Jessica Williams

Jessica Williams is a senior policy associate at J-PAL Global, where she works on the education sector team, where she assists in developing research and implementing policies related to education. Her responsibilities include supporting research funding, synthesizing evidence, contributing to policy publications, and collaborating with research and implementation partners. She helps support the Post Primary Education Initiative, the Foundations of Learning program, and 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. 

Prior to joining J-PAL in 2023, Jessica worked as a strategy analyst at an ed-tech startup, Merlyn Mind, exploring artificial intelligence assistants for teachers in K12 classrooms. Before that, she served two years in the classroom as an eighth-grade algebra teacher in Chelsea, Massachusetts where she was involved in 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 an 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.