BA, University of Georgia

Jake is a native Georgian and attended Duluth High School in Gwinnett County, where he graduated with honors. He attended Kennesaw State University for two years, where he worked as a staff reporter at The Sentinel student newspaper before he transferred to the University of Georgia and worked at The Red & Black newspaper. Jake picked up an interest in politics at The Red & Black and became the newspaper’s primary reporter covering the Athens-Clarke County government. He moderated debates between Athens-Clarke County commission candidates and later became The Red & Black’s city news editor, coordinating all news coverage that didn’t pertain to the UGA campus. He also continued personally covering local government and state and federal politicians’ campaign stops in Athens. Jake was promoted to news editor during his final semester at UGA, overseeing The Red & Black’s entire news desk, editing nearly all news articles and working in the production of the publication’s weekly physical papers. Upon graduating in December 2021, Jake became a full-time reporter for Appen Media Group, which operates newspapers in Alpharetta, Roswell, Forsyth County, Johns Creek, Milton and Dunwoody. While his primary focus was on the local governments of Alpharetta and Forsyth County, he also honed in on local issues in all of the company’s coverage areas. Jake coordinated Appen Media’s coverage of the 2022 primary elections and continued reporting on state and federal politics and campaigns wherever he could.

Jake’s major research interests include public policy regarding social programs, criminal justice, health care and elections.