Ashley L. Jackson is a writer, producer, actor, and civic leader. She is the founder and president of PUSH The Next Generation (PTNG), a nonprofit organization dedicated to cultivating empathy, civic literacy, and moral imagination among emerging leaders. PTNG’s programs aim to build durable relationships across difference and renew empathy and historical memory for a generation facing sociopolitical strain and a weakened common language.

A summa cum laude graduate of Spelman College, Ashley designed an independent major, African American Narratives in Cinema and Television, with an emphasis in screenwriting. In 2025, she earned a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Southern California’s Peter Stark Producing Program, becoming the first Spelman graduate to complete the program.

Ashley began her career as an actor, co-starring in the Netflix film Beats, among other projects. She moved into development through Disney’s inaugural apprenticeship program, contributing across Freeform and Onyx Collective. She has since written for film and television, including Netflix’s forthcoming A Different World sequel series. Through Rainbow Child Productions, her production banner, Ashley develops projects that engage questions of justice and identity – among them a documentary she is developing with showrunner Prentice Penny on the life and legacy of her father, Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.

Her upbringing in a family shaped by public service, scholarship, faith, and global diplomacy introduced her to an early understanding of justice as encounter. In that spirit, Ashley’s advocacy has focused on expanding whose dignity is protected and whose stories are heard. She has championed survivors of sexual exploitation through her work with the National Center on Sexual Exploitation, advanced food justice through a national campaign with PETA that earned a 2023 peta2 Libby Award, and worked to engage young voters during the 2024 election cycle. Drawing on personal experience, she also speaks publicly about long COVID and health equity.

Ashley is an inaugural EXODUS Leadership Forum Fellow under Van Jones and a 2026 Beerman Fellow for Peace and Justice. She has appeared in conversation with leaders including Gloria Steinem and on platforms convened by the National Action Network and Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights. In 2021, MIPAD, in partnership with the United Nations, named her among its 100 Under 40 Most Influential People of African Descent in Media and Culture.

Looking ahead, Ashley is working to build a broader platform for interfaith, intercultural, and intergenerational leaders committed to human dignity, coexistence, and ethical responsibility – developing a new vocabulary for public discourse amid increasing polarization. Across entertainment, advocacy, and institution-building, Ashley remains committed to storytelling as an instrument of empathy, accountability, and public repair.