Get to Know Bobbie Downs

Bloomberg Fellow Bobbie Downs has spent her career building more effective systems to serve the most vulnerable populations of learners. She now serves as Assistant Superintendent for the Burlington County Special Services School District in New Jersey, where she is responsible for improving the school system through staff development, student programming, and initiatives that support the social and emotional well-being of students and educators.

Her path began far from New Jersey, in Cairo, Egypt, where she taught and served as an administrator in a school for Sudanese refugees. That formative experience shaped her understanding of how children’s traumatic experiences can impact their learning, particularly for marginalized communities. Since then, she has worked in alternative and special education settings, with a consistent focus on students whose needs often go unmet in traditional systems.

The challenges her students face extend well beyond the classroom. Many live with autism, mental health concerns, and developmental disabilities, and grapple with housing or food insecurity.

The same complexity extends to her role as an administrator. One of her greatest challenges is ensuring staff are supported in emotionally demanding environments. “Burnout is real,” she says. “I’m constantly focused on how to build sustainable supports, through training, mentorship, and trauma-informed practices, that empower our educators without overwhelming them.”

Downs views schools not just as educational institutions, but as frontline responders to public health crises. The ripple effects of policy decisions around Medicaid, mental health funding, and in-home supports are felt every day in her district. For many families, schools have become a primary access point for connection, care, and stability.

That perspective is what led Downs to apply to the Bloomberg Fellowship at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “I applied because I believe in the power of interdisciplinary collaboration,” she says. “Health inequities show up in classrooms every day. I wanted to learn from public health leaders and bring that knowledge back to my district to create systemic change.”

This work is deeply personal. Her efforts are grounded in professional experience, a deep sense of care for the educators in her district, and the values she holds for her students’ education. For Downs, the goal is clear: build schools where every child can thrive.