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Mentor Recognition: Sarah Lennon '90

With this ongoing series, The Rockefeller Center recognizes the valuable contributions provide by its alumni mentors to participants in the First-Year Fellows program. The First-Year Fellows Program provides students with opportunities to meaningfully engage in public policy early in their Dartmouth career. Students are placed in fellowships with Dartmouth alumni in Washington, DC, serving in policy positions where the supervisor is willing to take on a significant mentor role.
"I decided to be a mentor/supervisor because I remember how daunting it was trying to find a job after I graduated and in the summers, not really knowing what the work environment was like. Additionally, I recall writing papers in college and graduate school where I thought I understood how it all worked, only to find out after getting to D.C. that I was completely misguided. So, I hope that by mentoring a First-Year Fellow, I can help him or her become a more informed student, citizen, and potential job applicant, helping to bring more Dartmouth to DC!" --Sarah Lennon '90 

Sarah G.J. Lennon '90 has served as the Director, Office of Bilateral Cooperation in the Department of Energy (DoE) Office of Nuclear Energy (NE) since January, 2013. As Director, she manages the engagement and communication with all relevant domestic and foreign actors to support U.S. bilateral international cooperation in the civil nuclear energy field. Prior to being selected as Director, Lennon was the first-ever liaison to the Office Nuclear Energy (NE) from the Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation to enhance coordination and communication among relevant DoE offices on issues relating to reducing the risks of proliferation and terrorism in an environment of expansion of nuclear energy. This Summer, Lennon is serving as a mentor to Alisa White '17 through the First-Year Fellows program.

Lennon was originally recruited to the DoE from the Department of Defense to serve as former-Secretary Bill Richardson’s Special Assistant for Russia. She has also served at the State Department as Senior Advisor to then-Assistant Secretary for Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance, Rose Gottemoeller, and was the Chief of the WMD-Terrorism Group in the National Counterterrorism Center’s Directorate for Strategic Operational Planning. Lennon was also selected as a Brookings Institution LEGIS Fellow and served as the national security staffer for former Senator Jean Carnahan. Lennon entered government through the Presidential Management Fellows (PMF) program and served as the primary action officer within the Office of the Secretary of Defense for Policy for fissile material control programs in the former Soviet Union in the Office of Cooperative Threat Reduction Policy.

Lennon holds a B.A. from Dartmouth College and an M.A. from the Monterey Institute of International Affairs, where she specialized in Russian and nonproliferation. She has also earned a Diploma in Translation in Russian from the Institute of Linguists Educational Trust of the United Kingdom. Lennon has traveled extensively, and in addition to Russian, knows French, Swedish, and Spanish. She is a member of Women in International Security (WIIS), sole proprietor of AtomicJewelry and has volunteered as the leader for her daughter’s Girl Scout troop for 3 years.