EDUCATION (R)EVOLUTION 

Dr. Miguel A. Cardona was sworn in as the 12th Secretary of Education on March 2nd, 2021.

Secretary Cardona previously served as the Commissioner of Education in Connecticut, a position he held after being appointed by Governor Ned Lamont in August 2019. In this position, he faced the unprecedented challenge of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic and led the safe school reopening efforts in Connecticut. To do so, Secretary Cardona and his Department provided school districts with the balance of guidance, local autonomy, and oversight needed to ensure equitable and meaningful educational opportunities for students while also prioritizing public health mitigation measures. Secretary Cardona and the State of Connecticut focused on equity by arranging for student access to technology to support remote learning, helping the state become the first in the nation to provide learning devices to fulfill the identified need for all students. Recognizing the increased importance of providing resources for the social-emotional health of students and staff, Secretary Cardona and his team collaborated with the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence and other stakeholders to provide free social and emotional learning courses.

Secretary Cardona's approach to leadership in Connecticut focused on partnerships: within his Education Department; between State agencies; and with local boards, educator unions, school administrator associations, child advocates, and most importantly, students and families. He attributes his success in Connecticut in part to the strong backing of those partners, as well as support from the members of the Connecticut State Board of Education and his staff at the Connecticut State Department of Education.

Under Secretary Cardona's oversight — despite the pandemic — Connecticut launched a statewide FAFSA Data Dashboard; procured a comprehensive statewide Special Education Data System (CT-SEDS); announced the State's highest ever extended graduation rates for students with disabilities and English Learners; reached a new stipulated agreement in the landmark school integration case Sheff v. O'Neill, established the first national requirement for high schools provide courses on black and Latino studies; and initiated systemic improvement protocols that can reach every corner of the state. His focus on equity and excellence for all learners has driven his work at all levels.

Secretary Cardona has two decades of experience as a public school educator from the City of Meriden. He began his career as an elementary teacher. He then served as a school principal in Meriden in 2003 where he led a school with outstanding programming for three to five-year-olds, students that were bilingual, and students with sensory exceptionalities. He proudly served in this role for ten years. In 2012, Miguel won the 2012 National Distinguished Principal Award for the State of CT and the Outstanding Administrator Award from UCONN's NEAG School of Education. Secretary Cardona then transitioned to lead the work of Performance and Evaluation in the district. He then assumed the role of Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning, overseeing teaching, learning, and leadership alignment.

A lifelong Meriden resident, Dr. Cardona attended Meriden Connecticut Public Schools and graduated from Wilcox Technical High School. He attended CCSU for his Bachelor's degree and UCONN where he completed a Master's in Bilingual/Bicultural Education, Administrator Preparation Program, Doctorate in Education, and Executive Leadership Program (Superintendent) Certificate. Secretary Cardona is very active in his community, serving on several non-profit charitable organization boards of directors. He has had several articles published in AASPA Perspective, National School Boards Association, District Administration, and the Scholars Strategy Network.

His greatest source of pride, however, is his family. Secretary Cardona and his beautiful wife Marissa are the proud parents of two children.

Priscilla Chan is co-founder and co-CEO of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. As a pediatrician and teacher, Priscilla’s work with patients and students in communities across the Bay Area has informed her desire to make learning more personalized, find new paths to manage and cure disease, and expand opportunity for more people. She is also the founder of The Primary School, which integrates health and education and serves children and families in East Palo Alto and the Belle Haven neighborhood in Menlo Park, California. Priscilla earned her BA in Biology at Harvard University and her MD at University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). She completed her pediatrics training in the UCSF/PLUS Pediatrics Residency.

Sharif El-Mekki is the Founder and CEO of the Center for Black Educator Development. The Center exists to ensure there will be equity in the recruiting, training, hiring, and retention of quality educators that reflect the cultural backgrounds and share common socio-political interests of the students they serve.

The Center is developing a nationally relevant model to measurably increase teacher diversity and support Black educators through four pillars: Professional learning, Pipeline, Policies and Pedagogy. So far, the Center has developed ongoing and direct professional learning and coaching opportunities for Black teachers and other educators serving students of color. The Center also carries forth the freedom or liberation school legacy by hosting a Freedom School that incorporates research-based curricula and exposes high school and college students to the teaching profession to help fuel a pipeline of Black educators.

Prior to founding the Center, El-Mekki served as a nationally recognized principal and U.S. Department of Education Principal Ambassador Fellow. El-Mekki’s school, Mastery Charter Shoemaker, was recognized by President Obama and Oprah Winfrey, and was awarded the prestigious EPIC award for three consecutive years as being amongst the top three schools in the country for accelerating students’ achievement levels. The Shoemaker Campus was also recognized as one of the top ten middle school and top ten high schools in the state of Pennsylvania for accelerating the achievement levels of African-American students.

Over the years, El-Mekki has served as a part of the U.S. delegation to multiple international conferences on education. He is also the founder of the Fellowship: Black Male Educators for Social Justice, an organization dedicated to recruiting, retaining, and developing Black male teachers. El-Mekki blogs on Philly’s 7th Ward, is a member of the 8 Black Hands podcast, and serves on several boards and committees focused on educational and racial justice.

Freddy Gonzalez leads teams across the Foundation to create and improve curriculum and assessment for the KIPP network; support KIPP regions in improving student achievement; work alongside KIPP network leaders to facilitate opportunities for professional growth and development; develop overall talent strategy; and share KIPP’s resources and practices with other district, charter, and education organizations.

Before joining the KIPP Foundation, Freddy worked at KIPP Austin College Prep as a teacher, assistant principal, and finally as principal for seven years. Under his leadership, the school earned Recognized or Exemplary ratings every year and earned distinctions in all possible categories. Prior to KIPP, he was the lead counselor with Settlement College Readiness Program in New York City.

In 2019, Freddy joined the board of EdFuel, a national nonprofit that helps education organizations recruit and retain top talent. He lives in Austin, TX and earned his master’s degree from New York University’s Steinhardt School of Education, and a bachelor’s degree from Brown University.

Tre Johnson is a freelance writer on race and culture and a longtime career educator. His education began as a high school English teacher via Teach For America, and continued on in the DC Metro Area, Philadelphia, PA, and Camden, NJ in various roles that have included youth program manager, Executive Director (TFA Greater Philadelphia), and district central office administration (Camden City School District). Currently, he's DEI Partner for Catalyst:Ed, focused on the strategic delivery of capacity-building projects and initiatives with public sector partnerships and leaders to increase their DEI fluency. 

His writing focuses on the historical and cultural intersections of race, politics, and identity. His freelance career as a cultural critic and essayist has included appearances on CNN Tonight w/ Don Lemon; CBS This Morning; PBS NewsHour and NPR Morning Edition. His writing has appeared in Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, New York Times, Vox, San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post, and several other outlets. He's served on panels for the NY TV Festival, Black Star Film Festival, and others. He's also given keynote addresses and lectures at the University of Pennsylvania, St. Mary's College of Southern Maryland, and Lewis & Clark College. His first book, BLACK GENIUS: Our celebrations and our destructions, which will explore the phenomenon of Black excellence and its ability to succeed and sometimes be crushed by white systems and people, will be published by Dutton Books at Penguin Random House.

Outside of education, Tre has served as a board and vice-chair focused on issues such as education, teacher diversity, and juvenile sentencing and reentry. 

Tre is a graduate from the University of Maryland, proudly born and raised in Trenton, NJ and currently lives in Philadelphia, PA.

The recipient of Oprah's first "Chutzpah Award" for boldness, Irshad Manji is founder of Moral Courage ED, a nonprofit that empowers students to engage with empathy about polarizing issues. She is the New York Times bestselling author, most recently, of Don't Label Me: How to Do Diversity Without Inflaming the Culture Wars. (Fun fact: Chris Rock calls the book "genius.") A professor of leadership at New York University for many years, Irshad now teaches at Oxford University's Initiative for Global Ethics and Human Rights.