Biography

Ivan M. Hageman is the Head and Co-Founder of The East Harlem School at Exodus House (EHS), a small independent middle school in New York City created eleven years ago as a response to the inadequate public school education afforded inner city youth. Raised in East Harlem in a residential drug treatment center run by his parents, the Rev. Dr. and Mrs. Lynn L. Hageman, Ivan and his brother returned years later to the same building to create the school.

Ivan attended Harvard University where after three years he received a Bachelor of Arts degree, magna cum laude, in Social Anthropology and later a Master's degree from Harvard's Graduate School of Education. After teaching in inner city public schools, Ivan returned to his alma mater, the Collegiate School, to run a diversity initiative and teach history.

Ivan has received a summer Klingenstein Fellowship from Columbia University and the Next Generation Leadership Fellowship from the Rockefeller Foundation. He has also been honored by the Iscol program at Cornell University and was a recipient of an Essence Award and the Robin Hood Foundation Hero Award. Ivan has also worked with the Charter Schools Institute at the State University at Albany to evaluate existing and prospective charter schools.