Jessica Walden has joined the staff of EveryoneOn, a national nonprofit working to eliminate the digital divide, as their newly named Macon regional manager. The announcement of her hire coincides with last month’s $288,500 grant announcement from the James M. Cox Foundation to EveryoneOn to fund an innovative pilot program providing 1,500 tablet computers, preloaded with premium educational content, to local families who are enrolling in Cox Communications’ Connect2Compete Internet service program.

Since 2009, Walden has worked as the director of communications for the College Hill Alliance, a grant-funded partnership between the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and Mercer University, to assist the city in creating positive change to the physical, social and economic fabric of the College Hill Corridor, a two-square mile area between Mercer University’s campus and Macon’s downtown. More than $150 million in private and public investment has been leveraged in the area, with the College Hill Corridor heralded nationally for its neighborhood revitalization, lively events, historic preservation, creative resources and civic engagement. The College Hill Alliance is nearing the end of its second phase of funding and is scheduled to sunset at the end of the year. Among her signature College Hill initiatives were implementing the community-based branding initiatives and organizing the Second Sunday Concert Series.

This month, Georgia Trend Magazine named Walden one of the “40 under 40” for the state of Georgia. She was named one of Macon Magazine’s “Five under 40” in 2010 and is a graduate of Leadership Georgia (2013) and Leadership Macon (2009). She is a member of Downtown Macon Rotary Club and the Georgia Public Broadcasting Macon Advisory Council. She is also a passionate promoter of Macon’s rich music history and co-operates music history tour company Rock Candy Tours with her husband, Jamie Weatherford, and is a contributing writer in the Macon Telegraph’s “Ear to the Ground” column.