In Service to the Greater Good

St. Paul’s School has one mission: to educate students to build purposeful lives in service to the greater good. We do so by working together to draw forth what is best in ourselves and in each other as we strive to be citizens of character and integrity within our communities.

In the coming year, we will hear from SPS alumni whose service to the greater good provides inspiration and insight, and we will learn from their examples of leadership. We begin with a special virtual panel on Jan. 10 featuring:

Habitat for Humanity CEO Jonathan T.M. Reckford ’80
Equal Justice Initiative Senior Attorney Sia Sanneh ’97
Peace Corps Lesotho Country Director Randa Wilkinson ’75

Join Rector Kathy Giles and a student co-host online as they engage in conversation with these alumni, exploring their individual perspectives and pathways toward a life of service in the nonprofit and NGO sectors.

Alumni Panel

Jonathan T.M. Reckford ’80

is CEO of Habitat for Humanity International, a global Christian housing organization that has helped more than 46 million people construct, rehabilitate or preserve their homes. Since 2005, when he took the top leadership position, local Habitat organizations in the U.S. and in more than 70 countries have grown from serving 125,000 individuals annually to helping more than 7.1 million people last year.

Jonathan earned his MBA from Stanford University, has held a number of executive positions, and served as executive pastor of his Minnesota church before joining Habitat.

He and his wife, Ashley, have three children and live in Atlanta.

Sia Sanneh ’97

is a senior attorney with the Equal Justice Initiative. Since 2008, she has represented indigent men and women sentenced to death, children in adult prisons, people wrongly convicted or charged with violent crimes, poor people denied effective representation, and others whose trials are marked by racial bias or prosecutorial misconduct. In addition, with EJI’s director Bryan Stevenson, Sia helps develop and manage EJI’s racial justice and public education projects.

Sia earned a B.A. in history, magna cum laude, from Columbia University, and an M.A. from Columbia Teachers College. She received her J.D. from Yale Law School.

Randa Wilkinson ’75

began her international career 40 years ago as a Peace Corps health volunteer in Mauritania, living in a village that was a two-day trip from the capital in the dry season but a two-week trip during the rainy season. Randa worked with local counterparts at the health clinic, helping to establish a feeding center for malnourished children. In 2016, Randa returned to her village in Mauritania after 35 years. She is currently the country director for Peace Corps Lesotho after serving as country director for Peace Corps Comoros from 2017 to 2020.