Leading Efforts for Texas' Digital Divide
Story By: Yara Simon
Whether it’s riding the digital divide gap, teaching college students about social capital, or promoting community and economic development, Jordana Barton’s desire to help Latinos traces back to her humble beginnings. Now the Senior Advisor at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, Barton grew up in Benavides, Texas, a colonia – known as unincorporated, low-income communities on and near the U.S.- Mexico border – with scant resources.
FOR JORDANA, growing up in Benavides helped her develop a strong sense of wanting to improve opportunities for Latino kids. She identifies kids who grew up just like her, in places where maybe the school system doesn’t have high expectations for their future opportunities.
It was a challenging place, particularly when it came to learning. Jordana, one of six siblings, explains that it’s almost as though her undergraduate schooling served as her true high school education. Yet, her hometown challenged her in different ways. Looking back, she calls her childhood the most creatively fulfilling time in her life. She wrote and put on plays for her small predominantly Mexican-American community.
The lack of opportunities also never made her feel like college was out of reach.
The daughter of two college-educated teachers, she knew the importance of education. She ended up at the University of Texas at Austin, where she majored in English. She first worked as a teacher, following in her parents’ footsteps.
After teaching English at a public high school for four years, Jordana returned to her alma mater to work in the Department of Mexican American & Latina/o Studies. It was there where she began her journey into the world of finance.
Knowing that low-income students weren’t always knowledgeable about wealth and asset building, she developed the Latino Financial Issues program. On top of teaching them about how to build wealth, the program also delved into community economic development, the policies that affect low-income communities, personal financial education, and the importance of connections via paid internships. To strengthen the program, Jordana worked with banking executives, non-profit organizations, and community development institutions. Finance was beginning to become a central part of her career.
“[Then] I went into microfinance with Accion Texas, which is now LiftFund, community development banking andvnow, the Federal Reserve,” she says. “I’ve worked in every sector, public education, higher education, non-profit, corporate, and now government, quasi-governmental.”
Though her path is unconventional, every aspect of Barton’s career has shaped her. For example, working in microfinance, she focused her energy on making credit available to low-income communities. After Muhammad Yunus won the Nobel Prize for microfinance, she saw a chance to educate people on the top- ic. She held a summit on microfinance, which helped her link up with banking professionals and Ben Bernanke, the former Chair of the Federal Reserve, who spoke at her event.
Barton joined the Federal Reserve in 2013. She works to make sure everyone has equal access to the same opportunities, that they can participate in all aspects of the economy. One of her most important studies to date revolves around colonias. In “Las Coloinias in the 21st Century: Progress Along the Texas-Mexico Border,” in which she served as the lead author, she broke down the conditions that led to health disparities, missed educational opportunities, and incomplete infrastructure in these towns.
While “Las Colonias” presents a lot of necessary data and facts, it’s the personal stories about lack of internet access that led to another impactful study, “Closing the Digital Divide: A Framework for Meeting CRA Obligations.” Even before the COVID-19 pandemic forced us all, including the youngest of students, to go entirely digital, Barton was looking at the ways that lack of internet had long-lasting effects, which is why access to broadband became a part of the Community Re-investment Act, ensuring that banks will lend to broadband providers in underserved communities. Barton is also leading a new initiative, “Connecting Beyond the Classroom”, for local stakeholders to work on closing the homework gap by creating a private network that expands broadband infrastructure and allows students to access at home the educational institution's intranet or network.*
More than anything, Barton’s job allows her to bet on those often overlooked. To see past the numbers and show us who they really are.