Heang Ly

Heang Ly has two decades of experience practicing and leading in the field of youth & community development, education, behavior & learning, organization & program development, non-profit management, and group facilitation. In her former role as director of consulting and training at the Center for Teen Empowerment, she provided technical support and skills training for non-profits, businesses, foundations, schools, and city departments to ensure successful organizational and program development.  Over her career she has trained and coached over 2,000 clients on curriculum development, interactive meeting design, and skills to facilitate groups and difficult conversations.

She currently utilizes her expertise in her independent consulting practice where her clients include the Lenny Zakim Fund, The Massachusetts Asian American Commission, and the Federal Reserve Bank. Ms. Ly  uses a facilitative leadership framework with a diversity, equity and inclusion lens to guide her work. Ms. Ly serves as a teaching fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for courses in diversity issues in counseling and advocacy as well as group counseling. She also uses the foundations of learning theories to successfully create and teach engaging and creative curriculum for diverse English language learners.

Ms. Ly holds a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, in Psychology and Education and a Master’s degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education in Administration, Planning, and Social Policy. In addition, she is a graduate of the Institute for Nonprofit Practice Certificate program at Tufts University.

Heang believes in creative avenues for addressing social justice issues and making change. Her short story “the Lotus Gift” was published in the award winning book, Troubling Borders: An Anthology of Art and Literature by Southeast Asian Women in the Diaspora which currently is used in academic courses.