Kim Frusciante (NC ’05)

Kim Frusciante is the Founder of Early Partners, an innovative non-profit early learning center in New Orleans focused on providing high-quality early childhood education and scaling its impact city-wide. Under Kim's leadership, Early Partners has achieved 100% kindergarten readiness for its PreK students, exceeding developmental benchmarks in language, cognitive, and social-emotional skills. The center is also pioneering work in early intervention and teacher development, setting a new standard for inclusive, data-driven practices in early childhood education.

Kim is a proud graduate of Newcomb College (Class of 2005), where she majored in Political Science and minored in Women’s Studies and International Development. She earned her Master’s in Education (Ed.M.) from the Harvard Graduate School of Education in 2022.

After beginning her career in education as a high school Social Studies teacher in Dallas, Texas, Kim returned to New Orleans to engage in educational reform. She joined Collegiate Academies as a founding teacher at Sci Academy and later became a founding instructional leader at G.W. Carver Collegiate Academy. During her tenure at Collegiate Academies, she held several roles, including Instructional Dean, Director of Curriculum & Instruction, and Director of the Collegiate Academies Teacher Residency Program.

Inspired by the importance of the foundational years of brain development, Kim shifted her focus to early childhood education. Before founding Early Partners, she participated in programs through 4.0 Schools, New Schools Venture Fund, and Propeller. At Harvard, she used her coursework and network to build Early Partners’ programming, participating in the HGSE Summer Educational Entrepreneurship Fellowship and the Summer Venture Program at the Harvard Innovation Labs. Kim completed her Ed.M. in the School Leadership Program, served as Class Marshal, and delivered the HGSE Student Convocation Speech in 2022.

Kim is deeply passionate about educational equity, diverse schools, and women’s issues. She lives in New Orleans with her husband, Taylor Gilbert; their two children, Edith and Andy; their bloodhound, Samantha Ethel; and their basset hound, Sir Brimley Pickle IV.