October 14, 2022 | Read Time: 3 minutes
Mertz Gilmore Foundation
Aditi Vaidya, a senior program officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, will become president on December 1.
She will succeed Jay Beckner, who is departing after 35 years at the $108 million foundation, including 21 years as president.
Conrad Prebys Foundation
Kaberi Banerjee Murthy has joined the foundation in San Diego, which reported assets of $1.1 billion in 2020, as chief impact officer.
She has worked at Meyer Memorial Trust since 2018, most recently as chief impact officer.
GoFundMe
Soraya Alexander will now serve as chief operating officer of GoFundMe and president of Classy, its affiliate that raises money online for nonprofit groups. She has worked at Classy since 2018, most recently as chief operating officer.
Alexander succeeds Chris Himes, who has been CEO of Classy since April 2021 and will now become an adviser to the organization.
In addition, Eric Pannese has been promoted from senior vice president of product and design at Classy to chief product and technology officer. Chris Silver, vice president of product marketing at Classy, is now senior vice president of marketing.
Lego Foundation
Anne-Birgitte Albrectsen has departed after one year as CEO of the toy company’s foundation, which has not yet named a successor.
More New CEOs
David Blasher, a consulting operations manager for the MAP Fund’s Scaffolding for Practicing Artists program, will serve as the fund’s interim executive director following the departure of Moira Brennan. She plans to step down at the end of the year after two decades at this New York organization that raises money for the arts.
Jay Golan is now executive director of the LaGuardia Community College Foundation. Most recently he was vice president for advancement at the City University of New York Graduate Center and executive director of the Graduate Center Foundation.
Sharmila (Mona) Sinha, co-founder of Raising Change, has joined Equality Now as global executive director. She will overlap with Yasmeen Hassan, who has led the group since 2011 and will depart in January.
Other Notable Appointments
Tammy Collins has joined the Burroughs Wellcome Fund to lead its programs in regulatory science and interdisciplinary science, including the Career Awards at the Scientific Interface. She comes to the $947 million foundation from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences where she was director of its Office of Fellows’ Career Development.
Dee Dee Irwin has been tapped as managing director at the New Jersey Repertory Company. She was most recently director of marketing and communications and associate producer at the Laguna Playhouse.
Melissa Sinclair has been promoted to assistant vice chancellor for major gifts at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. Previously she was director of development for major gifts in the College of Health and Human Services.
Legacy
Lorry Lokey, the retired founder and CEO of Business Wire who gave hundreds of millions to universities in the United States and Israel, died on October 1 at age 95. He founded the newswire in 1961 and sold it to Berkshire Hathaway in 2006. Lokey signed the Giving Pledge in 2010 and has appeared on the Chronicle’s Philanthropy 50 ranking of donors in numerous years. Among his top beneficiaries were the University of Oregon, Stanford University’s School of Medicine, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science, the American Society for Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, and the University of Haifa.
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