Jessica Williams

Jessica Williams is a Policy Manager at J-PAL Global and manages the Learning for All Initiative, which aims to improve global learning outcomes for children in low- and middle-income countries by generating research to inform policy. As a member of the Policy and Communications group and Education Sector, Jessica works with governments, NGOs, academics, and others to build partnerships and advance evidence-informed policymaking. She also supports the policy efforts for completed research under the Post Primary Education Initiative and the interdisciplinary Foundations of Learning program.

Prior to joining J-PAL in 2023, she worked as a Strategy Analyst at an ed-tech startup, Merlyn Mind, exploring artificial intelligence assistants for teachers in K-12 classrooms. Before that, she served two years in the classroom as an eighth-grade algebra teacher outside of Boston where she was involved in multilingual curriculum design and afterschool programming for girls in STEM and girls in sports. She has completed analyst internships at impact-investing firm Social Finance and Argentinian NGO, Directorio Legislativo, focused on government transparency. 

Jessica holds a master’s degree in education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and a bachelor’s degree in economics from Harvard College, where she graduated cum laude in field.