About Us
Sharon Rubinstein
What we can do for you
Sharon Rubinstein
Sharon Rubinstein is a former journalist, lawyer and lobbyist with more than a decade of communications experience, primarily for non-profits.Her journalistic writing has appeared in a wide array of channels, including CNN, CBS News, Newsweek International, McGraw Hill, the Baltimore Sun, and the Ann Arbor News.
While Communications Di
Sharon Rubinstein is a former journalist, lawyer and lobbyist with more than a decade of communications experience, primarily for non-profits.Her journalistic writing has appeared in a wide array of channels, including CNN, CBS News, Newsweek International, McGraw Hill, the Baltimore Sun, and the Ann Arbor News.
While Communications Director at Maryland’s Advocates for Children and Youth, she was a frequent on-the-record source for both print and broadcast outlets, and was responsible for all strategic communications planning and products.
Communications clients have spanned a broad range of issues, such as health policy, tax and budget concerns, and poverty.
Sharon is a proud alumna of the Cornell Daily Sun, was a federal law clerk, and likes wielding a paint brush when not wielding a pen - or computer keyboard.
Leonard Sparks
What we can do for you
Sharon Rubinstein
Leonard Sparks is an award-winning journalist and avid multi-media producer. After beginning his journalism career in Maryland, he came to the Hudson Valley to work for the Times Herald Record, a daily where he served first as a Sullivan County reporter, and then assumed the Newburgh city beat, winning state-wide awards.
In Baltimore, he
Leonard Sparks is an award-winning journalist and avid multi-media producer. After beginning his journalism career in Maryland, he came to the Hudson Valley to work for the Times Herald Record, a daily where he served first as a Sullivan County reporter, and then assumed the Newburgh city beat, winning state-wide awards.
In Baltimore, he was a reporter for Capital News Service as well as the Baltimore Afro, and host of a local radio show.
Leonard was a Washington Post Simon Fellow at the University of Maryland’s journalism school, from which he received a masters degree. He was also an Open Society Institute Fellow for which he conceived of and published a newspaper that addressed poverty and homelessness issues. When he’s not crafting non-fiction stories, he enjoys short story and poetry writing.
What we can do for you
What we can do for you
What we can do for you
We believe in the power of stories. What do you want to achieve? More visibility and reach? Public policy impact? Increased funding? Whether you're an individual professional or an organization's leader, we can help you crystallize and realize your goals through the use of visual and verbal tools that engage head and heart. These are amo
We believe in the power of stories. What do you want to achieve? More visibility and reach? Public policy impact? Increased funding? Whether you're an individual professional or an organization's leader, we can help you crystallize and realize your goals through the use of visual and verbal tools that engage head and heart. These are among the services we provide:
- Strategic communications planning
- One-on-one communications coaching
- Guidance toward thought-leadership
- Crisis communications
- Press release drafting and pitching
- Video script writing, shooting, and editing
- Photography
- Op-ed writing
- Social media planning
- Content creation for websites and social media
- Researching and drafting white papers
- Data analysis
- Statements and testimony
- Powerpoint presentations
- Event planning; telephonic and actual press conferences
Testimonials and more
Full text of selected testimonials
Sharon and Leonard have been a great asset to Survivors Empowered since they began working with us more than a year ago. They are extremely versatile, and we credit RubiSparks Communications with big boosts to our overall planning and strategic vision, strategic communications planning, and fundraising.
Sharon and Leonard are each excellent writers, and individually they have important understanding of policy, data, politics and the law that has facilitated their work for Survivors Empowered.They are adept at interviewing and writing features on a host of topics, including mindfulness meditation, advocacy, trauma, and healing. They have been critical partners in our preparation of a “toolkit” for survivors, with knowledgeable and creative contributions.
Sharon and Leonard understand messaging and the media. We have been very impressed with the talking points and draft commentary they’ve written. Their wise choices for opinion placement have resulted in prominent publications accepting our submissions. They also initiated our well-received monthly newsletter which they both write and compose, and they have been instrumental to our successful annual appeal drafts and other fundraising plans. We are very happy to have been introduced to them, and it has been a great pleasure to work together. We look forward to more of their counsel and help. Sharon and Leonard are valued allies and friends of Survivors Empowered, and us.
Sandy and Lonnie Philips, Founders
I've known and appreciated Sharon for decades, since she was the Communications Director at Advocates for Children and Youth. She was a key member of the MedicaidMatters! Maryland Coalition, and we often worked toward common goals. She has a knack for absorbing and translating complicated concepts into pithy and persuasive messages, for print or broadcast, short form or long form, and she knows how to work with others productively and positively.
Sharon is a lawyer, and an excellent researcher and advocate who has very capably acted as a lobbyist and spokesperson. When Maryland was faced with a "Doomsday budget," I hired her to do supplemental speech writing and event organizing for a coalition of Faith Leaders. Her work was creative, quickly produced, and effective - the draconian cuts were defeated!
I enthusiastically recommend Sharon and RubiSparks Communications for the highest quality communications counsel and performance, and I also recommend her as a pleasure to work alongside.
Vincent deMarco, President
Maryland Citizens' Health Initiative
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Your Swiss Army Knife for Public Relations and Advocacy
I ran a tiny public policy and advocacy organization focusing on state finances and economic policy. Sharon Rubinstein was my communications consultant. But she was so much more. She engineered an awareness campaign for us that included traditional media outreach, a stakeholder forum, targeted social media items, and one-on-one sessions with decision makers. Sharon knows how to handle traditional media and social media. She is very creative. She can help you to set big-picture strategy, and she can help you sweat the details. No job is too big or too small. She understands media relations, effective communication, and event organizing. She is excellent dealing with a wide range of people. She is high-energy and also has great professional judgement. She made our little staff look like a big player. If you are wondering if Sharon is a good choice to help YOUR organization, the answer is probably “yes.”
Neil Bergsman, former Executive Director, Maryland Budget and Tax policy institute
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Sharon is an outstanding advocate and communications professional. She understands a wide variety of issues in great detail and she knows how to make strong arguments in person and in print. She is always a great source of ideas about how to package and pitch ideas and causes. All this makes her a great asset to any advocacy group or organization lucky enough to work with her.
Franz Schneiderman, former editorial board member, Baltimore Sun; current Executive Director at Consumer Auto
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Sharon is an excellent advocate for children and their families. Her management style is collegial and organized while her interpersonal skills are empathetic, focused and inclusive in all of her interactions. She is able to critique a situation and articulate clearly and appropriately her observations and suggestions regarding these situations. She found ways to bring issues to the attention of the individual or group and help them focus on specific improvements, and followed up with patience and persistence.
Ellen A. Willinghan, Community health advocate
Some of our causes
Teaming to create a "toolkit" for survivors of gun violence: Help for healing and taking action
Survivors Empowered and Giffords jointly produced a two-part toolkit to aid survivors of gun violence in the immediate aftermath of shootings, and with advocacy efforts they might choose to undertake. We are proud to have contributed substantially to this effort, all too necessary as gun violence creates more and more survivors for whom the toolkit was designed.
Turning Pain into Purpose
As part of the Survivors Empowered 2022 Honor with Action Tour, we've helped to get coverage in multiple outlets, and contributed to the drafting of and placing of commentary as well.
Before the tour launched, notable Survivors Empowered commentary appeared in USA Today, the Denver Post, and elsewhere around the country.
Since late 2020, we've been producing a monthly newsletter for the organization, with profiles of some of the most dedicated anti-gun violence policy voices and survivors directly affected by gun violence.
Helping Powerful Stories Inspire
Teach the Shoah exists to tell stories of the Holocaust, commemorate survivors and those lost, and foster a better world. We were happy to help them with an array of communications tasks, including the launch of their first newsletter and an op-ed that appeared in the Dallas Morning News.
Making the case for money: Staving off harmful budget cuts, with coalition partners
In 2012, Maryland advocates came together to repel budgetary cuts that would have starved essential services for the most vulnerable, and education funds necessary to keep promises made to schoolchildren. Sharon was a consultant to the Maryland Budget and Tax Policy Institute for most of the year, and after the end of the state’s legislative session, in anticipation of a special session, she was hired to draft speeches and assist in continuing efforts pursued by Health Care for All. We were successful in staving off the most dramatic cuts.
More recently, Maryland's Governor Larry Hogan stripped funding from his education budget. The Maryland Education Coalition (on which Sharon serves) reacted with a February, 2022 letter in the Baltimore Sun; the money was restored.
Promoting a vital organization and spreading knowledge: Helping the hungry and homeless
For ten months during 2019 and 2020, as communications consultants to Caring for the Hungry and Homeless of Peekskill, Inc. (CHHOP), we devised and implemented a strategic communications plan, created and put out a new e-newsletter, drafted the organization's annual appeal, contributed to and placed two influential op-eds, and dramatically increased social media viewership. As COVID-19 upended realities for social service organizations, CHHOP was nimble, and with targeted outreach and visibility, received extraordinary community support for its essential services.
A tragedy, and its aftermath: Spurring dental health care reform
In 2007, a young boy, Deamonte Driver, died from an abscessed tooth. MedicaidMatters Maryland joined with Advocates for Children and Youth and the Public Justice Center to press for reform at the federal and state levels, and I handled media relations. A congressional hearing ensued, and soon, there were regulatory and budget changes at both levels. See the press release and some coverage, here.
Check out additional information or samples here.
Op-ed, Baltimore Sun:
https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/bs-xpm-2013-01-31-bs-ed-school-funding-20130131-story.html
Contributed to drafting, placed:
"Your Turn" Commentary, Baltimore Sun
Contributed to drafting; placed:
https://patch.com/new-york/peekskill/op-ed-lack-affordable-housing-today-hope-tomorrow
Contributed to drafting; placed:
https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/op-ed/bs-ed-teachstrong-20160114-story.html
Apples and oranges! Photos and more
We happily shoot photos and video, and we get in the act act as interviewers for both print and broadcast, too.