Jessica Howard, GED’14

Jessica Howard

Jessica Howard

Education Policy M.S.Ed.

Part of our Share Your Story Campaign

"School is a lifeline in so many ways for our students, families, communities, educators, and staff. We must step up to provide support and stability during this time and recognize the trauma many are facing."

“School is a lifeline in so many ways for our students, families, communities, educators, and staff. We must step up to provide support and stability during this time and recognize the trauma many are facing,” writes Education Policy master’s graduate Jessica Howard, GED’14, of her work addressing our complex times as CEO of the Californians Dedicated to Education Foundation. “We have created our #LunchBites series of online instructional snapshots focused on STEAM content integration (and also include social and emotional learning and project-based learning elements). We’ve learned that people want concise, focused content that clearly shows how to incorporate digital tools into quality pedagogy most effectively. Also it must be fun, hands-on, relevant, low-cost, and inspiring! We will co-host the 2020 *Virtual* CA STEAM Symposium, December 11-13, with the California Department of Education (CDE). We typically work statewide and are close partners with the CDE. Among other efforts, we have teamed up with the CDE, the California Office of Governor, and our State Board of Education to create the California Bridging the Digital Divide Fund. We administer the fund and have been able to use approximately $6 million thus far to provide thousands of devices to districts and communities across California. Of particular priority have been rural and small districts, as well as those with highest percentage of free and reduced-price lunch eligibility. We also see this crisis and the greater public awareness of ongoing civil rights violations as an opportunity to fundamentally change the system at large. We have the innovation and passion to find ourselves in a more equitable world on the other side—we just have to commit to building it together now.”