Jason Gaulden, 2023 Education Fellow

Jason Gaulden has spent his professional career working at the intersection of the business and nonprofit sectors. He is a partner at Oak Rose Group, a strategy consulting firm specializing in education, workforce development, and economic mobility. He draws upon 25 years of professional experience in varying roles: executive leadership, philanthropy, communications, grassroots advocacy, research and writing, fund development, and nonprofit board development.

From 2015 to 2020, he worked with America Succeeds, a national network of business leaders focused on modernizing the nation’s education system. He co-authored the report The Age of Agility: Education Pathways for the Future of Work. The initiative empowers business leaders, educators, and policymakers to better prepare students for the new workforce and economy.

As a teenager and young adult, Jason had an unusually diverse set of professional experiences, being elected to the NAACP national board of directors at the age of 18, becoming a grassroots advocate and executive director of Hillside Neighborhood Association at age 19, and becoming youth director at the Pikes Peak Region Urban League at age 21.

Jason served as the program officer for education at Daniels Fund from 2005 to 2009, and before that, a Senior Fellow at El Pomar Foundation from 2001 to 2005. Jason is a graduate of the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology. He lives in Denver, Colorado.

About the Education Fellowship
Colorado and Arizona’s continued economic vibrancy will depend on its ability to recruit and retain top talent across all economic sectors. CSI has injected data and facts into the policy debates shaping education for a number of years and recently launched a multi-state fellowship. The focus of this fellowship is to address structural challenges to school choice and educational advancement across the two states. The fellowship will focus on a number of education policy topics including, education spending, addressing COVID-related learning loss, identifying underutilized facilities to promote more educational access, identifying barriers and opportunities in school transportation, and ways to better align postsecondary credential attainment with workforce demands.