Congratulations Leah Sakala

Leah Sakala will be attending graduate school at Brandeis, and we are hiring a Policy and Communications Associate.

by Peter Wagner, April 29, 2014

I am pleased to announce that a long-time member of the PPI team, Policy Analyst Leah Sakala, will be this fall attending the Masters of Public Policy Program at Brandeis University. Leah has worked full time with PPI for three years, and prior to that, another three years part-time while she was an undergraduate at Smith College.

PPI has grown by leaps and bounds since Leah first joined us in 2008. She’s helped us develop new ways to explain our work, new ways to share our findings and helped us tackle new issues. Much of Leah’s work has been transformative behind the scenes, but she’s most well known for some of her reports. She is the author of Return to Sender: Postcard-only Mail Policies in Jail, which the National Institute of Corrections called “required reading for policy makers and anyone working with individuals in jail custody.” She also co-authored Reaching too far, coming up short: How large sentencing enhancement zones miss the mark, Please Deposit All of Your Money: Kickbacks, Rates, and Hidden Fees in the Jail Phone Industry, and Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie.

She’ll remain full-time with us through June 20th, and after taking some much deserved time off and starting her new graduate school program, she’ll be returning this fall to us one day a week as a Senior Policy Analyst.

And yes, since Leah will no longer be working full time at the Prison Policy Initiative, there is a new employment opportunity opening up. We’ve posted an opening for a Policy & Communications Associate. Please spread the word, and if you think the position is for you, please apply.

In the mean time, please congratulate Leah on her next steps at Brandeis!