Allison Serafin's commitment to educational equity began in 2001 as a Teach For America corps member at Attucks Middle School in Houston. That experience in the classroom changed everything, igniting a passion for expanding opportunity alongside communities historically underserved by existing systems and setting the course for a career spent building the infrastructure that great schools need to thrive.

Today, as Chief Strategy and Development Officer at Building Hope, Allison leads the design and growth of the Building Hope Impact Fund, a platform deploying capital, technology, and fellowships to expand students' access to high-quality PreK-12 education. She launched a first-of-its-kind microschool loan program with eleven early-stage school borrowers across eight states, and she is developing SchoolStack.ai, a fintech SaaS platform designed to simplify financial management for small and emerging schools.

Allison's path to Building Hope was shaped by formative leadership experiences. As the Founding Executive Director of IDEA Greater Houston, she helped fuel one of the most ambitious school network expansions in the country before serving as Vice President of Development, where she secured $40M and led real estate strategy for five K-12 campuses. She later joined the Dovetail Impact Foundation as its first Domestic Giving Program Officer, reporting to David Weekley, where she developed a philanthropic perspective that continues to shape how she deploys resources for impact.

Allison's entrepreneurial streak runs deep. She founded Opportunity180 in Las Vegas, building Nevada's first talent and pipeline infrastructure for high-quality public charter schools. From 2012 to 2015, she also served as an elected member and Vice President of the Nevada State Board of Education.

A graduate of Texas Christian University and the University of Texas at Arlington, Allison is the primary caregiver for her parents and three doodles in Summerville, South Carolina.