Kristina Baldwin, Vice President

Kristina Baldwin is the Interim Director for the City of Hartford Department of Families, Children, Youth and Recreation. She works daily to accelerate and elevate the collective efforts to improve the lives of youth and young adults with a strong focus on youth-centric and youth engagement strategies. Through this, she creates, manages, and implements systems, process, and programs, working with with community partners on the engagement and learning of Hartford’s youth, by developing life-changing paths and meaningful opportunities for all young people and their families in Hartford. She has dedicated her life to supporting children and youth, through a commitment and passion that she deems as having been ordered to perfectly place her on the path to have a broad impact on serving young people that are most in need.

Kristina has an extensive background and expertise in youth development. She has been with the City of Hartford in the Department of Families, Children, Youth and Recreation since 2014, as both a Grants Manager and Project Leader, prior to her current role as Assistant Director. Kristina works collaboratively with many partners on youth justice, youth employment, and youth engagement initiatives under Hartford’s Youth Service Bureau. A few key programs under Kristina’s leadership include the Juvenile Review Board, Understanding the Needs in Today’s Youth (UNITY) Grant program, Summer Youth Employment and Learning Program, Truancy Reduction Taskforce, Hartford’s Youth Service Corps, Hartford Youth Advisory Board, and the Hartford Youth Violence Prevention and Intervention Work Group. Prior to her work with the City of Hartford, she worked at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Hartford and Wheeler Clinic in multiple roles including Director of Teen Services, Unit Director, Grants Manager, and Prevention Specialist. Kristina has served hundreds of youth in her professional career. She has been recognized for her outstanding professional impact by the Hartford Business Journal with a 40 Under Forty award in 2012 and highlighted at the 2019 National Youth Development Symposium for the National Association of Workforce Development Professionals. She is also an Aspen Institute Economic Opportunity Fellow.

Kristina holds a degree in Child and Developmental Psychology from the University of Connecticut. She sits on the Board of Directors for the Connecticut Youth Services Association. She is also a Board of Trustee member at Union Baptist Church of Hartford, where she volunteers regularly, and is a dedicated member of her church community. However, it is as the proud mother of a son, Mason, and a daughter, Taylor, that Kristina holds as her greatest accomplishment.