So happy to spend time with my former teammate @ewwaldo.bsky.social, and witness the extraordinary work he and his team are leading at DC CAP! Their goal is to help DC become the college graduate capital of the country, by closing the college completion gap between high and low income students.

"I understand that it’s very hard for parents to have their kids home for extended periods of time, especially parents of young children...But conditions were not safe for many students asked to attend class that day," writes ninth-grader Rayna Leibowitz Hampton.

BIG NEWS for DC students and families. Yesterday, the President signed the FY26 appropriations bill, which includes a 50% increase in the DC Tuition Assistance Grant (DCTAG)—raising the annual award from $10,000 to $15,000 per student. This is the first increase since DCTAG was established in 1999

For The Ringer, I wrote about how amazing it was that the brilliant Catherine O'Hara finally became a superstar in her 60s, and how sad it is that she was taken from us just when we had all finally begun to appreciate her:

Great to speak at the UERU Association National Conference today about the power and importance of first-gen student success. Proud to share some lessons learned from my time at the White House and my time leading DC CAP Scholars

¡Feliz Navidad! Merry Christmas!

NEWS: DC CAP Scholars is proud to be a recipient of a generous gift from MacKenzie Scott and her team at Yield Giving. So proud of this team. This recognition is as good as it gets from the most trusted name in philanthropy. We will keep pushing for ALL DC students to get to and through college

I said roughly ten percent of the things I could have said about Rob Reiner.

Rosie on her own picked out a Brown shirt for me today. Just heartbroken for our community.

Please help, friends! My panel for SXSWEDU is up and if you vote for it, we’ll get to share how DC CAP Scholars has closed college achievement gaps where national fixes have stalled. Voting is open until Aug 24. Please create an account, & tap the heart. 🙏🙏🙏 t.co/6rBkJYv4Iz

Survey: Most Parents Still Want Their Kids to Go to College A new survey from @gallup.com and the Lumina Foundation shows that the majority of parents prefer that their children’s plans after high school include some form of higher ed. bit.ly/4lB7BSF #EDUSky #AcademicSky #HigherEd

There are ways to reduce #dementia risk: 🦻get hearing checked 🚶‍♂️exercise 👭stay social But beware of #pseudoscience. A family member was sold “light therapy for the brain.” If it cured dementia, it’d be the first. Physicians aren’t hiding cures—we’re trying to protect from harm. #BrainHealth #NIH

wow, the trump budget request to congress (this is NOT the medicaid/snap/tax cuts bill) calls to cut the maximum pell grant award by $1,685

Proud husband alert! Katie Waldo was named by The Washingtonian as one of DC’s 500 Most Influential People Shaping Policy of 2025. Since she helped found We The Action in 2017, she has been activating pro-bono lawyers to support nonprofits. Even more important today!

🎉 IT’S TIME! DC’s biggest celebration for students is BACK! 📅 April 11, 2025 | 📍 @CapitalOneArena For #CollegeSigningDay 2025, we are doubling down in our celebration of DC students' commitment to their post-secondary education. Stay tuned for more details! 🎓

Every single philanthropic institution needs to do this rather than retracting right now. abcnews-go-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/abcnews....

We’re in the middle of the worst flu outbreak in 15 years. 😷 But, we’re canceling the meeting to plan for this years’ flu vaccine. And we’re about to cut #Medicaid for 72 Million poor and disabled Americans. What could go wrong?

Trials abandoned due to the stop-work order on USAID-funded research:

Not great.

True story: I once hosted a meeting at ED with Peter Yarrow and @alexdsanchez.bsky.social and he brought his guitar and told us stories and of course advocated for music in schools. Crazy thing is he was in my dad’s fraternity at Cornell and just a few years below him. They were friends. RIP

🎓 2024 was a landmark year for DC-CAP. This year, we celebrated: ✅ College Signing Day, honoring 2,500+ DC students ✅ Launch of our 2050 Moonshot Goal to raise DC’s college graduation rate to 80% ✅ A streamlined application, making aid more accessible than ever Help here: dccap.org/donate

Happy Thanksgiving! I love my family, my friends, and the work I get to do. Feeling grateful for all it.

Thank you to Nic Jafarieh, Jen Byers, and the entire team at the Sallie Mae Fund for their generous $75K check to DCCAP Scholars. A real treat to have a check presentation ceremony at the Caps game tonight.

It’s Prince’s birthday This is my favourite story about him by a country mile

The 2050 Moonshot goal for DC made it into the Sunday WaPo! Please read more about how we want to raise the bar for DC students through higher education www.washingtonpost.com/education/20...

DC city-wide College Signing Day is moving to April 30th! Cannot wait to celebrate students for committing to their education past high school. It’s satisfying to collaborate to bring a celebration I worked on nationally to my home in DC. Lord knows our students deserve it. And Go, Caps, go!

the doomers have spread a lot of bullshit on this but once again, the vaccine greatly cuts your risk of infection and long COVID

¡Feliz Dia de Reyes!

¡Feliz Navidad!

I took some time to reflect on the transformative year we had at @DC_CAP. This incredible team made some incredible strides in empowering students and improving college access. But, we're just getting started. Here's to an even better 2024 🎓 medium.com/@dccap619/wh...

Me, walking into a giant shopping mall five days before Christmas. “Be careful. Look out for each other. This is the fight of our lives. And we’re going to win. Whatever it takes.”

This is amazing

We should have had at least two more decades of Andre Braugher. Just heartbreaking. I don’t even know where to start.

Everything is pretty agonizing in the world at the moment; if you’d like a break, I talked to Scott Detrow for seven minutes about the Star Wars Holiday Special and told him exactly which part is weirdest (I am right). www.npr.org/2023/12/06/1...