Alumni Profile: Prentice Butler, AB'02, CLA'17, AM'20

Prentice Butler, AB'02, AM'20, may be the only Harris School of Public Policy grad who has run for alderman, participates in a podcast about Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, done voice acting, plays The Legend of Zelda: Tears of The Kingdom on his Nintendo Switch, and reads 1,000-page Robert Caro biographies “for fun.” The valedictorian of his high school, Butler took an unusual path to his current position as executive director at the Neighborhood Bridge, a non-profit that provides families on Chicago’s West Side with resources. 

As an undergrad at the University of Chicago in the late nineties, Butler had difficulties adjusting and found himself on academic probation. “I was not as prepared as I needed to be,”  Butler recalls. “And I had to open myself up to asking for help. A lot of it.” That help came from resident head Ilya Davis and an academic advisor Jean Treese, the latter of whom—though never technically assigned as Butler’s advisor—became so close she attended Butler’s father’s funeral when Butler was a third-year. 

Treese encouraged Butler to explore community service opportunities on campus, where he crossed paths with Pamela Bozeman-Evans and Michelle Obama, who like Butler, grew up in South Shore. “These two Black women taught me how to grow professionally, and said, ‘Don’t you dare leave this campus thinking you're better than anybody else. You are to lead with equality and collaboration as you help communities in need.’”

Butler’s first job out of school was as a district executive for the Boy Scouts of America, where he was charged with engaging communities on the southwest side of Chicago and the surrounding suburbs. From there, he worked at a boutique law firm specializing in bankruptcy law—a bit of fortuitous timing that dovetailed with the subprime mortgage crisis of the late 2000s. “I saw many cases of families, most of them African American, being defrauded and losing everything,” he says. “It revealed the vulnerability in the Black community in terms of not having resources or being empowered with information.”

After getting a Master’s in Urban Life Learning from Loyola, Butler spent more than a decade working for the city—ultimately rising to chief of staff for 4th Ward alderman Sophia King.

But all the while, he had his heart set on attending the Harris School. Twice he applied; both times he was turned down. Then the school launched a part-time program for working professionals, and this time he was accepted. Twenty years after initially graduating, he returned to UChicago. “I had an idea about what I wanted to achieve,” Butler says, “and I didn't want to let that go.”

Despite some initial anxiety (“I was never a math person per se”), Butler’s experience at Harris strengthened his skill sets as a professional in the civic space, whether in budget talks or political analysis. He even became a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, the oldest African-American intercollegiate fraternity in the United States. “I wanted to do it in undergrad, but my grades didn't permit it,” he says. “Twenty-two years later, I did it.”

In 2023, when Butler ran for 4th Ward alderman himself, his Harris education armed him with the ability to go deeper on issues than candidates typically do. “I was able to come up with thoughtful discussion points and solutions on policy issues in debates,” says Butler, who ultimately lost the election. “When I talked about replacing lead pipes because lead in water has been shown to impact the neural development of individuals at a young age, the other candidates were taking notes." 

Butler’s current position as executive director at Neighborhood Bridge is a natural extension of his journey. The 501(c)(3) organization works with five schools in Oak Park and Austin to connect families to resources on issues of financial literacy, employment resources, mental health resources, healthcare resources, housing, and childcare.

“When a family comes in, we ask: What do you hope to achieve?” he says. “Let's say a family needs housing. We design a plan together that is achievable, and volunteers will walk alongside them to advocate on their behalf.” Neighborhood Bridge’s “essentials pantry” also provides families with hygiene products, coats and scarves, bus cards, and gift cards for groceries.

Butler’s Harris experience influences his everyday work, particularly when he was tasked with putting together Neighborhood Bridge’s budget in December 2024. And critically, Harris has also altered his worldview. “I think that UChicago fostered the ability to think creatively for myself,” he says, “to take facts, information, have a level of discernment to think through problems and not necessarily go with what’s popular and what the masses may say. Very few times in your life do you have the environment where you can have these conversations.”