Rudy Ruiz, FourPoint vice president and partner, brings over 20 years of experience to bear in leading the firm’s college, career, and life readiness portfolio. Throughout his career, Rudy has demonstrated his steadfast commitment to improving postsecondary readiness and attainment. Rudy has had first-hand experience creating, coordinating, and supporting students along multiple college and career pathways, including leading successful work through school counseling, career and technical education, gifted and talented education, community-based college access centers, service learning, and career-connected learning.
Rudy grew up in a low-income household in the inner city of Milwaukee and went on to earn his bachelor’s degree from Stanford University as a first-generation college student. After eight years as a successful high school classroom teacher and subsequent school leadership roles, Rudy went on to lead district-level college and career readiness efforts. His approach in the Milwaukee and Baltimore public school systems was to develop collective impact networks. These collaborative ecosystems resulted in substantially increased FAFSA completion rates, as well as increased proportions of students of color and students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds enrolling in four-year colleges and universities.
Following his 16 years serving urban school systems, Rudy also served as the Chief Education Officer of the Maryland Business Roundtable for Education, a statewide nonprofit organization. In this role, he helped bridge and coordinate productive employer-school partnerships serving school districts across Maryland while collaborating with local, state, and federal partners and foundations and associations.
In his work with FourPoint, Rudy and his diverse team of subject matter experts have supported nonprofit organizations of all sizes, including the National College Attainment Network; school districts of all sizes; municipalities, including the City of Philadelphia; and companies to strengthen college, career, and life readiness systems, resources, and outcomes through effective planning, training, resource development, and implementation support.
Rudy is currently completing his doctorate in education at the Johns Hopkins University School of Education. He serves on several youth-serving nonprofit boards of directors, as well as the national advisory board for the Center for Postsecondary Readiness and Success at American University. He also serves as liaison for the national advisory board for Naviance, the market-leading college and career readiness platform from PowerSchool.
Expertise
- Collective impact leadership and coordination
- College and career readiness pathways
- Student and teacher engagement
Education
- Principal and Director of Instruction Licensure through the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee
- MEd in Instructional Technology from Cardinal Stritch University
- Teacher Licensure through WI CESA #1 and Marquette University
- BA in Linguistics from Stanford University
