Greg Darnieder currently serves as Senior Advisor at the Steans Family Foundation to its comprehensive community investment strategies in North Lawndale and North Chicago. Greg began his career in education as a middle grades teacher in St. Louis, MO and Riverdale, MD. He has a B.A. in Sociology, a K-8 teaching certificate from St. Louis University and a M.A. in Christian Education from Wheaton College. He worked for 15 years as the Executive Director of youth development and college access organizations in Chicago’s former Cabrini Green Housing Development. Beginning in 1993, he became the Steans Family Foundation’s first executive director and oversaw the Steans Family Foundation’s community focused philanthropic efforts in North Lawndale, including early childhood, education, organizational development and affordable housing.
In 2003, Greg established the Department of Postsecondary Education and Student Development (DPSESD) at Chicago Public Schools (CPS). In 2009, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan named Greg Senior Advisor to the Secretary on the College Access Initiative at the U.S. Department of Education, where he served as a leading voice on the President’s 2020 Postsecondary Goal as the country with the greatest percentage of college graduates.
In 2018, he established with former Chicago Public School colleagues the National Postsecondary Strategy Institute (NPSI). NPSI works with 300 state and school district executive leadership teams to create and establish postsecondary strategy frameworks, with the goal of significantly increasing the percent of postsecondary graduates. He has served in leadership roles for several foundations and on over twenty non-profit organization boards.
Greg is a diehard Packer fan who loves living in Chicago amongst Bears fanatics. He lives in Chicago and San Antonio, Texas and enjoys spending time with his family -especially his 4 grandchildren.