Jibrielle Polite

Diversity and Inclusivity Outreach Manager, SPARK

SPARK

Jibrielle Polite joined the Simons Foundation in February 2021. She serves as the diversity and inclusivity outreach manager on the SPARK (Simons Foundation Powering Autism Research) research team. SPARK is the world’s largest online research study of autism. Launched in 2016 by the Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative (SFARI), SPARK aims to accelerate autism research and discovery by building an online research community of thousands of individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and their family members. She is responsible for developing, implementing and evaluating the study-wide strategy for the outreach and engagement of traditionally underrepresented, marginalized and emerging majority communities in SPARK. She is also responsible for developing and maintaining relationships with national and regional organizations to build bridges to underrepresented racial, ethnic and geographical groups in the United States and establishing best practices for the SPARK study.

Before joining the foundation, Polite worked in various civic and community engagement roles within the nonprofit sector. Most recently she led a non-profit women’s organization that developed capacities for social, economic and political change for women in underserved communities nationally and internationally and their families. In that role, she was responsible for steering the organization and managing operations, leading the efforts in collaborating with both local, national and international partners for community engagement efforts, curating community-faced programming, and capacity building.

Polite has almost a decade of experience in social engagement, capacity building and comprehensive outreach. She earned her undergraduate degree in history with a focus on anthropology and African diasporic studies from Howard University.

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