A Chance to Make ChangesWorking as a teacher led President Lyndon Baines Johnson to fight for civil rights, and he recalled his time in the classroom as he urged Congress to enact the Voting Rights Act of 1965. “My first job after college,” he said, “was as a teacher in Cotulla, Texas, in a small Mexican-American school. Few of the people there could speak English, and I couldn’t speak Spanish. My students were poor, and they often came to class without breakfast and hungry. And they knew even in their youth the pain of prejudice. They never seemed to know why people disliked them, but they knew it was so because I saw it in their eyes.”
Johnson’s longing to help those students haunted him, as he would later reveal. “I often walked home late in the afternoon, after the classes were finished, wishing there was more that I could do. But all I knew was to teach them the little that I knew, hoping that it might help them against the hardships that lay ahead. And somehow you never forget what poverty and hatred can do when you see its scars on the face of a young child,”—an image that remained in his mind decades later when he became our nation’s leader. “I never thought then, in 1928, that I would be standing here. It never even occurred to me in my fondest dreams that I might have the chance to help the sons and daughters of those students, and people like them all over this country. But now I do have that chance. And I’ll let you in on a secret: I mean to use it.”
Johnson’s sense of resolve played a strong role in the passage of the 1965 act, which guaranteed that the right to vote would not be denied because of race. And it was part of Johnson’s Great Society program to empower people of color, cut poverty rates, attack disease and remove urban blight. But you couldn’t make society great if you didn’t give all young folk a quality education, as Johnson believed. “Education will not cure all of the problems of society, but without it no cure for any problem is possible,” he said.
So, we need to move “toward full educational opportunity,” as he declared in a special message to Congress on January 12, 1965. “We must demand that our schools increase not only the quantity but the quality of America’s education. For we recognize that nuclear-age problems cannot be solved with horse-and-buggy learning. The three Rs of our school system must be supported by the three Ts—teachers who are superior, techniques of instruction that are modern, and thinking about education which places it first in all our plans and hopes”—the same standards that education leaders and child advocates are reaching toward today.
And Johnson’s agenda for education came up against much of the same roadblocks that education leaders now face as they strive to provide equity in early learning nationwide. “In many places, classrooms are overcrowded, and curricula are outdated,” Johnson said as he looked at the state of preschools in his day. “Most of our qualified teachers are underpaid, and many of our paid teachers are unqualified. So, we must give every child a place to sit and a teacher to learn from. Poverty must not be a bar to learning, and learning must offer an escape from poverty,” he urged the nation in 1963.
Two years later, this conviction led Johnson to launch Head Start, a program that I attended as a child from a low-income home and later worked in as a teacher early in my career. By then, Head Start had long grown from an eight-week demonstration project designed to break the poverty cycle into a full-year program that served millions of children from marginalized communities nationwide. And the expansion of the program led to the CDA®, a new credential to train teachers so they would have the skills to give the nation’s children a head start. The goal of Head Start was to help all children be school ready, but Johnson understood that he couldn’t stop there. He also had to consider the quality of learning as children advanced to higher grades.
Johnson was determined to help all children reach their full promise because he believed “the basis of our whole future as a nation and a civilized society depends on our ability to give every child all the education that he can take.” And his administration acted on these words by passing over 60 education bills, more education legislation than any White House administration before. And Johnson showed the personal meaning of this record by coming back to his first school to sign one of his major education bills.
On April 11, 1965, Johnson sat at a picnic table outside the Junction School, a one-room building in rural Texas, where he had grown up. His first teacher, Miss Katie Deadrich, was by his side as he signed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which gave extensive federal funding to the nation’s schools for the first time. And being there with Deadrich brought Johnson back to his first experience of education. “I felt a very strong desire to go back to the beginnings of my own education,” Johnson said as he signed the bill, “to be reminded and to remind others of that magic time when the world of learning began to open before our eyes.”
Thoughts of the past also flooded his mind when he went to Texas State University, his alma mater, to sign the Higher Education Act of 1965. The act opened the doors of college to millions of students through scholarships and loans, including young people like those that Johnson still clearly recalled from his days teaching in Cotulla.
“I shall never forget the faces of the boys and girls in that little Mexican-American school, and I remember even yet the pain of realizing and knowing then that college was closed to practically every one of those children because they were too poor. And I think then that I made up my mind that this nation could never rest while the door to knowledge remained closed to any American.” And that door begins to open with quality early learning that helps children escape poverty and reach their promise, as Johnson firmly believed.
I’m proof he was right since my time as a Head Start student launched me on a path to higher learning and leadership at the Council, where I support teachers in earning their CDAs. In this role, I face some of the same issues that have dogged our field since Johnson’s days. We still don’t have enough qualified teachers. And we still don’t give these valued professionals the pay they deserve. As a result, many children still don’t have a place to sit in a preschool or a skilled teacher to learn from. And now that I’m Council CEO, I want to do all I can to provide all young learners with qualified teachers, like those who gave me a head start toward success. It never occurred to me in those early years that I would have this chance to make positive changes—and I mean to use it.
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Vice President of Strategic Alliances
Elisa Shepherd is the Vice President of Strategic Alliances at the Council, where she leads initiatives to advance the Council’s mission and strategic plan through designing, managing, and executing a comprehensive stakeholder relationship strategy.
With over 25 years of experience in early childhood education (ECE), Elisa has dedicated her career to developing impactful programs, professional development opportunities, and public policies that support working families, young children, and ECE staff. Before joining the Council, Elisa held numerous roles within the childcare industry. Most recently, she served as Associate Vice President at The Learning Experience and as Senior Manager at KinderCare Education, where she influenced government affairs and public policies across 40 states.
Elisa’s commitment to leadership is reflected in her external roles on the Early Care and Education Consortium Board of Directors, the Florida Chamber Foundation Board of Trustees, and as the DEI Caucus Leader for KinderCare Education. She has been recognized as an Emerging Leader in Early Childhood by Childcare Exchange’s Leadership Initiative.
Elisa earned a Bachelor of Science in Psychology with a focus on child development from Pennsylvania State University in State College, PA.
Chief Operations Officer (COO)
Andrew Davis serves as Chief Operating Officer at the Council. In this role, Andrew oversees the Programs Division, which includes the following operational functions: credentialing, growth and business development, marketing and communications, public policy and advocacy, research, innovation, and customer relations.
Andrew has over 20 years of experience in the early care and education field. Most recently, Andrew served as Senior Vice President of Partnership and Engagement with Acelero Learning and Shine Early Learning, where he led the expansion of state and community-based partnerships to produce more equitable systems of service delivery, improved programmatic quality, and greater outcomes for communities, children and families. Prior to that, he served as Director of Early Learning at Follett School Solutions.
Andrew earned his MBA from the University of Baltimore and Towson University and his bachelor’s degree from the University of Maryland – University College.
Chief Financial Officer (CFO)
Jan Bigelow serves as Chief Financial Officer at the Council and has been with the organization since February of 2022.
Jan has more than 30 years in accounting and finance experience, including public accounting, for-profit and not-for-profit organizations. She has held management-level positions with BDO Seidman, Kiplinger Washington Editors, Pew Center for Global Climate Change, Communities In Schools, B’nai B’rith Youth Organization and American Humane. Since 2003, Jan has worked exclusively in the non-profit sector where she has been a passionate advocate in improving business operations in order to further the mission of her employers.
Jan holds a CPA from the State of Virginia and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Lycoming College. She resides in Alexandria VA with her husband and dog.
Vice President of People and Culture
Janie Payne is the Vice President of People and Culture for the Council for Professional Recognition. Janie is responsible for envisioning, developing, and executing initiatives that strategically manage talent and culture to align people strategies with the overarching business vision of the Council. Janie is responsible for driving organizational excellence through strategic talent practices, orchestrating workforce planning, talent acquisition, performance management as well as a myriad of other Human Resources Programs. She is accountable for driving effectiveness by shaping organizational structure for optimal efficiency. Janie oversees strategies that foster a healthy culture to include embedding diversity, equity, and inclusion into all aspects of the organization.
In Janie’s prior role, she was the Vice President of Administration at Equal Justice Works, where she was responsible for leading human resources, financial operations, facilities management, and information technology. She was also accountable for developing and implementing Equal Justice Works Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion strategy focused on attracting diverse, mission-oriented talent and creating an inclusive and equitable workplace environment. With more than fifteen years of private, federal, and not-for-profit experience, Janie is known for her intuitive skill in administration management, human resources management, designing and leading complex system change, diversity and inclusion, and social justice reform efforts.
Before joining Equal Justice Works, Janie was the Vice President of Human Resources and Chief Diversity Officer for Global Communities, where she was responsible for the design, implementation, and management of integrated HR and diversity strategies. Her work impacted employees in over twenty-two countries. She was responsible for the effective management of different cultural, legal, regulatory, and economic systems for both domestic and international employees. Prior to Global Communities, Janie enjoyed a ten-year career with the federal government. As a member of the Senior Executive Service, she held key strategic human resources positions with multiple cabinet-level agencies and served as an advisor and senior coach to leaders across the federal sector. In these roles, she received recognition from management, industry publications, peers, and staff for driving the creation and execution of programs that created an engaged and productive workforce.
Janie began her career with Verizon Communications (formerly Bell Atlantic), where she held numerous roles of increasing responsibility, where she directed a diversity program that resulted in significant improvement in diversity profile measures. Janie was also a faculty member for the company’s Black Managers Workshop, a training program designed to provide managers of color with the skills needed to overcome barriers to their success that were encountered because of race. She initiated a company-wide effort to establish team-based systems and structures to impact corporate bottom line results which was recognized by the Department of Labor. Janie was one of the first African American women to be featured on the cover of Human Resources Executive magazine.
Janie received her M.A. in Organization Development from American University. She holds numerous professional development certificates in Human Capital Management and Change Management, including a Diversity and Inclusion in Human Resources certificate from Cornell University. She completed the year-long Maryland Equity and Inclusion Leadership Program sponsored by The Schaefer Center for Public Policy and The Maryland Commission on Civil Rights. She is a trained mediator and Certified Professional Coach. She is a graduate of Leadership America, former board chair of the NTL Institute and currently co-steward of the organization’s social justice community of practice, and a member of The Society for Human Resource Management. Additionally, Janie is the Board Chairperson for the Special Education Citizens Advisory Council for Prince Georges County where she is active in developing partnerships that facilitate discussion between parents, families, educators, community leaders, and the PG County school administration to enhance services for students with disabilities which is her passion. She and her husband Randolph reside in Fort Washington Maryland.
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