Connect our Kids CEO and Co-founder

Dr. Jennifer Jacobs

Dr. Jacobs is a U.S. Army veteran and graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. She served as a military police officer, nuclear operations officer, and a jumpmaster. During her time at one of the nation’s nuclear weapons laboratories, Dr. Jacobs assisted the U.S. Postal Service in the aftermath of the anthrax attacks and helped protect the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Greece. She served as a White House Fellow with the National Security Council, and assisted with Iraqi recovery while working for McKinsey & Company. Most recently, Dr. Jacobs was selected as a member of the 2022 Class of Presidential Leadership Scholars.


Dr. Jacobs, a nuclear engineer, was working in national security in 2011 when she read about manual methods used for finding the families of children in foster care. She noticed parallels between the sophisticated software used in the intelligence community to visually map terrorist networks, and what was needed to connect foster kids to supportive family networks.


When she learned that child welfare professionals did not have similar software, but were doing this work on Post-It notes and Excel spreadsheets, she determined to put world class data visualization and collaboration tools to work for children.