I’m a bilingual nonprofit professional and sociologist.
Leah Reisman is a sociologist, evaluator, and nonprofit practitioner with expertise in strategy, evaluation, the arts, and immigration. Leah is adept at deploying right-sized, rigorous research to develop smart strategy, and thrives in making connections – between organizations, people, and ideas. An ethnographer by training, Leah is a skilled facilitator with deep experience in both the study and practice of nonprofit management. She was trained as a program evaluator at UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science and currently serves as a Program Officer at the Barra Foundation.
In recent years Leah served as an affiliate at Metris Arts Consulting, worked with the Wallace Foundation and LISC as an independent researcher and, as a Research Fellow at NYU’s John Brademas Center, contributed a major Mellon Foundation-funded study focused on the relationship between arts engagement and social wellbeing in California. Her original quantitative and qualitative research on strategy consulting to nonprofits, Philadelphia’s philanthropic ecosystem, cultural philanthropy in Mexico, and professionalization in nonprofit organizations has been supported by the National Science Foundation and featured in academic journals and professional magazines.
Leah began her career working in art, science, and natural history museums. Through roles ranging from education to exhibition development, Leah developed broad fluency in national trends and challenges facing the arts, and was recognized by the Visitor Studies Association as an emerging leader in the museum evaluation field. Bilingual in Spanish, Leah acts on her commitment to social justice through work in arts and immigrant-serving organizations – she spent several years as Health & Wellness Director at Puentes de Salud in Philadelphia, and serves on the Board of Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens, Juntos, and the Asociación de Empresarios Mexicanos en Philadelphia. Across her varied roles, Leah leverages strong communication and problem-solving skills to navigate complex strategic and organizational issues spanning philanthropists, nonprofit leaders, and local communities.
Leah holds a B.A. in anthropology from the University of Chicago, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in sociology from Princeton University.
