Mary Anne Schmitt-Carey is President of Say Yes to Education, a national nonprofit that partners with communities to help give every public high school graduate access to a college or other postsecondary scholarship. Say Yes also works with communities to set milestones along the pathway to postsecondary readiness, and to organize and deliver supports and services intended to eliminate predictable barriers to achievement, particularly for students from low-income backgrounds. In 2024, she was appointed to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Education Reform Commission.

For six years Schmitt-Carey was President and Chief Executive Officer of New American Schools (NAS), which merged with American Institutes for Research (AIR), helping that nonprofit grow from a pilot to the model for a national school improvement program called Comprehensive School Reform. During 11 years at NAS, Schmitt-Carey also served in several other key leadership positions. Prior to NAS, she was the Director of the Goals 2024 Community Project at the U.S. Department of Education. In addition, Schmitt-Carey has worked in public relations and has held several senior level positions in national political campaigns. She received her MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.