Josh Edelman Joins Transcend as Head of Network

Transcend is delighted to welcome Josh Edelman to our team! Josh will serve as Transcend’s Head of Network where he will focus on building a vibrant national community of visionary stakeholders throughout the field. These include school and systems leaders, educators, researchers, funders and other supporters with the goal of learning together to advance innovation and prepare all young people to thrive in and transform the world. 

Josh shares the following about his decision to join Transcend, ”Working as a teacher, principal, district leader and philanthropist has shaped me to believe that it is essential to work at the systemic and school levels to create equitable, 21st-century learning environments that serve all young people. Transcend’s commitment to this ‘both/and’ approach, vision for supporting schools and communities across the nation to solve their own problems with evidence-based approaches, and vision for doing this essential mindset and skill set building at scale is the exact right work at the right time.”

Prior to joining Transcend, Josh spent over a decade at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as a Senior Program Officer then Deputy Director in the K-12 program before serving as a Senior Advisor for the US Program President. Specifically, when on the K-12 team, Josh co-led a 500M portfolio focused on increasing the number of Black, Latinx, and low-income students who earn a high school diploma, enroll in a postsecondary institution, and are on track in their first year to attain a credential with labor market value.  

Before Gates, Josh worked in two public school districts focused on creating and improving school options and learning environments. Josh was the Deputy Chief of School Innovation (OSI) for the DC Public Schools, which focused on supporting and empowering 58 DC public schools through the infusion of unique programmatic elements and was the Executive Officer of the Office of New Schools (ONS) at Chicago Public Schools, which worked to recruit, develop, and support schools as part of a mayoral initiative to create 100 new schools over a seven-year period.

Josh has also been a principal at The SEED School, a public charter boarding school in Washington DC, and he taught high school social studies for ten years in Massachusetts and California before working with SEED.  

Josh has a B.A in American History from Harvard University, a Master’s in Education from Stanford University, and a Master’s in Educational Administration, also from Stanford University.  Josh is or has served on the boards of AVID (current), Breakthrough Collaborative, Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning, City Works DC (current), City Year DC, City Works DC (current), Education Forward DC (current), EL Haynes Public Charter School (current – board chair), Leading Now (current), Maya Angelou Public Charter School, The National Alliance of Public Charter Schools and One World Network of Schools (current).

Josh lives in DC with his wife, Heather, and has two young adult daughters, Ellika and Zoe.

Josh’s immense expertise in the education field, his curious, warm approach and his knack for bringing individuals and groups together to build groundbreaking change will be vital to Transcend in our next chapter. Please join us in welcoming him to our leadership.