Jennifer Montgomery
Jennifer Montgomery – Rotary Peace Fellow
Jennifer Montgomery has been selected as a 2021 Peace Fellow. Montgomery, who was chosen from a pool of global candidates, will take part in the Professional Certificate program at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda She will spend several months next fall at the Rotary Peace Center at Makerere University where she will study negotiation, facilitation, mediation and conflict transformation. This will be followed by a remote nine-month independent work period which will culminate with a return trip to Uganda in September of 2022 for a one-week Capstone session. As a Peace Fellow, she hopes to deepen her understanding of conflict resolution and make a lasting contribution to peace and civil discourse in communities in Kansas and across the globe.”
Jennifer Montgomery has been working in the office of Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt in 2013 focusing on human trafficking issues. She leads the attorney general’s anti-human trafficking efforts as Director of Human Trafficking Education and Outreach and serves as Chair of the Kansas Human Trafficking Advisory Board.
She is an author and has provided trainings on human trafficking to health care professionals, law enforcement officers, school administrators, members of the business community, students, faith community and non-profit leaders and members of the public. Additionally, Jennifer has served as a guest instructor for undergraduate and graduate level courses on social justice and human trafficking at the University of Saint Mary in Leavenworth, Washburn University in Topeka and the University of Kansas in Lawrence. She also serves as a subject matter expert with the Attorney General Alliance-Africa Partnership for Justice, an organization that fosters an international exchange of knowledge that can lead to the reduction and prevention of transnational crimes in collaboration with African stakeholders.
Through her life experience and professional work, Jennifer is a passionate advocate for women and youth who have experienced sexual abuse and exploitation. Jennifer also serves as the public affairs director for the attorney general’s office. A fourth generation Kansan, she returned to Kansas after working in Washington, D.C., as a congressional staffer for the Kansas delegation and holding various positions in government affairs and public relations. Jennifer has a B.A. in Communication Studies from the University of Kansas and an M.A. in Arts Education from the University of Florida.
Locally, Jennifer volunteers as a Shawnee County CASA and as a mentor with the Kansas Women’s Leadership Institute at the University of Kansas. She is currently president of the board of directors of Freedom’s Path, an anti-human trafficking non-profit organization affiliated with the Topeka Rescue Mission. Jennifer has volunteered with two non-profit organizations in Rwanda and Kenya in east central Africa who work with at-risk populations on trauma recovery and resiliency building with an emphasis on community peace-building.