UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Jonathan C.W. Jones, who graduated from the Penn State College of Education in 2007 with a master’s degree in special education and a focus on augmentative and alternative communications, is driven by three overarching goals in his career: utilize technology to help students with disabilities, address inequalities in funding opportunities in under-resourced communities, and unify and empower Black male educators.
Jones recently began a new position as assistant principal at Washington Technology Magnet School in Minnesota's Saint Paul Public Schools. In addition, he is founder of Ideation4, a for-profit business that explores economic opportunities for under-resourced communities through proposal workshops, coaching and consulting. Jones also is executive director of UpLIFT Movement, a national nonprofit organization with a mission to recruit, retain and engage so that Black male educators thrive and excel.
Jones said his journey to Penn State was facilitated in large part by his connection with Jhan Doughty, who graduated from the College of Education in 1994 and 2001 and now is senior program adviser for National Assessment of Educational Progress at the Educational Testing Service in Princeton, New Jersey.
Jones, who grew up in St. Paul, attended Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans, where he majored in special education and where Doughty earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology. Doughty and her mother, Marva Doughty, an administrator at Xavier, encouraged him to apply to the Summer Research Opportunities Program (SROP), an eight-week research program designed to interest undergraduate students from underrepresented groups in academic careers. Jones applied to the SROP and was accepted into a cohort at Penn State.
While in SROP, Jones worked with David McNaughton, professor of education (special education), and Janice Light, professor of communication sciences and disorders and the Hintz Family Endowed Chair in Children’s Communicative Competence. Jones delved into research examining the role of technology in special education.
“My experience with doing research and learning how to do research has been very significant in my career,” Jones said. “By the time I got out of graduate school, I knew I had the passion as well as the skill set to do this work.”
In his first year of teaching, Jones said, he worked with students with special needs attending Northeast Metro Intermediate School District 916 and started building his knowledge about the lack of resources in schools and how to go after funding. He pointed out that organizations led by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) individuals tend to be the least-funded nationwide.
The impetus behind starting UpLIFT Movement, Jones said, was to create a sense of community among Black male educators and help build Black male educator pipelines across the country. To date, Jones has developed and published two editions of the UpLIFT publication (digital and print) and impacted 90 Black male educators from across the country, including teachers, professors and administrators.
“The board of directors has decided we will continue developing the publication on a yearly basis, identify geographic areas to focus on, and really try to build our nonprofit as a networking hub for other Black male educators across the country,” he said. “We’re very excited to build on this and see where it takes us.”