Jenna Pollack
Urban planner, researcher, dancer
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About
Jenna Pollack (she/her) is a collaborative, detail-oriented, and trusted community economic development professional and artist. Most recently, she helped launch the Chicago Community Wealth Building Ecosystem (CCWBE) at UIC. She has over ten years of experience in interdisciplinary program design, implementation, and management.
Driven by the operationalization of racial equity in urban development, and particularly through grassroots solidarity economy approaches. Skilled relationship-builder, creative problem-solver, and cross-sector communicator. Committed to cultivating a culture of care and radical accountability.
With support from the Cooperative Development Foundation, she is currently researching cultural community land trust structures across the country and their ownership, capitalization, and governance structures. She also serves on the Archiving Advisory Board for the Chicago Black Social Culture Map.
Jenna contributed a chapter titled 'Locating Power: Sammy Dyer School of the Theatre and Urban Renewal' to Dancing on the Third Coast: Chicago Dance Histories (University of Illinois Press, 2026). She is also working on a book project about the local dance sector’s relationship to urban planning, policy, gentrification and displacement, and community self-determination.
Jenna loves live performance, cultural policy, archiving, and the solidarity economy.
Experience
Chicago Community Wealth Building Ecosystem at UIC CUED (May 2023 - Dec 2024)
Program Manager, Ecosystem Coordinator, and Researcher (full-time)
- Liaisons with institutional stakeholders, community economic development allies, and City of Chicago staff
- Convenes 100 community members monthly across four working groups for peer learning, policy agenda setting, relationship-building, and resource-sharing
- Co-developed data collection strategies and 5 IRB oral research protocols, and conducted 22 in-depth interviews
- Directed and co-designed 12 personalized, bilingual reporting tools for grantees including dynamic data collection templates and an extensive data dictionary
- Created digital technical assistance readiness tool; resource library; bilingual informational packets for public officials; and video animations, tutorials, and cooperative features about community wealth building in Chicago
UIC Research Institutes (Jan 2022 - May 2023)
Graduate Research Assistant (part-time)
- Center for Urban Economic Development: Analysis of national Community Wealth Building models and national approaches to municipalism in support of Dr. Stacey Sutton and Professor Renee Hatcher’s work on the advisory committee for the City of Chicago’s Community Wealth Building initiative
- Institute for Policy and Civic Engagement: Communications strategy in collaboration with the Associate Director, production of official Institute literature and community partnership publications, seasonal blog content and newsletters, and all social media content
- Master of City Design, McKinley Park Charrette: Summer Studio logistics management, university compliance, community stakeholder liaison, operational support for Directors, and producer and editor of 25-minute documentary. Winner of the 2022 American Planning Association Illinois chapter (APA-IL) Student Project Award
Arts Alliance Illinois (June - Oct 2022)
Research Assistant (part-time)
- Data synthesis, marketing materials, and stakeholder communication for Illinois Creative Workforce Activation (ICWA) – a program expanding the career paths open to the state’s creative workers while also addressing needs in Illinois’ key growth industries
Borderless Studio (June - Aug 2022)
Community Researcher, Creative Grounds (full time)
- Comprehensive data aggregation and analysis on 105 closed Chicago Public Schools since 2013, 15 FOIA requests, 5 successful FOIA appeals in collaboration with the Illinois Attorney General’s Office, research proposals for backcasting and predicting school closures related to gentrification and capital investment, and asset-based research on the role of co-locating (wrap-around services, public-private partnerships, school co-locations) in mitigating closures and deepening a wellness approach to schools as community anchors
Assistant Professor, Dance and Theatre Departments (full-time)
- Contemporary Dance, Improvisation, Ballet Technique
Visiting Lecturer, Dance Departments
- Dance Research, Dance History, World Dance, Composition, Ballet and Modern Techniques
- 2019 Distinguished Teaching Award Nomination from Salem State University
Springboard Danse Montréal
2017 – 2021: Communications and Artist Relations Associate
- Operational strategy, copyediting, marketing, artist liaising, project management
- Fluent in Microsoft Office, Mailchimp, Mail Merge, Canva, and across social media channels
- Curational assistance, artist and participant liaison, and communications associate for 2021 digital symposium with 45+ artists and 100+ participants in 16 panels over three days
2014 – 2017: Executive Assistant
- Assistance in nonprofit incorporation, international integration of operational processes and marketing materials, production of internal reports, and devising and maintaining office systems
2013 – 2014: New York Audition Coordinator
- Reviewed 850 international applications, live audition coordination at New York City Center, supervision of organizational protocol, communication and scheduling for the Artistic Director
Education
University of Illinois at Chicago (2021 - 2023)
Master of Urban Planning and Policy
- Double specialization: Community Development and Economic Development
