Karrah Herring
BA 2005, Communication
Chief Equity, Inclusion & Opportunity Officer
State of Indiana - Office of the Governor
South Bend, IN
South Bend, IN
Karrah (Miller) Herring is a native and resident of South Bend, IN and a proud graduate of the South Bend Community School Corporation. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Communications/Public Relations from Purdue University (’05) and her Juris Doctorate from Valparaiso University School of Law (’11).
On November 19, 2020, Indiana governor, Eric Holcomb announced his appointment of Karrah to his cabinet as Indiana’s first-ever Chief Equity, Inclusion and Opportunity Officer for the state. In this role, she works with the governor and his team to improve state government operations as well as remove hurdles in the government workplace and services the state provides. During the foundational phase of the office, Karrah engaged with over 300 stakeholders, built the infrastructure of the office, and in conjunction with other agencies rolled out the State of Indiana's first ever Equity Data Portal. Her team's work focuses on growing statewide access and opportunity in education and economic development and enhancing employee experiences within Indiana state government’s executive branch.
Prior to joining Governor Holcomb's team, Karrah worked for the University of Notre Dame for nearly a decade and served as the Director of Public Affairs in the Office of Public Affairs and Communications. Prior to her role with Public Affairs, she served on the University of Notre Dame’s Office of Human Resources Senior Executive Leadership team as the Director of the Office of Institutional Equity and University Title IX Coordinator.
Karrah has received a number of awards and recognition and serves on various boards and commissions. In 2022, the Purdue University College of Liberal Arts added Karrah to their list of over 150 Distinguished Alumni Award recipients. She was named to the Indianapolis Business Journal’s prestigious Forty leaders under 40 2022 list and to the IBJ’s inaugural 250 influential leaders list in the same year. In 2021, she was named by the South Bend Regional Chamber as the 2021 Woman of Influence and recognized by the Purdue Black Alumni Organization as a Purdue Pioneering Woman.
In October of 2021, the chief justice of the Indiana Supreme Court, Justice Rush, asked Karrah to serve as the executive branch’s representative on the Indiana Supreme Court’s Commission on Equity and Access within Indiana Courts. Karrah is not only serving on the commission but is also chairing the subcommittee within the commission to look at pathways to the legal profession’s bench and bar for historically underrepresented groups. She is also a member of the Center for Digital Government’s Digital Equity Advisory Committee, the NASHP Population and Public Health Steering Committee and she is a member of the Board of Directors for Sunz Insurance and Sunz Holdings LLC (Bradenton, Florida).