We've got big news to share—some exciting, some bittersweet—for the upcoming school year.
Let's start with the exciting: This year, we're proudly elevating the next generation of EdNavigator leaders. After serving for 10 years as co-founders and executives, CEO Tim Daly and COO David Keeling will step down from their roles by December. Taking their place will be two internal leaders who know our work better than anyone and are ready to take the reins: Director of Navigation Victoria Paulino, who will become Executive Director, and Director of Partnerships and Outreach Nelida Garcia, who will become Director of Partnerships and Operations.
Victoria has been with EdNavigator since 2018, serving first as a Navigator and then building our pediatric partnership model from the ground up. Nelida has managed and grown our partnerships with healthcare organizations for the past three years, cultivating strong collaborative relationships with senior contacts and front-line care providers alike.
Together, Victoria and Nelida are already leading our team to new levels of success. Over the last six months, our Navigators have helped more than 500 families resolve school-related challenges, closing referral cases at a record-breaking pace. Even better, they've been able to do so while improving satisfaction rates among families and pediatric care providers, with 98 percent of families saying they’d recommend us to a friend, and 97 percent of providers saying we’re helping them provide better care to their patients.
Unfortunately, during this same time period, we've also seen the funding environment become more challenging than ever. At a time when we hoped to tap into public funding from the states where we work to diversify our revenue, improve sustainability, and grow our reach, we instead have to take steps to constrain our costs. As a result, we've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of our team. This means saying goodbye to several of our universally outstanding Navigators, as well as our dedicated operations and marketing staff. It's been by no means an easy process, and we're working hard to make sure all our talented folks land on their feet.
Although this is a challenging time for our team, we feel confident that the leaner and more focused organization that emerges will be well-positioned to succeed and grow under Victoria and Nelida's leadership. We're grateful for your support and collaboration, and look forward to sharing more about where our work takes us.
