The Scratch Foundation
For Immediate Release
March 13, 2023
The Scratch Foundation names Mindee H. Barham and Sarah Smirnoff as Co-Executive Directors
BOSTON, MA — Mindee H. Barham, a philanthropy leader with over 25 years of nonprofit and development experience, and Sarah Smirnoff, an education technology leader with over 20 years of experience in product design and solution development, have been named co-executive directors of the Scratch Foundation, a global nonprofit dedicated to providing young people with digital tools and opportunities to imagine, create, share, and learn.
Barham and Smirnoff first joined the Scratch Foundation in 2022 as chief philanthropy officer and chief product officer, respectively. They were named interim co-executive directors in October of last year.
“Mindee and Sarah bring unique perspectives and rich experiences to lead the Foundation’s continued growth,” said Margaret Honey, the Scratch Foundation’s chair and president and CEO of the New York Hall of Science. “With their stewardship, Scratch will continue to transform millions of children’s lives using the power of creative learning and creative coding.”
"With Mindee and Sarah's leadership, the Scratch Foundation's team is strongly positioned to fulfill its vision to spread creative, caring, collaborative, equitable approaches to coding and learning around the world," said Mitchel Resnick, founder of Scratch and MIT Media Lab professor.
Barham and Smirnoff will lead the Foundation’s work to break down barriers and expand access to creative learning and creative coding for children from underrepresented communities. They will focus on strengthening and growing the Foundation’s coding platforms—including Scratch, the largest coding community for kids that recently crossed 100 million registered users, and ScratchJr—and continuing to evolve and expand its creative learning and coding programmatic work.
“The work that the Scratch Foundation is doing is more important than ever,” said Barham. “The world needs creative thinkers and I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to continue building a sustainable organization that will impact the lives of millions of children for decades to come.”
“The Scratch Foundation is uniquely positioned to be a leader in creative learning spaces and online communities for children,” said Smirnoff. “Our Scratch and ScratchJr platforms have the opportunity to shift how children learn and build a generation of creative thinkers.”
Before joining the Scratch Foundation, Barham served as the chief development officer for the past six years at Grameen America, a national, nonprofit microfinance organization with a mission to empower women who live in poverty to build small businesses to create better lives for their families. Barham has also held key leadership positions in fund development and management at education and human services organizations, including the United Way of New York City, Columbia University, Classroom, Inc., the YMCA of Greater New York, and the I Have a Dream Foundation.
Before joining the Scratch Foundation, Smirnoff was the executive director of new product development for ETS, where she led teams to test new product concepts for the K12 classroom, higher education institutions, and workforce. Her previous work experience includes leading the knowledge management department at New Visions for Public Schools, project and product management at Amplify Learning, and solution development at Learning Ally.
The Scratch Foundation
The Scratch Foundation is a nonprofit dedicated to providing young people with digital tools and opportunities to imagine, create, share, and learn. Through innovation and collaboration, the Scratch Foundation spreads creative, caring, collaborative, equitable approaches to coding and learning around the world. Scratch, the world’s largest coding community for children, was originally developed by the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab and publicly launched in 2007. The platform provides millions of young people from all backgrounds with the opportunity to develop their voices and express themselves by creating their own stories, games, and animations.
Press Contacts
Carlos Diaz Barriga
Director of Marketing and Communications
carlos@scratch.mit.edu
Annie Whitehouse
Communications Content Manager
press@scratch.mit.edu