JON BERNSTEIN

Bernstein's 25 years of Washington, DC experience began during he tenure as a Legislative Fellow for Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), working on immigration, crime, intellectual property and judiciary issues. His education advocacy career commenced when he became Legislative Counsel for The Lightspan Partnership, an educational software company. Bernstein went on to lobby for the National Education Association and the Federal Communications Commission. In 2005, Bernstein founded his own government relations firm, Bernstein Strategy Group, and has worked for high-profile clients like Apple, the American Federation of School Administrators (AFSA), and the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE).

Today, Bernstein works closely with many of the major K-12 education associations as co-chair of both the Education and Libraries Networks Coalition (EdLiNC) and the Homework Gap Big Tent Coalition, and as Executive Director of the National Coalition for Technology in Education and Training (NCTET). Since 2016, Bernstein and his firm have helped organize and run NAFSA: Association of International Educators’s Advocacy Day and he is working currently on developing NAFSA’s first Virtual Advocacy Day for 2021. He also helps lead the Principals Group, an informal coalition which focuses on professional development funding and related issues. Bernstein’s accomplishments include his work to help establish and expand funding for the federal E-Rate program, which provides schools and libraries with $4 billion in annual discounts on broadband and Wi-Fi services, and to preserve funding for the Every Student Succeeds Act’s Title II (professional development) and Title IV (flexible block grant) programs in the face of the Trump Administration’s efforts to eliminate them.