By Sal Montemurro, Webmaster & Staff Writer
Jill Tracy Jacobs Biden, (born June 3, 1951) is an American educator with her fair share of White House “royalty.” She is the First Lady of the United States, as the wife of our current President Joe Biden. Before this, she was the Second Lady of the United States from 2009-2017 as her husband was the vice president.
She is the first spouse since Barbara Bush to hold the positions of both Second Lady and First Lady and is the first spouse since Pat Nixon to hold them non-consecutively. She is also the first Italian American First Lady.
She married Joe Biden back in 1977, becoming stepmother to his two sons from his first marriage, after his wife died in a tragic car accident. Jill Biden and her husband also have a daughter together, Ashley Biden.
Born in Hammonton, NJ, while she grew up in Willow Grove, Penn.. Since 2009, Biden has been an English professor at Northern Virginia Community College. Jill Biden has a doctoral degree in education from the University of Delaware, a bachelor’s degree in English, as well as master’s degrees in education and English from Villanova University and West Chester University.
Biden is considered the first wife of a U.S. vice president and president to hold a paying job during her husband’s presidency. Biden taught reading and English in high schools for 13 years and instructed adolescents with emotional disabilities at a psychiatric hospital. From 1993-2008, she was an English and writing instructor at Delaware Technical & Community College.
With Michelle Obama, she is co-founder of Joining Forces. She is also the founder of the Biden Breast Health Initiative non-profit organization, co-founder of the Biden Foundation, is active in Delaware Boots on the Ground, and the co-founder of the Book Buddies program. She has also published a memoir and two children’s books.