Director, Region 4 Expanded Learning Programs, Alameda County Office of Education

Akilah Byrd is currently the Director of Region 4 Expanded Learning Programs at the Alameda County Office of Education and she is the System of Support for Expanded Learning County Regional Lead providing technical assistance to 180 Local Education Agencies (LEAs) throughout the diverse San Francisco Bay Area. Akilah is an award-winning administrator and prior elementary and secondary classroom teacher who holds a Master’s Degree in Educational Leadership with an emphasis on Social Justice in Education. In 2020, she was named the regional Elementary Principal of the Year by the Association of California School Administrators in Region 6. She was a site administrator for ten years with expanded learning partnerships. As an equity warrior, she is passionate about ensuring that her contributions help to lessen the opportunity gap for our disenfranchised students.

Akilah was motivated to join the CAN Leadership Team due to her personal reflections of being a youth herself, growing up in East Oakland, and recalling the wonderful opportunities that participating in a high-quality expanded learning program exposed her to the outside of the regular academic school day. Therefore, she recognizes the value of providing access to high-quality expanded learning programming for all students. This includes a need for successful collaboration between the school day and out-of-school time staff, progress monitoring of student outcomes, and a collaborative focus on serving the whole child successfully together.