Philanthropy Northwest Names New CEO to Start This Summer

Philanthropy Northwest

Starting July 11, Jill Nishi will become CEO of this network of grant makers in Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming.

Nishi most recently was principal of JTN Consulting and, before that, served as director of strategy planning and management and chief of staff for the U.S. Program at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Educational Testing Service

Amit Sevak, chairman of the advisory and investment firm Mindset Global, will join the education group as its next president and CEO on June 15.

He will succeed Walt MacDonald, who is leaving after eight years of leading the organization that administers the SAT and the Test of English as a Foreign Language, among other standardized tests.

McKnight Foundation

Cedrick Baker is joining the $2.8 billion foundation as its chief of staff.

Most recently he was chief of staff at Saint Paul Public Schools.

More New CEOs

Kim Andrews will be the next executive director of the Fund for Women and Girls. She most recently served as executive director of the Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia.

Johanna Liu, director of quality and process improvement at the Santa Clara Family Health Plan, will now serve as president and CEO of the San Francisco Community Clinic Consortium.

Luis Lozada has been promoted from general counsel to CEO of Democracy Works. He has led the group on an interim basis since December.

Doreen Riley will join the Northeast Ohio Medical University as vice president for advancement and president of the Neomed Foundation on June 20. Currently she is vice president for university advancement and board corporate secretary at John Carroll University.

Gregory Patterson has been promoted from director of development to executive director of the Plano Symphony Orchestra.

Paul Plaia III, group president of EverCommerce, has been appointed CEO of FrontStream, a company that makes software for nonprofit fundraising and payment facilitation.

Other Notable Appointments

Pooja Shivangi Amin, associate general counsel at CenterPoint Energy, has joined the Greater Houston Community Foundation as general counsel.

Marco Baptista, vice president of research programs at the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, has joined the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation as its chief scientific officer.

Chris Cooper has joined Sierra Health Foundation and the Center at Sierra Health Foundation as a program officer, where he will direct its California Funders for Men and Boys of Color program. Most recently he was director of Neighborhood Safety and Youth Engagement for the Health Education Council.

Karen Davis, chief advancement officer at the Student Conservation Association, has been appointed chief development and marketing officer at the National Council on Aging.

Laura Day, director of annual giving at Williams College, has been promoted to assistant vice president for alumni engagement.

Amy Dinofrio has been named vice president and chief human resources officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Most recently she was chief people and culture officer at United Way Worldwide.

Lisa Hodge, operations manager at Higher Octave Healing, is now finance and operations manager at the Alliance of Arizona Nonprofits.

Michelle Wodtke Franks, executive director of Golden Hills Resource Conservation and Development, has joined the Iowa West Foundation as a program officer.

Adrian Matejka, a graphic novelist and former poet laureate of Indiana, will join the Poetry Foundation as editor of its Poetry magazine. He is the publication’s first Black editor.

Alicia Oberman, founder and chief experience officer of Boardified, will become vice president for Leading Places to Serve at Leading Edge when Leading Edge acquires Boardified in July.

Ryan Smith, chief external officer at the Partnership for Los Angeles Schools, has been hired as chief strategy officer at Community Coalition.

Alison Swain, senior director of alumni relations at the University of Connecticut School of Law, was named major-gifts officer at New England Public Media.

Kevin Webb, director of the Mitsubishi Electric America Foundation, has been promoted to senior director of corporate social responsibility and environmental sustainability for the Americas region at Mitsubishi Electric U.S.

Departures

Jennifer Butler will step down on June 1 as CEO of Faith in Public Life. She founded the group 17 years ago. Jeanné Lewis, vice president and chief engagement officer at the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, will fill in as interim CEO while the group searches for a permanent successor.

Jeff Fleming, director of the Des Moines Art Center, intends to retire in April 2023 after 25 years in the position.

Helene Gayle is leaving after five years as the president and CEO of the Chicago Community Trust to become president of Spelman College. Read more about her plans for the historically Black women’s college in the Chronicle.

Charlotte Haberaecker will retire after 10 years as president and CEO of Lutheran Services in America.

Bruce Karstadt, president and CEO of the American Swedish Institute for the past 31 years, plans to retire early next year.

David Routh, vice chancellor for development at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, will step down next year at the conclusion of the school’s $4.25 billion capital campaign.

Legacies

Harriet Stimson Bullitt, a philanthropist who poured hundreds of millions of dollars into conservation in the Pacific Northwest, died on April 23. She was 97. Her family made its fortune in logging, communications, and real estate. With her siblings, Bullitt oversaw the sale of King Broadcasting in 1990 to endow the Bullitt Foundation, which has since made more than $200 million in grants toward environmental and conservation causes.

Lillian Lowery, a teacher and educational advocate who served as board chair at the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching from 2014 until last year, died on April 13 at age 67. She was among the first students to integrate North Carolina schools and later, after earning a doctorate in education, returned to teach middle-school English in her hometown of Gastonia, N.C. She later served as the first president and CEO of FutureReady Columbus and vice president for pre-K-12 policy, research, and practice at the Education Trust. In 2018, she joined the Educational Testing Service as vice president of student and teacher assessments.

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