About

Mission

I grew up in South Texas in a family of k12 public school teachers. From a very young age I saw their struggle as educators in providing holistic and comprehensive education to students of all races, genders, abilities, and socioeconomic backgrounds within the content-acquisition-based curriculum expediencies of Texas Public Schools. A key part of a holistic education is skills based learning including subjects like financial literacy.

Background

Jaci went to the University of Texas at San Antonio for her undergrad education where she studied Marketing, Civic Engagement, and Public Policy. During this time, she focused her interest in holistic skills education. She founded a club on campus that, through a partnership with Catholic Charities, held financial literacy classes for refugees in San Antonio. Concurrently, she worked on youth advocacy and civic engagement through facilitation in a variety of Youth Voice Summits.

To make changes to promote financial literacy education in schools, in her junior and senior years of undergrad she wrote a policy brief, recommending that the "Every Student Succeeds Act," be amended to provide incentives for financial literacy education starting in high school rather than college. She also became an Archer Fellow to learn about public policy and lived in Washington D.C. interning for former District 35 Congressman, Lloyd Doggett.

When returning home to Texas, she graduated from UTSA and will graduate with a Master of Public Administration from The University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley Summer 2023. She will also have her teaching certification by May 2023.

Jaci now works full time at the University of Texas in marketing, education, and events planning. She is also serving as Miss America Austin 2023, and volunteers with the Austin Bat Refuge, Foundation Communities, and CASA regularly while participating in various other community events. She teaches a financial literacy and digital literacy curriculum to children in schools and at some of these events.

She plans to continue her education with a Ph.D. in Public Policy and dissertation research on childhood education, civic engagement, and/or child and family wellbeing. She hopes to work as a professor, advocate, and researcher on these topics to positively influence Texas and National education.