Jessica is the Senior Campaign Director for North Carolina Food Insecurity and for the National Member Engagement Team at MomsRising. 

Jessica has been an active member of the North Carolina MomsRising Steering Committee since it began in 2007. Her two sons (ages 12 and 14) have grown up advocating for family friendly policies at the legislature, marching in protests, and making crafts (like decorating onesies or wooden train engines) to deliver to their legislators. 

Jessica has dedicated the past twenty years to the strategic development, implementation, and scale-up of public health programs in North Carolina and mental health programs across the country. Her public health areas of focus include childhood obesity prevention, child trauma treatment, access to care in rural areas and Latino health.

In addition to her MomsRising work, she is currently supporting the implementation of a NC Farm to Early Care and Education Breakthrough Series Collaborative, which connects children in child care with local food and farms across North Carolina.  She loves to travel, and served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Nicaragua. 

She has Masters’ degrees in Public Health and Social Work from UNC-Chapel Hill and is fluent in Spanish.