Living in close quarters, pulling all-nighters to finish assignments, being pitted against intense and hyper- competitive peers. Sounds more like Johns Hopkins than show business.

"It was like living in a sorority house — in our case, a frat house," says Leslie Sanchez, a 36-year-old Texas native who made her reality television debut last fall, clambering her way through several grueling episodes of The Apprentice: Martha Stewart.

Sanchez — a marketing consultant with experience working for a congressman, the Republican National Committee, and the White House — was selected last spring to compete in Martha Stewart's version of the Apprentice series. Over six weeks of shooting, Sanchez pushed designer wedding cakes, hawked retractable garden hoses on QVC, and — in her final, fatal task — oversaw the awkward design of a showroom for a luxury car.

"I come from a very serious background — politics and important issues," Sanchez reflects. "An important lesson to me was that it's OK to laugh at yourself."

That's especially true in the unreal world of reality television, where you wear a microphone 24 hours a day and are watched constantly by cameras. And where, despite the genre's moniker, you can easily come off very unlike your real self.

Sanchez had been a spokesperson for a national political campaign, and had been a talking head on media outlets such as Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN. ("Drop the Chalupa," she said of Al Gore's courting Latino voters.) Ironically, that experience may have resulted in her being overshadowed by brasher competitors on The Apprentice.

"I think I was always editing myself because I have an understanding of how things can get edited. I was always cognizant of the camera," she says. Shortly after Sanchez's last show, a party was arranged for the contestants, which she dived into organizing. "People were laughing," she says. "They said, 'We had no idea you were so animated and effervescent. You are two totally different people.' I definitely think there's a more gregarious side."

Sanchez came by her gregariousness out of necessity. When she was in high school, her parents divorced, leaving her and her mother in a one-bedroom apartment in a working- class Houston neighborhood. To earn money for college, Sanchez began selling P.F. Collier encyclopedias door-to- door. She wound up selling books in 23 states, becoming a field manager, and earning enough cash for separate apartments for herself and her mother. Meanwhile, she learned "how people live, what matters to them, and how to talk to them with respect and courtesy."

After earning a journalism degree from George Washington University, Sanchez became an aide to Congressman Henry Bonilla, the first Latino in Texas to be elected to a Republican House seat. She was eventually appointed to head the RNC's national Hispanic vote strategy, running the party's first multi-million-dollar advertising campaign aimed at Latinos.

In 2001, Sanchez was appointed executive director of President George W. Bush's Hispanic education initiative. During that time, she was also busy completing her MBA at the Johns Hopkins School of Professional Studies in Business and Education. ("Of all the concepts I learned at Johns Hopkins," she says, "the one that stands out is the ability to bring a diverse group of people together and build them into a team for a common purpose.") In 2003, she founded the Impacto Group, a communications and market research firm that specializes in studying attitudes among Latinos and women.

Reality television doesn't quite seem a logical next step. But Sanchez saw it as a way to reach out to the world, Martha-style.

"I believed I could help Martha build relationships, particularly with the Hispanic market," she says. "If I did really well and lost, I thought, look at all the connections I will have made."

Sanchez did do well, lasting 10 episodes before Martha gave her what many viewed as a harsh send-off. ("I would prefer to hire the doer rather than the talker," Stewart said.) Sanchez, however, doesn't see it that way.

"I think I got one of the nicest send-offs," she says. "She said focus on what you do well, which is marketing and communications. She's right."

Sanchez now has a legion of young female fans, and her Apprentice role attracted more consulting business — not to mention a book agent. She is working on a proposal about the effect of immigration and border issues on U.S. elections. And, of course, there is always the possibility of television.

"I would love to do another reality show," she says, "from the production side." —Sara Clemence, A&S '96, '98 (MA)

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http://www.jhu.edu/jhumag/0206web/alumnews.html#sanchez