Greg Jobin-Leeds has made a career out of launching and nurturing successful, high-impact public policy organizations. His talent for recruiting effective leaders and guiding their efforts to break new ground has led to milestone victories for the nation’s historically underserved children and most under-represented families.
Greg is co-founder and chair of the board of the award winning Schott Foundation for Public Education. In 1993—under Greg’s leadership—the Foundation began funding the Campaign for Fiscal Equity (CFE) and later helped found the Alliance for Quality Education (AQE). Through litigation, legislation, media, and grassroots organizing, both CFE’s and AQE’s efforts led to winning $7.4 billion annually for high-need New York schools. Schott won the Council of Foundation’s 2007 Critical Impact Award for this victory. In 1999, Schott recruited the leadership and provided the start-up funding for the Early Education for All (EEA) campaign in Massachusetts, which successfully advocated for a universal pre-kindergarten education bill. In 2003, the Foundation published state report cards on “Public Education and Black Male Students,” which generated a national consciousness, leading many to confront historical inequities and rethink how to educate boys of color. In 2004, the Foundation created The Schott Fellowship for Early Care and Education at Cambridge College to train new public policy leaders of color.
Greg co-founded Access Strategies Fund, which helps disenfranchised communities harness their collective democratic power to improve their lives. Access has played a leading role in closing the racial gap in voter turnout in targeted communities and overturning racially unjust gerrymandered districts, which has led to progressive leaders of color being elected. www.accessstrategies.org
Instrumental in the launch of the 501(c)(4) League of Education Voters of America in 2005, Greg led the recruitment of the founding board. The League’s mission is to create the political will to transform the nation’s public education system by holding public officials accountable for serving the needs of all children. www.leagueofeducationvoters.com
At the Institute for Student Achievement (ISA), a leading high school redesign organization, Greg co-chaired the Strategic Direction and Oversight Committee, and recruited ISA’s first president, a former superintendent-of-the-year. These leadership changes facilitated ISA transforming large high schools into small, inclusive learning communities with tremendous student outcomes. www.studentachievement.org
As a founding board member, Greg helped manage the original research, recruit the leadership, and launch the Alliance for Excellent Education—now a highly effective national advocate for public high school policy. www.all4ed.org
Similarly, in partnership with Teacher’s College at Columbia University, Greg helped launch The National Academy for Excellent Teaching to improve teaching in urban schools. www.nafet.net
He is the founding chair of Progressive Majority’s Leadership Circle, which is highly successful at electing bold state candidates committed to racial and economic justice, public education and health care. www.progressivemajority.org
Greg is a founding executive board member of Congresswoman Barbara Lee’s One Voice PAC, which is successful in electing progressive federal candidates who have strong platforms on public education, racial, and economic justice. www.onevoicepac.org
Greg founded the CMP Media Foundation, served on the corporate board of CMP Media, and currently serves on committees of six investment portfolios.
As the son of immigrants who escaped Nazi persecution, Greg lives the commitment of fighting for fairness and social justice. He is driven by the fundamental belief that excellence is the result of inclusion not exclusion. Greg has been dedicated to educational excellence throughout his career. Early in his career, he worked as a high school English teacher, then he trained adult literacy teachers, and more recently he has worked to increase political access for disenfranchised populations. He has a Master’s degree from Teacher's College, Columbia University and more than 25 years of education, public policy, media, community organizing and leadership experience.