Angela Paik Schaeffer is the founder of Cause and Effect Strategies, which provides communications consulting, strategic positioning and planning, and leadership and organizational development for educational institutions and other mission-driven organizations. She began work with PRG as a senior associate in 2022.

Schaeffer launched her consultancy after developing and leading communications and marketing operations in higher education, most recently as vice president for communications and marketing at Trinity College in Hartford, CT. Her communications leadership experience includes a decade at the Johns Hopkins University Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and several years at Williams College.

In those roles, she served on senior administrative teams, advised and supported leaders at all levels, and helped to develop and implement comprehensive strategic plans and complex institutional initiatives. Her experience spans all aspects of communications, including campaign communications, recruitment marketing, media relations and public affairs, crisis management, institutional branding and identity, digital communications, and executive communications.

As a consultant, her clients have included the College of Wooster, Johns Hopkins University, Trinity College, the Jewish Foundation of Greater New Haven, the National Association for College Admission Counseling, and the New York Academy of Sciences. She serves also as an affiliated coach with the Kardia Group.

Throughout her career in higher education, Schaeffer served in leadership roles in the sector, including as a member of the Consortium on Financing Higher Education’s Public Issues Committee, and provided strategic consultation to college presidents and communications and marketing operations at numerous institutions. She began her career as a newspaper reporter, first at The Philadelphia Inquirer, then at The (Raleigh) News & Observer and The Washington Post.

Schaeffer earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from Dickinson College and a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University. Her beliefs in the transformative power of education and in communications as a means for bridging divides are grounded deeply in the experiences of her family, especially that of her Korean immigrant father and his pathbreaking career as an American photojournalist and newspaper editor.

Contact: angela@petersonrudgersgroup.com