Ryan Seashore, Founder/ Executive Director
Ryan is the founder and Executive Director of CodeNow. He believes it essential to lower barriers normally associated with technology, giving students exposure to programming at an early age. In effect, this empowers them while they are beginning to explore their options and opportunities, giving them a unique ability to innovate and create. His diverse background in community organizing, politics and technology has allowed him to create forward-thinking strategies for the organization. Ryan launched CodeNow in February of 2011 with a passion for technology and social activism. He holds a BA in Communications with a concentration in Marketing from the University of Southern California.
Jeff Casimir, Lead Trainer
Jeff started his career with Teach for America, teaching middle and high school in Washington, DC, for six years. In 2009 he started Jumpstart Lab to teach programming to novices and professionals around the world. In early 2012 he started Hungry Academy with a class of 24 individuals, most of them with no programming experience whatsoever. The goal is to prepare them to become part of the LivingSocial engineering team in five months. Jeff holds a BSE in Computer Systems Engineering and a BA in Business from Arizona State University.
Steve Klabnik, Lead Trainer
Steve is a Ruby Hero, software craftsman, and an aspiring digital humanities scholar. He spends most of his time contributing to Open Source projects, and maintains both Hackety Hack and Shoes. He also teaches classes with Jumpstart Lab.
Derrick Brooks, Trainer
Derrick is a software engineer for a defense contracting company. He is a native to the Washington, DC area and has been involved with all phases of designing and developing enterprise software in his day job for the past 10 years. His interest in becoming a programmer started in high school when he had his first touch in creating simple Pascal programs in class. This interest focused him into studying and earning a B.S. in Computer Science at Georgia Tech
Brad Elkins, Trainer
Brad currently works as the Political Associate at the Truman National Security Project, responsible for coordinating outreach and engagement activities for the 2012 election and managing logistics for the Truman Partners program. Brad earned a dual B.A. in Computer Science/Mathematics and International Affairs at Lewis & Clark College.
Kareem Grant, Trainer
Kareem currently works as a strategy consultant for a large defense contractor. When he’s not solving business problems or helping kids learn how to code, you’ll probably find him training for his next long distance obstacle race. He has a B.S. in Information Systems from the University of Maryland College Park as well as a MBA from the NYU Stern School of Business.
Joanna Kochaniak, Trainer
Joanna works as a software engineer at Opower, where she uses her coding skills to encourage energy efficiency. She has been programming since the age of 11, when her dad first introduced her to Visual Basic. She has an MSE in Computer Science and BA in Cognitive Science from Johns Hopkins University.
CodeNow has an amazing pool of volunteers which grows with every training.
CodeNow Board of Directors
Roy Bahat
Roy is the former president of IGN Entertainment, which he joined in 2007 and stepped down from in August 2012. IGN, a division of News Corporation, is a leader in video game media, as well as video, digital distribution, and online game technology. Before joining IGN, he worked on various start-ups and with the government, including the office of New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg and for New York’s 2012 Olympic bid campaign. He also previously worked as a management consultant at McKinsey & Co. Roy graduated from Harvard College and was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, where he was also a lecturer in undergraduate mathematics and economics courses.
Angelique Brunner
Angel currently works as the founder and owner of Pettles Group, a real estate investment organization. She previously worked as a partner and the Vice President for Finance with Neighborhood Development Company, a Washington, D.C. real estate development company, where her responsibilities included project finance, investor sourcing and relations, and financial management. More recently, she was a member of the national acquisitions team for the equity group at Fannie Mae, where she was responsible for over $350 million of new equity commitments to affordable housing and more than $200 million of total development. Prior to her work in real estate, Angel was a Vice President of Core Capital Partners, a venture capital fund focused on early stage and growth investments. Angel has a Master’s degree and a Certificate in Urban Planning from Princeton University, where she was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow. She is also a Charter member in AmeriCorps.
Clay Johnson
Clay is a computer programmer who advocates for open source information and increased transparency in the federal government. In August 2012, he was selected as a Presidential Innovation Fellow as part of the White House Presidential Innovation Fellows program. In 2009, Clay was named the Google-O’Reilly Open Source Community Builder of the Year. In 2004, he was the lead programmer for Howard Dean’s presidential campaign. He along with other Howard Dean staffers, then founded Blue State Digital, a company that provided technology services and online strategy for the 2008 Barack Obama presidential campaign. Clay is a frequent speaker at government, Internet, and computer programming expositions and events. Recently he published the book “Information Diet.”
