Our Daily Show Interview! Getting to Know: Jenna Giess- New Executive Director of Oasis
ALTON - Oasis Women’s Center has a new executive director.
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Following long-time director Margarette Trushel’s passing in June, the center has hired Jenna Giess to fill the role. Giess currently works at Hope Haven in Kansas City and is looking forward to continuing the mission to end domestic violence and support survivors.
“I saw what they were doing at Oasis and it was so magical,” Giess shared. “This is a mission I can stand behind.”
Giess, originally from the Riverbend region, is eager to return home to Alton. She will take on the executive director position on a part-time basis in December, with plans to start full-time in January. She looks forward to learning from interim director Marcy Jacobs in the meantime.
As a college student, Giess studied criminology. But her path changed when she learned of a Kansas City organization that allowed her to sit with sexual assault survivors as they underwent forensic exams, similar to the work done by Metro East Every Survivor Counts in Wood River.
After volunteering with the organization in Kansas City, she was directed to Hope Haven, a domestic violence shelter. Giess quickly fell in love with this work.
“I’ve created the most amazing team at Hope Haven and I’ve created the best job for myself. I’m grieving leaving this place. It’s my favorite place on Earth,” Giess said. “But when I walked into Oasis, I could see that they also need what I have, the skills that I have developed, the internal controls. I could see that they had everything, all the foundation, everything that they need, and they just need somebody to come in with fresh ideas, somebody to come in and just elevate the team, care about them, just as the last director did for the past 40 years.”
Giess shared that she has been “watching Oasis over the years,” waiting for an opportunity to apply and monitoring the work they’ve been doing. When she was deciding whether or not to take the executive director position, she visited Oasis and saw firsthand the care and compassion that the employees put into their work.
Though she is sad to leave Hope Haven, she believes this will be a great new chapter for her professional life, and she looks forward to sharing her skills with Oasis. She is especially interested in elevating Oasis’s grant-writing and marketing.
She has already created a Facebook page for Oasis Women’s Center, and she is currently working on a $20,000 grant to boost their pet program, which allows survivors to bring their pets to the shelter. She also hopes to start a fundraising gala, similar to what they do at Hope Haven, to bring in money and share the Oasis mission with the community.
Giess hopes to amp up the education that Oasis does in the community to inform people about domestic violence. She emphasized that working in the domestic violence space is hard work, but it’s incredibly rewarding to see survivors flourish with the help of organizations like Oasis.
“The truth is, survivors look like me. Survivors look like you. Abusers are the people standing behind us in the grocery line,” Giess added. “I’m going to share so many stories. I'm going to learn all the Oasis stories. I’m going to go out there and I’m just going to talk to you guys, and I’m going to bring the raw emotion because this job, it’s hard. I see the worst of the worst, but I also see the most beautiful transformations on Earth. I truly believe that.”
For more information about Oasis Women’s Center, visit their official website at OasisWomensCenter.org or their official Facebook page.
If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic violence, check out this article on RiverBender.com for more information about local resources. You can also call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233 or text START to 88788.
