The Surge Institute is proud to announce the addition of Maria Heredia and Teresa Ward-Maupin to our esteemed Board of Directors. Maria serves as Chief Legal Officer, responsible for overseeing all aspects of legal, compliance, and governance operations work for the Rocketship Public Schools network. As Senior Vice President, Digital and Customer Experience, at Comcast, Teresa brings more than 20 years of experience in the digital, mobile, and telecommunications industries to her influence at Surge.
Learn more about our new board members:
Maria Heredia
Maria serves as Chief Legal Officer, responsible for overseeing all aspects of legal, compliance, and governance operations work for the Rocketship Public Schools network.
Maria has been actively involved with K-12 schools and education nonprofits for over twenty-five years, focusing on creating, expanding, and supporting innovative and effective educational opportunities for K-12 and college students. Maria’s experience includes leadership and active involvement in establishing and growing charter management operational systems as well as strategic planning, board engagement, governmental and stakeholder relations, and policy and advocacy work. Maria most recently completed her role as an Executive in Residence with the Charter School Growth Fund. There she worked across the Fund’s Seed, Scale, and Structured Finance teams supporting portfolio members from various states across the country in addressing start-up, expansion, operational, and governance questions.
Maria previously served as Chief Operations Officer and General Counsel at High Tech High, a network of 16 charter schools in San Diego, and taught a graduate-level course on School Law to new school leaders at High Tech High Graduate School of Education. Prior to that, Maria served as Senior Vice President of Legal Advocacy and General Counsel to the California Charter Schools Association. Before fully moving into the nonprofit education sector, she served charter schools, nonprofits, and private companies at two law firms: California Counsel Group, a law firm she co-founded and as a partner at Luce Forward Hamilton and Scripps LLP.
Maria is a graduate of Stanford Law School where she focused on the Lawyering for Social Change Curriculum, and Harvard University where she earned an A.B. in American History and Literature.
Teresa Ward-Maupin
A champion for cultivating the next generation of leaders, Teresa mentors many rising leaders at Comcast and across the industry. She is the executive sponsor of the Diversity and Inclusion Committee for Comcast Business and was appointed to the Comcast Cable DE&I Council, leading the launch of Comcast RISE, a program to support minority-owned SMB business owners through the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, Teresa is actively engaged in local and national STEM youth programs.
Teresa joined Comcast in 2015, and in her current role, she oversees the digital and customer experience strategy and execution across Comcast Business. Prior to joining Comcast, she held several positions at AT&T. She was part of an executive team that launched Cricket Wireless, a subsidiary of AT&T, and later served as the executive director of digital experience, where she was responsible for the e-commerce channel. Teresa joined Cricket Wireless after leading AT&T’s e-commerce sales and marketing team, where she was responsible for strategic marketing, planning, and management for various AT&T products and services.
Prior to AT&T, Teresa spent several years working for Prodigy Communications and EarthLink Network Incorporation. She served as director of program management and user experience design at Prodigy and as the national director of member services at EarthLink, where she led creative services, member publications, media production, and operations.
Teresa has received numerous industry achievement and leadership awards, including the Cablefax’s 2021 Most Powerful Women in Cable Award and 2021 Most Influential Multi-ethnic Executive Award, the 2020 Women in Achievement Award from The Philadelphia Tribune, and the Women in Cable Telecommunications (WICT) 2019 Inspire Award. Additionally, Teresa completed WICT’s Betsy Magness Leadership Program for Women and CTAM’s INSEAD Executive Management Program. She holds a B.A. in marketing and public relations from Texas Tech University.
Learn more about Teresa on her LinkedIn profile.
