In October 2006, Atiba joined the staff of The Zeist Foundation, a family foundation based in Atlanta, as the associate director to fortify their traditional grantmaking in the areas of health and human services, education, and arts and culture.
In addition, he provided critical support to the foundation’s signature place-based philanthropy mission in the Edgewood neighborhood of Atlanta, which began in 1994 with foundation support for a school0based pediatric clinic model and has since evolved into a multifaceted education, health, and affordable housing initiative.
After 13 years of service as the associate director, Atiba was promoted to executive director in spring 2020, just in time to help lead the foundation’s crisis response to the COVID-19 pandemic and to complete the foundation’s 25th anniversary report, “Place Based Philanthropy in Atlanta.”
Prior to joining The Zeist Foundation, Atiba served as the program officer responsible for Fostering Understanding and Education grantmaking at the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation from 2001to 2005. In this capacity, he managed a portfolio of 125 education nonprofits based in Boston, New York City, Los Angeles, Phoenix, coastal Carolina, and across the state of Georgia.
Before joining the foundation world in the 21st century, Atiba worked in the nonprofit field with a range of organizations including Hands On Atlanta, Southern Community Partners, and the Metro Atlanta Task Force for the Homeless. He was instrumental in creating and sustaining AmeriCorps programs throughout Georgia in the 1990s and served as a reviewer and consultant with the Corporation for National and Community Service; however, Atiba began his professional career in Rhode Island as a math teacher-counselor at an alternative high school and eventually served as a math teacher-advisor at two innovative middle schools (UCAP School and Community Prep) in Providence.
For 30 years, Atiba has volunteered as a coach for the BRAG (Bike Ride Across Georgia) Dream Team, a youth cycling organization. He currently serves on the governing board of Park Pride and the East Coast Greenway Alliance organization. In addition, Atiba serves on the PARTNERS for Equity in Child and Adolescent Health (school=based health centers) advisory board, the Atlanta Mayor’s arts advisory committee, steering committee of the Georgia Funders Network for Racial Equity, and is co-chair of the BIPOC Leaders Peer Network for the National Center for Family Philanthropy.
Atiba is a father to two adult children (graduates of Spelman College and Georgia Tech, Cornell University, and University of Georgia) and eleven grandchildren with the oldest attending Kennesaw State University.
In 1982 Atiba earned his BA in economics and urban studies at Brown University where he spent a semester at the University of Lagos, Nigeria (Fall 1980). During his tenure as a secondary school teacher-counselor in the 1980s, he was chosen to be a National Endowment of the Humanities Summer Fellow at the City University of New York Graduate Center.