Sarah always gets excited when she talks about working in higher education because it encompasses just about everything—from grounds and facilities to the highest-level abstract intellectual theories, from finance and accounting to sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll. Virtually everything that happens in society happens on a campus and often happens there first. And while all institutions are somewhat the same, each one is also different it its own way.

So every day at TVP, Sarah finds great joy in learning about new programs, ideas, and trends from clients and communicating those developments to wide audiences. Her work focuses on helping draft thought leadership articles by clients that deepen the understanding and broaden the perspectives of policymakers and others, as well as on how-to pieces that share colleges’ best practices.

Sarah’s passion for higher ed began during her undergraduate years at Duke University, which she views as her “real hometown” to this day. Besides helping with reunions and other events, she has served as co-chair of the inaugural National Women’s Studies Council at Duke, as well as six years on the board of the Duke Alumni Association and 27 years on the editorial advisory board of Duke magazine. In 2020, she actually moved to North Carolina, just a few miles from campus.

After Duke, Sarah received her master’s degree at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism and then worked in Chicago at J. Walter Thompson Advertising, writing for “the Uncola” 7-Up, Sears Paints, and others clients. A few years later, she moved to New York City, where she became a reporter at Forbes magazine covering all types of businesses and then a vice president at Hill and Knowlton, the world’s largest PR firm at the time. She also co-authored Success and Betrayal: The Crisis of Women in Corporate America, which was featured in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Fortune, and many other national and local publications, as well as on radio and television shows including Oprah Winfrey’s.

It was when she moved to Washington, D.C., to expand H&K’s practice that Sarah first became familiar with higher education associations and joined the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, eventually becoming its vice president of communications. She later was vice president of communications, marketing, and membership at the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges, as well as the Opinion Editor at the Chronicle of Higher Education and both the Opinion and Careers editor at Inside Higher Ed. Combined, she worked at the two publications for more than 20 years. In addition, she has edited more than a dozen books published by various education associations.

A lover of the arts, she has previously served on the boards of Literacy Volunteers of New York and the Erick Hawkins Dance Company, been a member of Associates Council of the Museum of Modern Art, and organized and headed a volunteer board for the Circle in the Square Theater, then the only nonprofit theater on Broadway. She has also been a board member of Horizons Theater in Washington, DC, and the Education Writers Association. These days, she has been focusing her attention on child welfare organizations like the Children’s Home Society of North Carolina, which helps orphans and foster children find loving homes.

Otherwise, she enjoys spending time with family and friends, walking on city streets and country roads, reading mysteries, and solving countless jigsaw puzzles.