Keynote Speaker: Shantel Palacio

Shantel Palacio is the Principal Advisor at Urbane Advisory and a consulting partner at the Perception Institute. She has served as both a project manager and chief advisor to governmental leaders and spent nearly ten years executing both mayoral and chancellor’s initiatives at NYC’s Department of Education. Additionally, she consults public and private entities on implementing diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. Palacio co-authored her first publication, The Economic Impact of Investment in Public Higher Education in Massachusetts, in 2012 as a grad student. It has since received several citations, including Harvard’s IOP. Recently, she co-authored Falsifying Teacher Absences, published in West’s Education Law Reporter. 

Shantel is also passionate about combating low expectation stereotypes in her hometown, Brownsville, and founded Brownsvillain LLC. Her work featured on NPR’s All Things Considered in 2018. She was awarded the Independent Film Project’s 2019 Documentary Fellowship for co-producing Million Dollar Block, which examines the institutions of public housing, public education, and the criminal justice system through the eyes of its residents. Last October, she was invited by GQ Japan to publish an article about her community in its first-ever Global Edition. Palacio earned a Bachelor's degree in Communication from Bryant University, a Master's in Public Policy from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and is currently a doctoral candidate in Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of New Hampshire.