Today, we’re shining a spotlight on Steven Morales: a Yale class of ’13 graduate from New York! While at Yale, Steven (he/him) was in Branford College and majored in Modern Middle East Studies. Though he wasn’t sure he wanted to enter the field of education, he knew he was interested in policy work. “I wanted to do something that influenced public systems and how the government interacted with citizens,” he said, “and I wanted to make some sort of difference or benefit in society.”
Steven fondly remembers the course “Child Care, Society, and Public Policy” he took while at Yale. “It really helped me understand, from an academic perspective, the systemic issues in child care, its funding, and how we view child care as a profession in the U.S.,” he recalled. “I was really moved by that class to work in education, and I ended up applying for and getting a fellowship with All Our Kin after graduation.” All Our Kin is a nonprofit organization that was started by Yale graduates Janna Wagner and Jessica Sager, who are also the professors of “Child Care, Society, and Public Policy”. The organization works with home-based family child care educators. Today, Steven is All Our Kin’s New York Policy Director.
Steven’s advice for YES students is to “think about the lots of different ways that are available to engage in education. That could be—and, for many, it is—in the classroom, but it doesn’t have to be. Consider your specific skill set, your specific interests, and there’s a good chance that there’s a job in education for you….Know what makes you happy in terms of what a day-to-day job would look like, and then go ahead and find it in education. It’s there.”