For nearly 20 years, April has devoted her career to helping the most vulnerable in our community. As a licensed clinical social worker, she provides direct clinical services and supervisory consultation for programs focused on adults with disabilities, children experiencing trauma, foster and kinship parent education and support. Working directly with families, the courts and city employees, April has a deep understanding of how effective prevention can keep families together. She has held a variety of Board and Committee positions related to social work at the local and state level, including Board Member of the Central Virginia Continuum of Care, and the VDSS Resource Home Advisory and Shared Accountability Committees. 

Through her work with government-funded programs like nutrition assistance, job training and employment services, and innovative education grants, April has direct evidence of how tax money, when strategically directed, can help break cycles of generational poverty and involvement with the criminal justice system. This experience has been instrumental to her perspective while serving in leadership positions and on teams, including Lynchburg’s Social Services Advisory Board, Strong Neighborhoods Alliance, and Community Engagement Committee. 

An active volunteer with a variety of organizations, April has primarily focused on serving her community as a proponent of public education. She was the PTO president at Sheffield Elementary School, and has supported additional programs at R.S. Payne Elementary School and Dunbar Middle School. Most recently, she was appointed by the LCS School Board to be the parent representative on the Academic Success Committee.

April can trace her family roots in Lynchburg back six generations, with many extended family members living within a few blocks of each other in Ward 4. She is a graduate of Heritage High School, with degrees in Social Work from Longwood University and Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). Married to Jason for 13 years, their three children proudly attend LCS schools.

Learn more about April Watson and her policy priorities here.