 23 schools and secure clean audits over 12 years.  He began his career as an analyst with NERA Economic Consulting in New York before transitioning into education through the Education Pioneers Fellowship.  Mr. Vastola holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Brown University.  He has passed Level I of the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) program.

Allison Fansler is an executive and organizational leader with deep expertise in management, growth and scale. Allison spent 16 years as the President of KIPP DC, where she led strategy, operations, talent, finance, governance, and external affairs for the network of schools. After joining KIPP DC in 2006, she led KIPP DC expansion efforts from 575 students to over 7,300 students and from 2 to 21 schools, scaling the organization from a startup to a mature organization over multiple phases of growth. After graduating from the University of Virginia, Allison served as the Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff and White House Liaison for the United States Department of Treasury under Secretary Robert E. Rubin. She joined the KIPP Foundation in 2001 and helped to start many of the first KIPP schools across the United States, before earning an MBA from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business and returning to KIPP in D.C. Allison has completed both the Broad Residency and the Pahara-Aspen Fellowship. She serves on the board of the DC Charter School Alliance, Connected DMV, and was a member of the Federal City Council in Washington, D.C. Allison is an alumnus of the University of Virginia and Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. In 2018, she was awarded Fuqua’s “Leader of Consequence” alumni award, which recognizes alumni whose exemplary professional accomplishments are matched by the significant positive social or environmental change they have created. Allison lives in Washington, D.C. with her husband and three children.

Jon offers a wealth of experience in academic and school systems leadership, spanning both charter and traditional public school sectors. He currently applies this expertise at EFF, where his role emphasizes developing and implementing rigorous evaluation methodologies to assess prospective borrowers’ academic performance, leadership, and growth plans. He is responsible for conducting evaluations, providing loan advancement recommendations, and closely monitoring and supporting the academic performance of portfolio members.

Before his tenure at EFF, Jon served as Chief Academic Officer at Prospect Schools. In this role, he led the growth and development of a K-12 International Baccalaureate academic program within a six-school network of 2,200 students. Before this, he played a pivotal role as the founding School Director at Brooklyn Laboratory Charter Schools, a recognized XQ Super Schools grantee. His experience also includes a variety of leadership roles at KIPP NYC and being a committed Teach for America corps member.

Earlier in his career, Jon served as an advisor for the US State Department of Education under Secretary Arne Duncan, lending his expertise to national education policy. He has a background in collegiate and high school policy debate and loves to have a good, substantive argument. Jon, and his wife Jessica and their two precocious daughters live in Brooklyn, New York.

Jon has a deep passion for learning and has studied at Drury University, Columbia University, Bank Street, and Johns Hopkins University.

Shawn supports charter leaders and local stakeholders in navigating the complex charter facilities landscape. As a member of the lending team, Shawn guides schools through the lending process and seeks to expand EFF’s impact through the development of new state-level financing vehicles. As a former charter school leader, Shawn is passionate about being an advocate for schools and creating equitable financing solutions that put more money back into classrooms.

Before joining the EFF team, Shawn was the Vice President of Building Hope, a non-profit charter school support organization, where he developed 12 charter school projects totaling over $150 million in Texas and Nevada. Prior to Building Hope, Shawn was the Director of Finance and then CFO of KIPP San Antonio, where he helped the organization grow from three to six schools and earn an investment grade rating. A graduate of the Broad Residency and Education Pioneers Fellowship, Shawn transitioned to the charter school sector after spending the first seven years of his career as a CPA with PwC and a private wealth firm.

Shawn holds a BS and MA from Tulane University and a MBA from the University of Texas at Austin. He also holds a MA in education leadership from the Broad Center.