Position Announcement – Program Officer, Public Welfare Foundation
Program Officer, Criminal and Juvenile Justice Program
The Public Welfare Foundation, a national foundation with assets of more than $400 million based in Washington, DC, is seeking a program officer who will help oversee nearly $7 million of annual grantmaking in the area of Criminal and Juvenile Justice. The position reports to the Vice President for Programs.
About the Foundation
Established in 1947, the Public Welfare Foundation supports efforts to ensure fundamental rights, opportunities, and advancements for people in need. We look for carefully defined points where our funds can make a difference in bringing about systemic changes that improve people’s lives. We focus on three programs: Criminal and Juvenile Justice, Health Reform, and Workers’ Rights. The Public Welfare Foundation is known for its commitment to social justice, its openness to new ideas, and its creative, thoughtful, and venturesome grantmaking. For more information, please visit our web site at www.publicwelfare.org <http://www.publicwelfare.org/> .
The Foundation’s Criminal and Juvenile Justice program is concerned that more than two million people are held in American prisons – the largest inmate population in the world. The number is growing daily, most notably because of federal and state laws prescribing mandatory minimum sentences, even for non-violent offenders. Also, despite a steady decline in youth crime since the mid-1990s, juvenile populations have risen by more than 20 percent since then. And more than 60 percent of the people in prison are racial and ethnic minorities.
Program Officer Position
The Foundation works to reduce America’s oversized prison population and high rate of incarceration. Toward this end, it focuses on accomplishing five high priority changes:
• Sentencing reform
• Improved prisoner reentry
• Ending the practice of trying and incarcerating youth as adults
• Expanding the use of alternatives to youth incarceration within juvenile justice systems, and
• reducing racial disparities in the justice system.
The new Program Officer will work closely with another talented and experienced program officer assigned to the Foundation’s Criminal and Juvenile Justice Program. Using guidelines recommended by staff and approved by the Board of Directors, s/he will reach out to criminal and juvenile justice policymakers, criminal and juvenile justice agency leaders, scholars, and advocates to identify and assess opportunities for improvement and advancement which can help shape the grantmaking program. The Program Officer will seek out potential grantees, work with them to develop fundable ideas, and review and evaluate grant applications. In addition to developing and awarding grants, s/he will develop relationships with knowledgeable experts, other grantmakers, policymakers, and community-based advocates to help support productive, innovative and promising reform work within the field. Both funding proposals and networking to support overall work taking place in the field will entail frequent contact with public officials working to reform the criminal and juvenile justice system at the state and national levels.
Among the qualities an ideal candidate will have are:
• Significant work experience in the field of criminal and juvenile justice, as well as broad background in public sector management, advocacy and/or policy work
• Superior analytic and strategic skills
• Experience in program development and program assessment
• An entrepreneurial approach, personal initiative and intellectual curiosity
• Outstanding written and oral communications skills, including the capacity to write clearly and succinctly under pressure of meeting deadlines
• Experience and knowledge of organizing coalitions and conducting multi-faceted, strategic advocacy campaigns and projects
• Graduate-level degree in an appropriate field is desirable
• Legal, lobbying, or legislative experience also welcomed
• Willingness to travel (20% on average)
• Enthusiasm, with a good sense of humor, for working closely and collaboratively with other staff and outside contributors to the work of the Foundation.
• Commitment to the Foundation’s mission and values.
The Public Welfare Foundation is an equal opportunity employer. The salary is competitive with excellent benefits.
Interested candidates may apply by submitting a statement of interest and a resume to hr [at] publicwelfare [dot] org or by sending these items to:
Program Officer Position
The Public Welfare Foundation
1200 U Street, NW
Washington, DC 20009
