Nefertiri Sickout
Nefertiri Sickout serves as Senior Vice President for EDI, providing organization-wide leadership to set actionable strategies and measures to further equity, diversity, and inclusion in Share Our Strength’s culture, operations, and outcomes. In partnership with executive leaders, Human Resources, and EDI committees, Nefertiri works to both broaden and deepen the organization’s EDI efforts to better serve all historically marginalized communities and ensure a workplace where all team members learn, advance, and thrive to their fullest potential.
Most recently, Nefertiri served as the Chief Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Officer for the Mayor’s Office, City of Philadelphia, where she established racial equity as an explicit governing principle through which City departments and agencies assessed and improved how their operations impacted all Philadelphians while centering communities living at the margins. She also supported the strategic efforts of the Mayor’s Office of LGBT Affairs, Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities, and Office of Economic Opportunity.
As a longstanding advocate of racial and social justice, Nefertiri brings substantial experience in advancing equitable outcomes for children and families through community-based nonprofit experience and legal advocacy as a former attorney at Pepper Hamilton LLP. Her educational background includes a BA in psychology from Clark Atlanta University; an MA in infant special education from George Washington University; an MA in developmental psychology from Teachers College, Columbia University; and a law degree from Villanova University School of Law.
Nefertiri is looking forward to settling down in the DMV area with her loving partner and spirited daughter.
What’s your “why?” I grew up in a close-knit family full of love in Atlanta in the 1980s. Many of the resilient families in my community experienced depressed economic wealth, low wages and underfunded schools which impacted their socioeconomic outcomes. I often spent time with my aunt, who supplemented her income by delivering newspapers. When I joined her on her route in more affluent neighborhoods, I began to question why some communities had more and other communities, like the one I lived in and loved, had far less. That inequality compelled me to work towards dismantling systems of inequity so that all children and communities can thrive. At Share Our Strength, I work towards this vision so that our staff and the communities we work with may thrive as well.
My idea of fun is: Spending quality time with my husband, daughter, family and friends, especially over a good meal, in nature or at the beach. Staying mindful of everything that I’m thankful for also brings me joy.