Nicodemus Ford is an internationally recognized consultant, facilitator and evaluator with more than 20 years of experience across education, government, food systems and community development.
He founded Design with Joy, a human-centered framework for cultivating joy, healing and system transformation. He works with school systems, foundations, public agencies and community organizations.
He has offices in Sacramento and Kalamazoo and will open an international office in summer 2027.
Current Work
San Juan Unified
Education and justice
Nicodemus founded and co-directs the Rural Professional Learning Network, a network of rural districts and county offices in Northern California. In San Juan Unified, he built a networked improvement community that is written into the district's 8-Point Commitment to Educational Justice.
Upcoming workshops
City of Sacramento
Civil rights and public participation
As a Sacramento Redistricting Commissioner, he helped lead a public process that produced new city council maps. As a Subject Matter Expert for the California Department of Justice, he works where school policy and civil rights meet, on racial discrimination and disproportionality in education.
Co-Design & Strategy
Yuba Water Agency
Food, land and learning
He co-developed a county-wide curriculum with Yuba Water Agency, Yuba County and the South Yuba River Citizens League. He led the Detroit site of a USDA food access study with UW–Madison, supported Black farmers at Calabash and helped the City of Davis launch California's first agrihood. He is an emerging Black farmer.
Co-Design & Strategy
Guidebook for the People
Restorative practice across borders
His Guidebook for the People, co-authored with Dr. Monica Ng, is used by practitioners on four continents and has been presented at the European Forum on Restorative Justice. He also started the Listen and Leap Project, a listening circle program he is co-designing with youth.
Facilitation & Restorative Practice
Rural Professional Learning Network
Learning and evaluation
He designs evaluation with the people closest to the work, including site visit tools for the Rural Professional Learning Network and his Data That Works webinar series. He has served as an external assessor with HighScope's Youth Program Quality Assessment and is a doctoral candidate at the University of Humanistic Studies in Utrecht, the Netherlands.
Learning & EvaluationWhat people say
“This was probably the best training session I have been involved in throughout my career.”Teacher, Yuba Water Curriculum and Teaching Project
“This group holds me accountable for doing the work that we are here to do: to provide safe, positive, engaging, and transformational places for children to grow, learn, and become leaders of their own future.”School leader, Rural Professional Learning Network
“By being a participant in the networked improvement community process I became more thoughtful and strategic in my teaching. Meaningful change happens when we stay curious, use data to guide our decisions, and remain committed to meeting students where they are.”Stephanie Jones, Teacher, Thomas Edison Language Institute, San Juan Unified School District
Schools, agencies and communities I've worked with
Have a project in mind?
Tell me what you're working on and I'll put together the team to support it.
Story & Background
From Detroit, his work went national. Through the Gates Foundation's Alternative High School Initiative, he coached about 250 schools serving 35,000 students. At the Henry Ford Learning Institute, he trained principals and teachers in design thinking with Stanford and coached principals opening new middle and high schools in three regions.
In New York City, he worked with Public School 89 as its report card rating rose from a C to an A over three years. In California, as a School Turnaround Facilitator with WestEd, he led improvement planning with seven Priority Schools in Stockton Unified, where API scores rose by as much as 38 points. He has also taught teacher preparation courses at Wayne State University and Loyola Marymount University.
His work has always crossed sectors, and much of it starts with listening to a community and turning what people say into a plan. As a redistricting commissioner for the City of Sacramento, he worked through nearly 60,000 public comments and helped redraw the city's maps with an equity focus. He has also led strategic planning through to board adoption, including with congregations in the Flint area.
He is a skilled facilitator, trainer, workshop coordinator and curriculum designer, working with schools, public agencies, farmers and community organizations. In partnership with Yuba Water Agency, Yuba County and the South Yuba River Citizens League, he led the launch of a county-wide STEM initiative that has served more than 80 K-12 teachers and brings Traditional Ecological Knowledge into its lessons.
He is a Subject Matter Expert for the California Department of Justice on racial discrimination and disproportionality in education. His evaluation and improvement work includes a networked improvement community in San Juan Unified that served more than 500 educators over seven years, and he has served as a federal grant reviewer.
In food systems, he led the Detroit site of a seven-city USDA food access study with UW–Madison, which helped secure $50,000 toward a people-owned grocery store. At Calabash, he supported Black farmers in Maryland and across the country.
Restorative practice has taken him beyond the United States, including to the European Forum on Restorative Justice in Tallinn. He is now an external doctoral candidate at the University of Humanistic Studies in Utrecht, working with Professor Nicole Immler, and his research builds on Joy as Infrastructure, his own framework.
He studied history at Wayne State and education at Marygrove, both in Detroit. His writing includes a chapter in Good Food, Strong Communities (University of Iowa Press), The Network Solution (Stanford PACE, 2018) and Guidebook for the People.
He holds a Permaculture Design Certificate and built the first fully permitted straw bale studio in Sacramento. When he's not launching a new partnership or project, you can find him chasing his beautiful four-year-old, perfecting his kombucha ferment or with his hands in the soil for next season's harvest.
He will bring the same care, compassion and skill to your organization or institution.
