Olive Embry

Olive Embry is a senior at The University of Texas at Austin studying Government with a minor in Sociology. Her interests center on criminal legal system reform and the ways incarceration intersects with factors including mental health, homelessness, and access to health care.

Olive grew up watching her mother tirelessly advocate for people with SMI cycling through the criminal legal system, homelessness, and short term hospital stays—work shaped by the involvement of Olive’s uncle with the state hospital and criminal legal system. Her family’s experiences gave her an early understanding of how easily people can become caught in systems that are not equipped to meet their needs, and how deeply those systems can affect individuals and their families.

Olive has also volunteered with Inside Books Project since 2018, where she has worked to support people incarcerated in Texas prisons. This experience has strengthened her interest in advocacy that centers the voices and experiences of people directly affected by incarceration.

At Texas Jail Project, Olive supports the organization’s advocacy and research efforts. She is particularly interested in the relationship between county jails, mental health, homelessness, and the broader criminal legal system, and hopes to pursue a career in public policy and criminal justice reform.