Dr. Jessica S. Samuel (she/her) is a scholar-activist who studies race, education, colonialism, and the environment, including where they all might converge, in the United States and abroad. Her recently completed dissertation, titled "From Virgin Land to Virgin Islands: Conserving 'America’s Paradise,'" examines the racialized confluence of public education struggles, National Park conservation objectives, and U.S imperialism on the island of St. John. Prior to obtaining her PhD in American Studies from Boston University, Jessica taught high school English and Writing as a Teach for America corps member in St. Louis, Missouri. She is an alumna of the Institute for the Recruitment of Teachers Fellowship program and the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. In 2018, after serving as an education policy fellow, she was appointed to the Racial Imbalance Advisory Council of the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Currently, Jessica resides in the Caribbean and consults on education and environmental policy.