WHAT CAN YOU DO WITH A PPS MAJOR? NAVIGATE A NAVY DESTROYER

Lt. Alexis Steele  PPS '08 is a cruiser class analyst for the U.S. Navy Commander Naval Surface Force for the Pacific Fleet, stationed in San Diego, CA.

What Can You Do with a PPS Major? Write About the Red Cross

Claire Rivero PPS’09 is a Senior Associate, Stewardship, Donor Communications and Relations with the American Red Cross and is based in Washington, D.C.

What Can You Do with a PPS Major? Run a Foundation

Can you give me the headline version of what you do?
I work for a private family foundation. We invest $2.5 million a year in K-12 public education to improve academic achievement and increase the high school graduation rate.

Changing Higher Education

The phrase “higher education” usually conjures images of leafy college quads, imposing stone buildings and school spirit fed by winning sports teams. That image leads to a bad case of “Harvard envy,” and a mismatch between the current system and the educational needs of the majority of the population, according to Andy Rosen, PPS/History '82, chairman and CEO of Kaplan Inc., the for-profit education and test-preparation company.

Advocacy through media

Kim Parker’s first big project as communications director for Brave New Foundation “struck a chord,” she said. Her task was to promote a new short documentary about the Wake County School Board elections in 2009. The newly elected conservative board members immediately began changing the county’s economically based student assignment system.

Health Policy on the global Stage

Several public policy alumni have gone onto careers in global health. The Duke Global Health Institute has interviewed many of them, including Kim Zimmerman MPP '00 now the Director of Government Affairs at the ONE Campaign.

Alum goes full circle with peace corps

Stacy Rhodes MIDP ’91, chief of staff of the Peace Corps, has spent a lifetime in international development. While he has worked for a host of organizations, Rhodes has no qualms about identifying the ideal way to begin a career in the field.

From teaching to philanthropy

Sean Paul Knierim always knew that he wanted to teach.

Before getting his PhD in comparative literature at the University of North Carolina and a master’s of international development from Duke’s Sanford School of Public Policy, Knierim MIDP’08 taught at Los Altos High School in California. And during his time at UNC, he was a senior teaching fellow.

Advocating for medical colleges

Elisa Siegel, (PPS ’80) serves as chief communications officer for the Association of American Medical Colleges.  Siegel notes that she “would not be where I am today” without her Sanford training, and in particular, her policy internship in the White House press office under President Jimmy Carter.

Fairfax Brings Concrete Change to Neighborhood

Sanford Board of Visitors member Justin Fairfax (PPS ’00) has a long and impressive list of leadership and public service positions on his resume. As an undergraduate at Duke, he was president of the National Panhellenic Council and Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity and was chosen as the graduation speaker for his PPS class.

Recent Grad Does Research Work for New America Foundation

Katherine Tiedemann (PPS ’07)researches nuclear weapons and nonproliferation policies at the New America Foundation. For her required PPS internship, she worked in the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research as a foreign media analyst in the summer of 2006.

“My degree in public policy studies, in conjunction with my internship, opened the door for me to apply for jobs in the think-tank world in Washington,” Tiedemann said.

Sapp Sees Results from Faith-Based Politics

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is known for many things, among them the concept of separation of church and state. But for Eric Sapp (MPP ’02), faith and politics go hand in hand.

As College President, Sorrell Launches ‘Extreme Makeover’

For Michael Sorrell (MPP ’90, JD ’94), his first year leading the historically black college in Dallas might be described as “extreme makeover, college edition.”

CEO of Mercy Corps Measures Triple Bottom Line

The term “social entrepreneur” had just entered the lexicon when Neal Keny-Guyer was an undergrad at Duke in the 1970s. But as it turned out, the personal explorations Keny-Guyer began as a joint public policy/religion major later made him one of the leaders who define the term.