CFBISD Alumni Spotlight: Ranchview HS Graduate Interns for Good Morning America

Ranchview High School alumna Jessi Grider will fly to New York City to make her live television debut Thursday, July 29, 2021, on ABC’s Good Morning America (GMA).

The Class of 2017 graduate is a digital story writer and social team intern at the news station. GMA will air a segment Grider recently produced with her intern cohorts as part of a National Intern Day celebration.

Grider joined the CFBISD family in 2006 as a second grader at Las Colinas Elementary School and it was quickly evident that she would become a writer.

“My mother was the librarian at the school, and my sisters and I were all Mighty Mustangs,” she said. “My teacher, Mrs. Humphrey, told me my writing was great and made the divine prediction that I would someday be a journalist. She was ultimately right.”

After Las Colinas Elementary, she continued to Barbara Bush Middle School and then to Ranchview High School, where she would participate in the International Baccalaureate (IB) program. At Ranchview, Grider’s passion for English, history, and the arts grew as she was inspired by her teachers and their ability to make learning special.

“Ms. Grisham’s stories and pictures from her world travels captured my heart during the intermissions we would take in her intense IB history class,” Grider said. “Dr. Capiello’s quirky teaching sense and sassy personality made IB English so fun for me too. Our book talks became the highlight of my days at RHS.”

She graduated from Ranchview and was accepted into her dream school, Howard University, with a full-ride scholarship. An overjoyed Grider spent the next four years at Howard studying media, journalism and film communications.

“I didn’t necessarily know what I was getting myself into,” Grider said. “But thanks to Howard’s wonderful journalism department, I was able to intern with the BBC’s Washington D.C. Bureau, Fox News Channel, and now, as a recent graduate, with Good Morning America.”

Grider plans to become a news and television producer and hopes to produce uplifting shows that unite and inspire everyone.

“I am proud of my journey,” she said. “And of who I am today as a young Black woman in America with big dreams.”