Memorable, Relevant Project-Based Learning
Yariza Villalba

Website: Mckenziesadventures.com

Books: McKenzie's Time Machine, McKenzie's Bisabuela, La Bisabuela De McKenzie

Twitter: @inc_yv 

Instagram: Yaritza.V__

Yaritza Villalba is an Education Consultant, currently working as an Educator Innovation Lead with Microsoft Flip. She leads professional learning opportunities, centered on culturally responsive sustaining education (CRSE) and project-based learning, to an international network of educators. With thirteen years of experience in urban education, Yaritza supplies many effective strategies and resources for educating and supporting BIPOC (Black, Indigenous. and people of color) students and families. After graduating from the State University of New York at Albany, she began her career teaching Social Studies to overaged, under credited high school students in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, New York.

Later, she earned her first master's degree from Long Island University, Brooklyn, where she studied Adolescent Urban Education and expounded her knowledge of inclusive pedagogical practices. Over her career, Yaritza became an Assistant Principal of an Expeditionary Learning School, CEO and Founder of McKenzie’s Adventures LLC, and an author of culturally relevant children's books. Yaritza’s overall mission is to create opportunities and experiences for students of color to gain fair access to resources that spark critical thinking and meaningful conversations in and out of the classroom.