Kirk is a fourth-generation educator with more than two decades in the field. After graduating from Dartmouth College in 1999, he worked for Schoolmaster.net, an early online learning platform based in London. In 2001 Kirk co-founded the Institute for Civic Leadership (ICL), an award-winning youth-educational nonprofit organization that opened up the Nasdaq stock exchange in 2008 and has been featured on CNN, FOX, CBS, WB, Channel 1, and Discovery. Over nearly two decades, ICL has trained thousands of student leaders, supported hundreds of student-led service initiatives, and opened a fully accredited, nonprofit performing arts school in 2015.

In 2013, he worked with the IBO to help launch the IB Open World Schools program and in 2015 co-founded the Dwight Global Online School.

Kirk’s inspiration is his father, Chancellor Stephen Spahn of the Dwight School, and he hopes to lead ICL as long as Chancellor Spahn has been at the helm of Dwight—54 years and counting!