Karla Ballard

Ms. Ballard comes to One Economy as an experienced manager and social enterprise professional. A graduate of the University of Virginia and a native of Philadelphia, PA, Ms. Ballard began her career as a bank officer at MBNA America, now Bank of America, where she managed teams responsible for Consumer Finance and Credit Collections in Maine and Delaware and established its first formal foundation with a seven million dollar budget.

Ms Ballard started a financial literacy youth development program, titled YIELD, in partnership with the University of Delaware’s Center for Economic Development, Delaware’s Health and Human Service division, the Philadelphia 76ers and local businesses and CBOs. As a result of the impact of her program, she was asked to serve as a witness for the US Congress Education and Workforce sub-committee hearings on the reauthorization for the Juvenile Justice Prevention Act in 1999. Ms. Ballard has worked with the US Chamber of Commerce, the Business Roundtable, the Points of Light Foundation, federal agencies and residents of housing developments on leading the development and management of a scalable model for comprehensive community reform piloted in the Congress Heights neighborhood of Washington, D.C.