Tanya Ward Jordan

About The Author

Tanya Ward Jordan is a long-time advocate in the whistleblower community. After a 26-year career in the federal government, Tanya founded and incorporated The Coalition For Change, Inc., (C4C) in 2009. As President of the Washington, DC-based volunteer, non-profit, civil rights organization, Tanya leads a self-help network for employees challenging racism and reprisal in the federal workplace. While in government, during the late Secretary of Commerce Ronald H. Brown’s administration, Tanya Ward Jordan served as a member of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Diversity Counsel. To her credit, she has also served as Acting President of the Ronald H. Brown Blacks in Government chapter, Data Group Leader for the NAACP Federal Sector TAsk Force  and a member of the No FEAR Coalition helping to convene the first Whistleblower Week in Washington conference on Capitol Hill. 

Notably, she received an award from Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner for her input into the “Notification and Federal Anti-Discrimination and Retaliation Act of 2002,” which was the first United States civil rights law of the 21st Century.  More recently, Tanya served as a consultant on the Arts, Trade, & Lifestyle Media Group, Inc.’s short documentary film entitled the Last American Plantation. The film exposed the Department of Agriculture’s discrimination against black American farmers. In 2014, Tanya received the Fannie Lou Hamer Civil Rights Activist of the Year recognition from the African American Voice Newspaper; and in 2015, she received national recognition from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), when the civil rights group listed Tanya Ward Jordan as a 2015 Black History Maker. Additionally, in 2015 Congressman Elijah Cummings recognized Tanya for her invaluable input in a civil rights' bill that later became law in January 2020. The law is known as the Elijah Cummings Federal Employee Antidiscrimination Act of 2020.  Tanya Ward  Jordan holds a Master of Science degree in Human Resources Management from the University of Maryland University College (UMUC).  

Photo:  Tanya Ward Jordan pictured  with Rep. Elijah Cummings 

 17 STEPS: A Federal Employee's Guide For Tackling Workplace Discrimination is now available through AMAZON.

Tanya Ward Jordan writes poetry under her pen name  "Tanya DeVonne".   After her encounter with racial inequality in the federal workplace, Tanya returned to her poetic roots. She finds poetry a freeing, empowering, and therapeutic form of self-expression.  She is a member of  Maryland Writers Association (MWA), which featured her poem—"Salute to Federal Whistleblowers” in its’ Pen in Hand literary magazine circa January 2020.   Women Whistleblowers Organization, writer Lisa Goldstein,  also saluted Tanya in an article dated May 20, 2021 entitled: No Fear: Tanya Ward Jordan Fights Federal Discrimination

 Tanya DeVonne serves as an active member of  Toastmasters International's University of Maryland Global Campus (UMGC) Power Speakers club. A consummate lover of the creative word, under her pen name  -DeVonne-  she has been writing poetry for over thirty years.  Her poem books "Sipping Wine Over Rhymes, Dancing In the Lyrics and In Black Skin are available on Amazon.  https://www.amazon.com/Tanya-DeVonne/e/B08C8TVWVP%3Fref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share