Mary Jo Madda is the Growth & Engagement Strategy Lead for several diversity + education initiatives at Google, and a doctoral student at the UCLA School of Education and Information Studies. Her work with Code Next, a Code with Google Program provides informal after-school training for high school freshmen of color (Black, Latino/Hispanic, and Native/Indigenous) in the most quickly-growing industries, including cloud computing and data science.
Chelsey Roebuck is a mechanical engineer who leads ELITE, a community-based youth development organization that utilizes STEM education as a vehicle to empower low-opportunity students to realize their academic and career potential. He leverages his Columbia degree to create meaningful impact toward addressing STEM education inequality as a means to close the achievement gap and provide opportunities for economic mobility for thousands of youth across the Americas and Africa.
Both Mary and Chelsey, recipients of Forbes's “30 Under 30” talk about the importance of social capital and networks to achieve success. The need to model and actively practice diversity equity and inclusion initiatives, creating safe places of belonging, becomes all the more important.