Shaun Yoder Senior Consultant
Shaun holds more than ten years of education policy experience that spans teaching in the public school classroom, staffing the state legislature and governor's office and directing a business-led education non-profit organization. At Education First, he manages a portfolio of projects in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education, higher education, and general student success initiatives. His work includes developing a national multi-state STEM Network, long-term strategic planning for state-level STEM and higher education entities and facilitating Nashville’s Achieving Student Success through Effective Teaching (ASSET) initiative, a partnership between the city’s Mayor and director of the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools to enhance teacher effectiveness.
Before joining Education First, Shaun was the executive director of the Ohio Business Alliance for Higher Education and the Economy (BAHEE). Driven by 12 of Ohio's most prominent business leaders, BAHEE promotes public policy that attracts, cultivates, and prepares the next generation of talent needed to create tomorrow's innovations. At the helm of BAHEE, Shaun executed strategies aimed at doubling the number of STEM baccalaureate degrees in Ohio by 2017. Specifically, he co-led the establishment of statewide, regional, and local education stakeholder coalitions that helped pass the Ohio Core college- and career-ready high school graduation requirements in 2006, launched the Ohio STEM Learning Network in 2008, and secured state funding commitments of more than $22 million over four years for STEM schools and programs- in an historically challenging state budget climate.
Prior to joining BAHEE in August 2006, Shaun served as policy assistant for education and workforce development for Ohio Governor Bob Taft. He also was legislative liaison for the Ohio Board of Regents and a 2001 Legislative Service Commission Fellow in the Ohio Senate, where he staffed the Senate Education Committee. But Shaun's education career started in the classroom. In 1999, he taught high school special education in West Jefferson, Ohio and later taught sixth grade reading and science at Canaan Middle School in his hometown of Plain City, OH.
Shaun holds a bachelor's degree in history and social studies secondary education from Anderson University, in Anderson, Indiana. He resides in Columbus, OH, where he volunteers as Chair of United Way of Central Ohio's Kindergarten Readiness Committee.