Myel Jenkins is an engaged parent, community volunteer, and a professional with multiple years of management experience in non-profit, foundation, and county government. In 2018, Myel ran for school board in the 11th largest school district in California. She was motivated to run to bring a parent voice and experience to her local school board.
Myel did not win in the election in 2018 but losing was not the end of her journey. She had always been active in her community and continued on regardless of the results of the election. Myel currently serves in leadership position with the local high-school Parent, Teacher, Student Association (PTSA), Black Women of Political Action, Sacramento, and the Women Democrats of Sacramento.
Myel is a bi-racial woman raising her two boys with her husband of over twenty years. It was her sons’ experiences as boys of color attending schools with minimal diversity that motivated her to run for school board.
She has worked for the California Schools Boards Association since 2017 and is currently the Director of Conferences. In this position, she develops the Association’s annual conference which provides professional development to the thousands of school board trustees from across the state.
Myel’s volunteer service at one time included coaching her son’s soccer team. Now that her sons are teens, she continues to fill her time volunteering, but now she has more time keep up with her vivacious reading habit and has replaced running soccer practices with hula-hooping and has 4 hula-hoops and counting.
Pact Press is proud to be publishing Step Up to Run: Women Shaping the Future of Politics and Public Policy, with Myel Jenkins, Tara Sreekrishnan, Delaine Eastin, Dionne Ybarra, and Jacalyn Smith in the spring of 2023.
