Senior Vice President, Executive Director

Application Instructions

Click Apply to submit your online application. Please attach a resume and thoughtful cover letter on the "My Experience" page in the "Resume/CV" field.

Active City Year Staff members must login to Workday to apply internally.

Number of Positions: 1Work Location: 100% On-Site

Position Overview

City Year is seeking an innovative, entrepreneurial, and people-focused leader to serve as the Executive Director (ED) of City Year Detroit. This position is an outstanding opportunity to play an integral role in advocating for and advancing public education in Detroit. This seasoned executive is responsible for ensuring the site meets its impact, revenue, district partnership, and external relations goals. City Year Detroit stands to further its position in the community, and key to the site’s success is a leader and collaborator who is a natural coalition-builder, people developer, and influencer who leads with both tenacity and humility.

Reporting to the Market President, this dynamic, visionary change agent leads 23 staff members and 110 AmeriCorps members serving in 17 partner schools. Additionally, the Executive Director works closely with City Year Detroit’s local board, comprised of civic leaders from the public, private, and non-profit sectors. The Executive Director is accountable for a current annual revenue budget of approximately $8.8M while simultaneously securing the resources necessary to ensure sustainability, growth, and scale. City Year Detroit attracts revenue from multiple sources, including local philanthropic and corporate donors, national corporate and philanthropic partnerships, school and district partnerships, the Federal AmeriCorps program, and state and local government sources,

Serving as the primary champion of City Year's impact locally, the Executive Director leads efforts to keep students in school and on track while also ensuring the site's sustainability and continuity. The Executive Director represents City Year Inc. and City Year Detroit within the greater Detroit community by mobilizing powerful coalitions to catalyze greater educational opportunities for students.

Additionally, the Executive Director is a Senior Vice President for City Year Inc.'s national organization and, therefore, strengthens the connection between City Year's national initiatives and Detroit’s local work. As Senior Vice President, the Executive Director also participates within the City Year global network to advance the mission by managing working relationships with staff at City Year's national office and helping to lead and set organizational strategy through network-wide project teams.

Job Description

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree or comparable experience
• Commitment to educational equity and belief in the potential of all students
• Demonstrated success managing effective and engaged teams, including managing through multiple layers of leadership
• Proven skills in influencing and motivating stakeholders; track record in fundraising from corporations, foundations, and major gifts and/or sales
• Ability to connect programs to funding, creatively generating other resources, and building collaborative and strategic partnerships
• Strong communication, listening, and public speaking skills needed to represent City Year's mission and vision powerfully
• Ability to attend evening and weekend events; ability to travel to in-person meetings in various cities quarterly (when safe to do so)
• Authorized documentation to work in the United States of America

• Criminal background history clearance to work with school-age children, depending on the position

Responsibilities

The Executive Director is responsible for leading and managing site staff and AmeriCorps members to ensure operational success and growth by generating resources and building support from the public and private sectors. This executive serves as a vital link between the local Detroit market, the City Year Market Group, and the City Year national office. Site supervision includes the functional areas of student impact and school partnerships, revenue generation, expense management, management and retention of AmeriCorps members and staff, and site board development and relations.

• People and Culture : Lead, coach, and develop 23 full-time staff members contributing to high levels of satisfaction, engagement, and retention. Establish a dynamic culture that embodies our core values of inclusivity and teamwork. Further develop site human resources structures to ensure excellent and equitable hiring, performance support, and career advancement practices.
• AmeriCorps Member Experience : Ensure the site delivers a transformational experience for all City Year AmeriCorps members by supporting members in feeling prepared and confident in their service and promoting member persistence from initial confirmation of acceptance to completion of service.
• Student Impact : In partnership with senior site staff and regional support staff, the ED will ensure high quality and commitment to the nationally developed Whole School, Whole Child service delivery model implemented by City Year AmeriCorps members in partner elementary, middle, and high schools.
• Private Sector Fundraising, Cultivation, and Stewardship : Serve as the chief fundraiser leading site staff and local advisory board to motivate key influencers to generate the resources necessary to meet annual and long-term goals leveraging national revenue and stewardship strategies. Develop a strategy to maintain a healthy, diversified, and growing revenue mix from private and public sources. Identify, cultivate, solicit, and manage strategic relationships with corporations, foundations, family foundations, and individuals to build a sustainable private revenue portfolio resulting in annual revenues reaching toward or surpassing $2.4M.
• School/District Investments: Sustain transformational partnerships with existing district and school leadership and, when necessary, cultivate new transformational partnerships with future school partners.
• Financial Management: Ensure City Year Detroit raises three percent more than it spends annually by managing a fiscally-sound budget, forecasting, expense management, and cash flow for a current site expense budget of $8.55M
• Board Member Engagement : Recruit, develop, and manage a diverse, dynamic, and deeply engaged local advisory board to build and execute a multi-year site strategic plan focused on deepening the evidence of our impact with students and in schools, facilitating a rewarding AmeriCorps Member experience, local fundraising efforts, community engagement, and brand awareness while also contributing to the success of the national organization. Ensure cultivation and engagement of future board leadership.
• Government Relations and Public Policy : Engage local and national elected officials – Governor, Mayor, City Council, local and state school board representatives, State Legislature, and members of U.S. Congress - to support funding and policies for City Year and the national service movement. Maintain an effective and collaborative relationship with AmeriCorps state commission; oversee the preparation of AmeriCorps grant applications and progress reports and meet performance and compliance requirements associated therein.
• AmeriCorps Member Recruitment : Collaborate with City Year’s national recruitment and admissions team to ensure site recruits, selects, and admits AmeriCorps members within the regional framework, meeting quality, quantity, and inclusivity goals. Partner with site staff and local partners to ensure a strong cohort returns annually for a second year of service.
• Alumni Engagement: Ensure the local alumni board's engagement to leverage alumni to support AmeriCorps members in service and continue their lifetime of service.
• Marketing and Communications : Lead the site in increasing visibility and brand awareness of City Year’s work in local and national media, social media, and marketing channels by developing and leveraging local relationships.

Preferred Qualifications

• Significant local non-profit, volunteer, or multi-sector experience preferred
• An established cross-sector, local network a plus
• Knowledge of Detroit Public Schools educational landscape preferred
• Content knowledge of K-12 education, youth development, and/or community or national service a strong plus
• City Year/AmeriCorps experience is a plus

Competencies

In order to succeed in this role, an applicant must have the following competencies:

• Collaboration: Connects with stakeholders to identify shared interests; partners with others to incorporate different perspectives toward a common goal.

• Teamwork: Actively contributes to shared projects with the understanding that team success is personal success.
• Understanding & Building Connection: Considers perspectives of others and cultivates relationships to strengthen interpersonal bonds with colleagues and external stakeholders.
• Decision-Making: Uses appropriate context and data to make sensible and timely decisions; displays sound judgment when faced with opportunities/challenges.
• Learning: Strives to continuously develop and improve self, teams, and organization.
• Accountability: Holds self responsible for actions and their impact on team, goals, and organizational mission.
• Flexibility: Changes course quickly and thoughtfully when faced with new or unanticipated circumstances.
• Managing Change : Leads and/or demonstrates support for innovation; helps others successfully manage organizational change; holds others accountable for adjusting to change (if people manager).
• Problem-Solving: Identifies opportunities to make improvements; gathers information; connects related and unrelated concepts; integrates findings into actionable solutions.
• Project Management: Organizes, prioritizes, tracks, and manages workflow and resources.
• Strategic Thinking: Identifies multiple pathways to address complex and nebulous problems; anticipates barriers and opportunities; develops plans to address them.
• Vision & Focus: Establishes a clear vision aligned with organizational goals; develops teams and activities to maintain alignment.
• Developing & Empowering Others: Creates opportunities for others to learn, develop, take action, and lead.

• Managing Performance: Assigns, tracks, and prioritizes work to ensure high-quality outputs; inspires committed and positive action toward organizational goals.
• Team Building: Leads individual contributors into becoming a cohesive unit; fosters belonging, collaboration, and inclusion.

Physical requirements

• Ability to remain in a stationary position for extended periods and occasionally move about the workspace to perform the essential functions of the position, with or without reasonable accommodation.

• Manual dexterity for typing, writing, and handling office equipment
• Visual acuity to read screens and printed materials
• Hearing ability to participate in conversations and respond to phone calls
• Occasional lifting or carrying of items up to 10–20 lbs (e.g., office supplies)
• Ability to communicate clearly in person, by phone, and in writing

Working Conditions

• Operates on a hybrid schedule located at the Detroit office
• Will require travel to client sites, school partner meetings, external and company events
• Typical schedule: Monday–Friday, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m., with occasional extended hours as needed.
• Noise level is generally moderate.
• Requires a valid driver’s license for travel as part of job duties.
• Must have reliable internet access for remote or flexible work arrangements.

Compensation

$155,000-$165,000 Annually Commensurate with Experience and Location

Benefits

City Year offers a comprehensive benefits package that helps our employees live their best lives and grow personally and professionally.

Employment at City Year is at-will.

City Year does not sponsor work authorization visas.

As an equal opportunity employer, City Year is committed to providing employment opportunities to all qualified individuals and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, ethnicity, religion, sex, gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, age, marital status, veteran status, pregnancy, parental status, genetic information or characteristics, or any other basis prohibited by applicable law.

Fair Labor Standards Act

Family and Medical Leave Act

Navigate to our City Year career page: Search for Jobs. Submit your application by September 25, 2026.

Click Apply to submit your online application. Please attach a resume and thoughtful cover letter on the "My Experience" page in the "Resume/CV" field.

Active City Year Staff members must login to Workday to apply internally.

Benefits

Full-time employees will be eligible for all benefits including vacation, sick days and organization holidays. You may participate in all benefit programs that City Year establishes and makes available to eligible employees, under (and subject to all provisions of) the plan documents that govern those programs. Currently, City Year offers medical, dental, vision, life, accidental death and dismemberment and disability coverage, Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA), and other benefits including 401(k) plan(s) pursuant to the terms and conditions of company policy and the 401(k) plan document. For more information, click here.

Employment at City Year is at-will.

City Year does not sponsor work authorization visas.