Dr. Lynn Jennings is a mother, educator, and longtime education advocate who has spent more than two decades working to ensure that every student has access to the opportunities they deserve. A graduate of Spelman College, her career has taken her from the classroom to the halls of government, giving her a deep understanding of how decisions about education are made and how those decisions affect students, families, schools, and communities.

Lynn has taught at colleges and universities including Columbia College Chicago, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Bowie State University. She has worked in government affairs, developed the next generation of public policy leaders at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, and today serves as Senior Director of Strategic Initiatives & National Partnerships at EdTrust, where she leads a national initiative with the goal of reducing chronic absenteeism by 50 percent over five years.

But for Lynn, this work is also personal. She's a mother of two boys who attended DCPS and charter schools, a former PTO president at John Burroughs Elementary School, and a former LSAT member — she's sat in the rooms where decisions about her own children's education get made, and seen firsthand how often families are looped in only after the real decisions have already happened.

That's why she's running: to put more than two decades of experience, advocacy, and leadership to work for Ward 5, the community she calls home. She will bring that same national initiative — and its goal of reducing chronic absenteeism by 50 percent over five years — home to Ward 5. She will make sure families are in the room before decisions are made, not after. For our children, for our schools, for our community, and for Ward 5.