Adrienne R. Smith is President and CEO of New Mexico Direct Caregivers Coalition, a statewide organization that advocates for and advances the professional development and workforce issues of New Mexico’s direct caregivers. The organization reaches 4,500 direct care workers, advocates and family members of caregivers statewide.
Ms. Smith has owned and operated a consulting firm since 2001, Education and Workforce Consultants, LLC, for which she worked for international, national and state clients in the areas of youth development, youth employment, workforce development, resource development and advocacy. Her work includes development of national strategies to serve in-school and out-of-school youth in Honduras, Brazil and Indonesia through U.S. Agency for International Development and assistance to national and statewide nonprofit organizations.
Adrienne served as founding director of a national academy for training youth workers for executive positions when she was with the National Youth Employment Coalition (NYEC). She also developed and delivered a training experience for initial Youth Opportunity (YO!) grantees funded by the US Department of Labor. She has also developed and delivered leadership academies while at NYEC for the U.S. Department of Labor.
Other positions include Data Analyst for MALDEF to equalize school finance funding in Texas in the landmark state Supreme Court education finance lawsuit; Policy Analyst to Governor Ray Mabus of Mississippi from 1989-91 on literacy, education and the state’s first Commission on Workforce Excellence.
She has served on the Board of the Latin American Youth Center; the New Mexico Forum on Youth in Community; the National Youth Employment Coalition; and as Committee Chair for the American Association of University Women. She is a 2014 Aspen Institute Fellow and 2016 Member of the Community Advisory Council to the Federal Reserve Bank Board of Governors.
Adrienne has a Bachelor’s in Biology and a Master’s in Public Policy Administration specializing in International Administration.