Gov. Gavin Newsom announced eight appointments Aug. 19, including a new state chief technology officer and the reappointment of a Sacramento State outreach coordinator who works with formerly incarcerated students.
Ayushi Roy, of San Francisco, was appointed state chief technology officer at the California Department of Technology. Roy has taught at Harvard Kennedy School since 2022 and previously held technology and policy roles with New America, the U.S. General Services Administration, and the U.S. Office of Management and Budget
Roy’s policy work has focused on the gap between government programs and the people they are intended to serve. In a Harvard course inspired by Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter,” she teaches students to examine how administrative and implementation barriers can undermine social safety-net programs.
“I do know as a practitioner, having served in the government for over a dozen years, that the building of technology is the easy part; managing the political feasibility and the implementation is the hard part,” Roy said…