Amarachi Onyema is a program evaluator based in St. Louis, Missouri. She is passionate about advocating for the public good and redesigning systems for equity and has cultivated a career in service, problem-solving, and capacity building. After graduating from Washington University in St. Louis (2019) with a B.A. in African & African American Studies and Global Health, Amarachi served with AmeriCorps for two years. In her first year of service (Baton Rouge, LA), she served as a 7th-grade math interventionist at a recently-established charter school. Without robust infrastructure, she used student data to identify and fill support gaps while making the math curriculum and classroom environment more culturally competent and specific to the needs of her students.

During her second year with AmeriCorps, Amarachi relocated back to St. Louis to join Creative Reaction Lab—a non-profit organization centered on designing interventions for racial and health equity—as their Curriculum Development Coordinator. Amarachi l ed the development of Creative Reaction Lab’s When We Create, a project-based curriculum focused on helping students identify and address issues within their community by using the Equity-Centered Community Design framework. Most importantly, When We Create was made in collaboration with educators across the United States and the 100 youth they served.

After her time as Curriculum Development Coordinator, Amarachi joined the Truman School of Government and Public Affairs as a Master’s in Public Affairs student and AmeriCorps Scholar. At the Truman School, Amarachi is studying program and policy evaluation. She has utilized her graduate studies to research the benefits of chess as a community policing tool in St. Louis schools as well as the differences in compensation trends among urban and rural Missouri municipalities. Amarachi also applies community-centered evaluation practices to her work with private organizations such as Edward Jones. As a graduate intern with Edward Jones (2022), Amarachi led a

current state analysis around the firm’s Service Advocate role. Using Equity Centered Community Design as a guide, Amarachi held ideation sessions with 188 Advocates nationwide and conducted a qualitative study to identify themes and opportunities among these conversations. Furthermore, she connected with stakeholders across the firm, including general partners and directors, and coordinated the development of a sequential plan to transform the advocate role. In addition to joining Mosaic Beginnings, LLC team and providing significant support on a major recent capacity building project where she took the project to the next level, elevating its ability to have an impact throughout the Region, Amarachi has also joined Edward Jones as an Accelerated Leadership Program cohort member, where she is committed to applying the spirit of co-creation to every project she works on. Utilizing these transferable skills, she will serve the MBHC well in her role as the Data and Policy Analyst.