Committed to Equity & Social Justice

Walter A.H.L. Fields Jr.  is the Community and Family Engagement and Public Policy Liaison for the National Center for the Elimination of Educational Disparities (NCEED) at Morgan State University. As a consultant to the School of Education and Urban Studies, he helped design the family engagement portfolio he now manages at NCEED.

A native of New Jersey, he is the son of the late Walter L. and Mattie Fields. In 2024, he changed his name to Walter A.H.L. Fields, Jr. to honor his great-grandfather Austin (A) and grandfather Herbert (H) and continues to share his father's first (Walter) and middle names (Lee). Having lost his father to cancer when Walter was twelve, the name change reflects Walter's commitment to honoring his paternal lineage. 

for decades he was a visible presence as a journalist and advocate in the New York metropolitan region. He has spent a lifetime advocating in support of Black children and youth, and families. At age thirteen, he became the youngest person appointed to a Board in the history of his hometown. He is the founder of the Black Parents Workshop, Inc., a not-for-profit parents advocacy organization based in South Orange- Maplewood, NJ that championed a landmark federal civil rights lawsuit on behalf of Black students in the local school district. He served on the Board of the New Jersey State Conference of the N.A.A.C.P. and was the organization’s political director for six years. In addition, he served on the Board and was Vice President for Programs with the New Jersey Public Policy Research Institute, the state’s Black public policy think tank. He also served on the Boards of the Bergen County Urban League, Bergen County NAACP, and the Bergen County Human Relations Commission.

As the principal of a public affairs consultancy in Trenton New Jersey, Walter represented a diverse roster of clients in the public and private sectors, and political community. For many years he was the only independently registered Black lobbyist in the state capital and the first to have an office on Lobbyist Row, across from the State House. He has consulted on projects in Japan, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Botswana, and Swaziland.

Walter previously served as Director of Public Affairs for the New York Trial Lawyers Association, and Vice President for Government Relations for the Community Service Society (CSS) in New York City. During his tenure at CSS, he established the New York Reentry Roundtable for formerly incarcerated persons and organized the first Reentry Advocacy Day in Albany, the state capital of New York. He also coordinated a monthly public policy luncheon for congressional staff in the United States Capitol and produced a televised New York city mayoral campaign debate focused on the needs of the poor. He also collaborated with Congressman Charles Rangel, then Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, to create a disconnected youth tax credit aimed at employing out of school and out of work youth signed into law by President Barack Obama.

Walter has also been an adjunct professor in political science at Montclair State University and a Visiting Lecturer in public policy at Meiji Gakuin University in Tokyo, Japan. He has been a frequent speaker at events in the United States and abroad, and a guest on news programming on every major television network in the United States.

Upon his relocation to Maryland, he assumed the role of Co-Chairperson of the Advisory Council Strong Schools Maryland, a statewide education equity advocacy organization. In addition, he serves on the Board of Child First Authority, a not-for-profit organization that sponsors in- school and out-of-school programming at twelve Baltimore City community schools. In the past, Walter was a Member of the Prince George's County (MD) Board of Education, appointed by County Executive Angela Alsobrooks, and served as the Chair of the Policy and Governance Committee.

His background also includes work and experience in every medium of journalism – daily press, magazines, radio, television, and Internet news. He has received awards from the New Jersey Society of Professional Journalism, Garden State Association of Black Journalists, and the New York City Deadline Club for his writing and editorial work. He was hired by NBC News as an original political contributor on the MSNBC Cable News Channel and for MSNBC.com, contributor to National Public Radio (NPR) and The National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) BlackPress USA website, news anchor on WRKS “98.7 KISS-FM” in New York City, creator of the NorthStarNews.com website, Contributing Editor to New Jersey Reporter Magazine, Advisory Board Member to the PBS program The Fred Friendly Seminars, and Publisher of City Limits Magazine in New York City. Walter Fields has also been a strong advocate for diversity in media and accountability in reporting.

His work has been honored by New Jersey Citizen Action, the New Jersey NAACP, Bergen County NAACP, the New Jersey Senate and General Assembly, the United Clergy of the Oranges, and the Bergen County Board of Commissioners.

Walter Fields holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Morgan State University, a Master of Public Administration degree with a specialization in public policy analyses and a professional certificate in not-for-profit management from the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University, where he was a Patricia Roberts Harris Fellow, recipient of the Dean’s Award and has been recognized as an Outstanding Alumni. He also received a Master of Arts degree in Political Science from the City University of New York Graduate Center as an inaugural National Science Foundation Fellow. Walter is currently pursuing a doctorate degree in Applied Sociology and Social Justice in the School of Graduate Studies at Morgan State University. His doctoral research is on Black fatherhood and the recognition of Black men in sustaining healthy Black families. 

He is a proud member of Iota Phi Theta Fraternity, Inc., one of the 'Divine 9' National Pan- Hellenic Council organizations, serves as the fraternity's National Director of Communications and Chairman of Brown and Gold PAC.

Walter is married to Donna Wharton-Fields, an alumna of Williams College and MIT, and they have a daughter, Jordan Marie Fields, a student-athlete alumna of the University of Pittsburgh, alumna of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law and the Carnegie Mellon University Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy.