Meet Our Staff

Penrose Jackson
VtPHI Interim Executive Director

Penrose Jackson serves as CEO of the Institute. She served for 15 years as Community Health Improvement director at the University of Vermont Medical Center, leaving that position in late 2018. During her time with CHI she provided leadership to three Community Health Needs Assessments, as well as to establishment of the Community Health Team and Medication Assisted Treatment team at the Medical Center. She continues to serve as an Advisory Board member of the Association for Community Health Improvement, a subsidiary of the American Hospital Association. She currently works with diverse clients on project planning and management, fund-raising, and population health.  In 2020 she and several co-authors published an e-book through Frontiers in Public Health Education and Promotion focusing on Community Benefit research and evaluation after ten years’ experience under the Affordable Care Act.

Sally Kerschner, RN, MSN
Consultant

Sally Kerschner has been involved with the Vermont Public Health Association for over twenty years and served as President 2017- 2020. She recently retired from the Vermont Department of Health as the MCH Injury Prevention Coordinator, Division of Maternal and Child Health. She has worked at VDH since 1983 in a variety of supervisory and management positions for programs addressing community health and Maternal and Child Health. Professional interests include population health planning, systems development, public health policy, and maternal and child health issues such as environmental, periconceptual health, injury prevention, and rural health. Sally is presently working with the Vermont Public Health Association and the Vermont Public Health Institute on implementing the CDC Health Equity grant deliverables for the Vermont Community Health Equity Project.

.

Laural Ruggles, MBA, MPH
Consultant

Laural Ruggles brings over 30 years experience in health care delivery system change and health reform innovation to the VtPHI team.  She was a consultant on the CDC Health Equity Grant and the Vermont Community Health Equity Partnership, and worked with VtPHI on the Public Health Infrastructure Grant and the New England Public Health Innovation Hub.  She actively volunteers in her community on projects and initiatives that promote social connections and those that strive to improve the health of communities and people at the systemic level.