Jane O'Meara Sanders

Jane Sanders (March 2016)

Jane O'Meara Sanders (* 8. October 1950 in Brooklyn , New York City as Mary Jane O'Meara ) is an American social worker and academic. From 1996 to 1997 she was interim provost at Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont and from 2004 to 2011 President of Burlington College in Burlington, Vermont . She is the wife of Bernie Sanders , the Vermont Senator.

Live and act

Jane Sanders is the youngest of the five children of Bernadette Joan O'Meara, b. Sheridan and Benedict Patrick O'Meara, and has Irish ancestry. She grew up in Bedford-Stuyvesant (Brooklyn) and attended a Catholic high school in Park Slope. After briefly studying sociology and early childhood education at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville , she married David Driscoll in 1968. Driscoll worked for IBM and went back to Brooklyn for the company, then to Virginia and finally to Vermont in 1975. His wife and three children who had since been born followed him.

Sanders attended Goddard College, where she graduated with a bachelor's degree in social work . In the late 1970s she separated from Driscoll and practiced her profession first in the youth department of the Burlington Police Department and then in a youth center.

In 1981, during his candidacy for mayor of Burlington, she first met Bernie Sanders, who set up a working group on youth and families for which she began to work. In the years that followed, she worked as a social worker in various areas, including setting up a newspaper, a youth center, after-school care programs and a day-care center.

In 1988 she married Bernie Sanders. When he ran for a seat in the US House of Representatives in 1990 , she worked on the election campaign, as well as in 2006 when he ran for the US Senate . During this time, she developed into one of her husband's most influential political and press advisers, temporarily headed his office and often appeared as his spokesperson.

In addition, Jane Sanders continued to pursue her own career. After she had previously served on the board of directors at Goddard College , she also served there as an interim provost in 1996/1997. She then resumed her studies at the Union Institute & University and graduated with a doctorate in 2000. In 2004 she became president of Burlington College, a small alternative college whose target audience, among others, was a. Vietnam veterans included. After criticizing her financial management, Jane Sanders came under pressure and finally stepped down in 2011. She currently (2016) serves as Commissioner at two government agencies: the Vermont Economic Development Authority and the Texas-Vermont-Maine Low Level Waste Disposal Compact Commission .

Web links

Commons : Jane Sanders  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Jason Horowitz: Jane Sanders Knows Politics, and How to Soften Husband's Image. In: The New York Times. December 28, 2015, accessed March 3, 2016 . Emily Greenhouse: Getting to Know Jane Sanders, Wife of Bernie. May 12, 2015, accessed March 30, 2016 .