Prior to founding her company, she was a school and district leader, director of professional learning at Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), and executive director of organizational management with Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. She is a strategic partner to The Winter’s Group, Inc. and FourPoint Educational Partners, and serves as an executive board member of Teach for Haiti. Valbrun is an Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) Qualified Administrator and holds a certificate as a Facilitative Leader for Social Change.

The daughter of first-generation immigrants, Valbrun is passionate about diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice, and she brings that lens to every organization with which she works. Valbrun notes that a constant over her long career has been the disproportionate opportunities afforded to marginalized groups. 

“As a classroom teacher to a business owner, I am interested in not only bringing light to this as an imperative, but to also help light a pathway to change through the work we do with teachers, leaders, and school systems,” she says. 

Valbrun cares about meeting people and organizations where they are, which requires creating opportunities for reflective practice, recognizing one’s own lived experiences and unpacking personal privilege and trauma. This self-work is important for knowing and understanding the experience of others in order to build relationships across differences, and to lead others on their journey. 

She started this company because she has been on the receiving end of a classroom that was not designed with her racial or cultural difference in mind, and she has led a school that also faced a racial academic divide. 

“Through opportunities for personal development of individuals working with students and leading systems, we hope to effect impactful and lasting change that disrupts the systems that have not traditionally worked for all,” Valbrun says.

The Valbrun Consulting Group’s services are for those wanting to move to real solutions. Valbrun strives to be an accessible partner doing shoulder-to-shoulder work with clients–delivering customized solutions to help clients get to the goals they set.