The Found Podcast with Molly Knuth: Small Town Business Strategy and Marketing

259: 28% Is Not Enough: Sarah Jakle on DemocraShe, Civic Engagement, and Why High School Girls Are the Future of Government

Published: July 1, 2026

Duration: 50:35

I get pitches in my inbox every day. Most of them I can't fit into the schedule, no matter how great they are.

This one stopped me cold.

Sarah Jakle is the founder and executive director of DemocraShe, a nonpartisan nonprofit offering free online training to high school girls in evidence-based resiliency skills, leadership, and civic engagement. They pay their participants $15 an hour. They recruit specifically from historically underrepresented communities. They are 90% girls of color and 70% first-generation Americans. And they have a wait list seven times longer than their current capacity.

Only 28% of...