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Keynote Speaker: Steve Gunderson
Steve Gunderson is President
and Chief Executive Officer of the Council on Foundations, a
Washington, DC-based nonprofit membership association of more than
2,000 grantmaking foundations and corporations.
The Wisconsin native served
16 years in the U.S. Congress, and three terms in the Wisconsin State
Legislature. His professional focus during this time was preparing
America’s citizens, and indirectly the organizations supporting them,
for the 21st century global economy.
He is probably most
recognized for his understanding of the emerging workforce challenges
facing America. Steve does extensive speaking and consulting on
workforce investment issues. He recently served as the leading author
of the book “The Jobs Revolution: Changing How America Works.”
Prior to joining the Council,
Gunderson served as the Senior Consultant and the Managing Director of
the Washington office of The Greystone Group, a Michigan-based
strategic management and communications consulting firm. Gunderson’s
areas of expertise included strategic planning and communications, with
a strong knowledge of public policy.
Gunderson currently serves on
the Advisory Board of Partner for Surgery – a philanthropic effort
bringing surgery to the rural poor of Guatemala. He has served on the
boards of Gallaudet University, the Mary Fisher Family AIDS Network and
the Human Rights Campaign. He has also served as President of the
Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in McLean, VA.
He has lectured widely from
Harvard University to The Brookings Institution, and he is often
interviewed in the media. A graduate from the University of Wisconsin –
Madison, Gunderson today lives in Arlington, Virginia, with his partner
Jonathan Stevens.
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Gubernatorial Candidate: Ted Strickland
Congressman Ted Strickland was
first elected to Congress to represent the 6th Ohio Congressional
District in 1992. His district has included twenty Ohio counties
stretching from the suburbs of Cincinnati to the suburbs of Youngstown.
Ted believes that government is at its best when it’s guided by the
heart and a good dose of common sense, and as governor, wants to focus
on core kitchen table issues—bringing good jobs to Ohio and making our
schools among the best in the nation.
During his last five terms in
Congress, Ted has served on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Ted is also an active member of the Congressional Steel Caucus. In
2003, Ted became a member of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs
and is the ranking Democrat on its Subcommittee on Oversight and
Investigations. He helped author the Children’s Health Insurance
Program (CHIP) and led the fight to keep our promises to America’s
veterans and to ensure that our troops have life-saving armor and
equipment.
Professionally, Ted has
served as a minister, a psychologist, and a college professor. He was
an administrator at a Methodist children’s home, an assistant professor
of psychology at Shawnee State University, and a consulting
psychologist at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility (SOCF).
Ted was raised in Lucasville,
Ohio, one of nine children. He spent his childhood active in church and
school life. He attended Asbury College in Kentucky, receiving a B.A.
in History in 1963. He went on to attend the Asbury Theological
Seminary and received a Master of Divinity. He continued his studies at
the University of Kentucky, receiving a doctoral degree in Counseling
Psychology in 1980.
Ted is married to Frances
Strickland of Simpsonville, Kentucky. Frances is an educational
psychologist and author of a widely-used screening test for
kindergarten-age children.
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Gubernatorial Candidate: Ken Blackwell
Republican gubernatorial
nominee and two-term Secretary of State Ken Blackwell has a
distinguished record of achievement as an educator, diplomat and
finance executive. He is a staunch economic conservative and believes
controlling government spending and cutting taxes will kick-start
Ohio's economy – creating jobs and economic prosperity.
Mr. Blackwell’s public service
includes terms as mayor of Cincinnati, an undersecretary at the U.S.
Department of Housing & Urban Development and U.S. Ambassador to
the United Nations Human Rights Commission. In 1994, he became the
first African American elected to a statewide executive office in Ohio
when he was elected Treasurer of State.
Mr. Blackwell is a Fellow of
the National Academy of Public Administration and a former member of
the federal senior executive service. He is co-chairman of the board of
directors of the Campaign Finance Institute in Washington, D.C. and a
member of the Harvard Policy Group on Network- Enabled Services and
Government. Mr. Blackwell is a member of the national advisory boards
of the Princeton Review and Youth for Christ. He also is a former
chairman of the U.S. Census Monitoring Board and member of the Advisory
Panel of the Federal Elections Commission.
He holds Bachelor of Science
and Master of Education degrees from Xavier University (OH), where he
later served as a vice president and member of its faculty. He has been
a Fellow at Harvard University’s Institute of Politics, the Aspen
Institute, the Salzburg Seminar in Austria and the School of Advanced
International Studies at Johns Hopkins University (British-American
Project). He was a founding partner of the highly successful Blue Chip
Broadcasting Company.
Mr. Blackwell is a lifelong
resident of Cincinnati. He and his wife of 37 years, Rosa, who
currently serves as superintendent of Cincinnati Public Schools, have
three adult children, Kimberly, Rahshann, and Kristin.
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Phyllis Eisen
Phyllis Eisen is vice president of the
Manufacturing Institute and executive director of the Center for
Workforce Success, the education, training and research arm of the
National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). The Manufacturing
Institute's mission is to tell the story of today's manufacturing to
the press and policy makers. The Center's purpose is to find innovative
workforce solutions for U.S. manufacturers, enabling them to compete in
a competitive global economy.
Before coming to the NAM, Ms. Eisen was a
consultant to the American Motor Vehicles Association and Mack Trucks.
Prior to that position, she was vice president of the National
Immigration Forum in Washington, D.C. She also taught in the public
school system as a high school social studies and special education
teacher for over a decade.
Ms. Eisen serves on the Board of Directors for
the National Center for Education and the Economy, the Precision
Manufacturing Association Foundation and on the executive committee of
the Washington, DC, chapter of the Industrial Relations Research
Association. She currently serves on the Department of Labor's Advisory
Committee on Apprenticeship. She recently received the Harry S Truman
award for distinguished service from the American Association of
Community Colleges.
Ms. Eisen earned her undergraduate degree in
political science and education at the University of Maryland in 1964
and pursued additional graduate work in public policy, political
science and education at both George Washington University and the
University of Maryland.
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Brian Gallagher
Brian Gallagher became President and Chief
Executive Officer of United Way of America in 2002 and immediately took
on the challenge of leading the transformation of the organization to
focus on community impact. Gallagher believes that the true measure of
success for United Way and other philanthropic organizations is
bottom-line results: the lives that are changed and the communities
that are shaped. Today, Gallagher has raised the bar on the
accountability, governance and transparency standards adopted as a
requirement of membership for each of the 1,300 local United Ways
across the country.
He began his career with United Way in 1981,
working in various positions in United Ways around the country
including Winston-Salem, North Carolina; Reading, Pennsylvania;
Providence, Rhode Island; and Atlanta, Georgia. He most recently served
as president of United Way of Central Ohio (UWCO) in Columbus.
Gallagher received his bachelor’s degree in
social work from Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana, in 1981, and
earned a master’s degree in business administration from Emory
University in Atlanta in 1992. In May 2003 Gallagher received an
honorary Doctor of Humanities from his alma mater, Ball State
University.
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Roberta Garber
Roberta Garber has been Executive Director of
Community Research Partners since 2001. CRP provides accurate, useful
and accessible data and research to inform positive community change.
The organization’s 12-person staff has undertaken over 90 community
data, applied and policy research, and program evaluation projects
across a wide range of program areas, both within and outside of
central Ohio. CRP was incorporated in 2000 as an innovative non-profit
partnership of United Way of Central Ohio, the City of Columbus and the
John Glenn Institute for Public Service and Public Policy at The Ohio
State University.
Ms. Garber serves on the board of directors of
Columbus Housing Partnership, the United Way of Central Ohio Housing
Vision Council, the Columbus Chamber Workforce Leadership Council, and
the Ohio Bridges to Opportunity Stakeholder Group.
Previously, she operated Roberta F. Garber
Consulting, providing strategic planning, facilitation, research,
evaluation and grant writing services for public and non-profit sector
clients. From 1983-93 she was Assistant Deputy Director and Deputy
Director for Community Development at the Ohio Department of
Development. Ms. Garber has also been a city planner for the cities of
Kettering and West Carrollton, Ohio. She holds a Bachelor of Urban
Planning from the University of Cincinnati and an M.A. from the
University of Dayton.
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Senator Ray Miller
The Honorable Ray Miller is the 13th
African-American elected to the Ohio Senate in the 202 year history of
the state. Prior to his election, he was the Dean of the Ohio House of
Representatives, having served 16 years as a member of that body. In
addition, he serves as the President and CEO of Professional Employment
Services of America, the largest minority-owned executive search firm
in the State of Ohio.
Senator Miller is highly regarded as an expert in
the development of public policy on health, education, and human
service issues. Senator Miller sponsored legislation to create the Ohio
Department of Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services and the Ohio
Commission on Minority Health, and to establish the nation’s first
state-level funding for the Head Start Program.
At the national level, Senator Miller served on
the White House staff as Deputy Special Assistant to President Jimmy
Carter. Prior to that, he served as the Assistant Director of
Legislation for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal
Employees and Vice-President of Minority Affairs for Columbus State
Community College.
Senator Miller serves on the boards of the
Children’s Hunger Alliance, Community Research Partners, and the Ohio
Commission on African-American Males, and is the President of Reclaim
Our Democracy. In addition, he is the chairman of the
International Institute for Democracy and the National Progressive
Leadership Caucus.
A graduate of Columbus East High School, Miller
holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science and a Master of
Arts degree in Public Administration from The Ohio State University.
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Neal Peirce
Neal Peirce is a foremost writer, among American
journalists, on metropolitan regions — their political and economic
dynamics, their emerging national and global roles. With Curtis
Johnson, he has co-authored the Peirce Reports (now
called Citistates
Reports) on compelling issues of metropolitan futures for leading
media in more than 20 regions across the nation.
In 2004-2006, Peirce took a lead role in
conceptualizing and launching the New England Futures Project,
starting with a
six-part monthly Peirce-Johnson series -- printed by 27 newspapers
-- focused on how that that historic six-state region deals with its
21st century energy, transportation, growth, higher education,
broadband and health challenges.
In 1975, Peirce began — and continues today — the
United States’ first national column focused on state and local
government themes. Syndication is by the Washington Post Writers Group.
His 10-book series on America’s states and regions culminated in The
Book of America: Inside 50 States Today (W.W. Norton, 1983). His
more recent books were Citistates: How Urban America Can Prosper
in a Competitive World, and Breakthroughs: Recreating The
American City.
Peirce was one of the founders and then a
contributing editor of National Journal, and was active in
the ’60s as political editor of Congressional Quarterly. He
was a member of the National Civic League’s executive committee from
the early 1970s to 1995 and was one of the founders and co-chair of the
National Academy of Public Administration’s Alliance for Redesigning
Government.
Known widely as a lecturer on regional, urban, federal system and
community development issues, Peirce has been a familiar figure before
civic, business, academic and professional groups nationally. He has
appeared on Meet the Press, the Today Show, National Public Radio and
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Mary Jo Waits
Mary Jo Waits is the center director of the Pew
Center on the States, an operating unit of the Pew Charitable Trusts.
In this role, Ms. Waits assists the Trusts and its partners explore
emerging issues at the state policy level. The Center on the States'
team of researchers and policy analysts design, commission and conduct
research and cross-state assessments on critical policy areas and
promising approaches among states.
Previously, Ms. Waits was a senior fellow with
the Center for the Future of Arizona. In July 2004, she founded a new
public policy consulting firm, Mary Jo Waits and Associates LLC, which
has assisted the City of Phoenix, the Arizona Board of Regents and key
business leaders with a variety of economic development projects,
including a redesign of Arizona's public university system, and a
downtown strategy for Phoenix that integrates a new Arizona State
University campus and biomedical complex.
For more than a decade, she was associate
director of the Morrison Institute for Public Policy, a "think tank" at
Arizona State University. She oversaw the Institute's project
development, publications, research and analysis and authored numerous
reports. Ms. Waits served as the assistant director of the Arizona
Governor ’s Office of Policy Development and Planning during the
Babbitt Administration and prior to that as a senior economic policy
advisor to the governor and lieutenant governor of Alaska.
Ms. Waits has authored numerous publications, and
her areas of expertise include state economic policy, urban growth and
environmental policy, education and health policy. She was the
principal author of Five Shoes Waiting to Drop on Arizona ’s Future, a
report that won the National Conference of State Legislatures’ 2002
Notable Document Award. Ms. Waits is a member of Economic Development
Quarterly ’s editorial board. She holds a master's degree in public
administration from the University of Southern California and was a
doctoral candidate (ABD) at the University of Michigan.
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Representative Shawn Webster
First elected in 2000, Representative Shawn
Webster is currently serving his third term in the House of
Representatives. He represents the 53 rd district, which is comprised
of parts of Butler County. Webster currently serves as Chairman of the
Higher Education Subcommittee of the House Finance Committee, and as
Vice Chair of the Aging Subcommittee of the Health Committee. In
addition, he serves on the Education Committee and the Financial
Institutions, Real Estate and Securities Committee.
In the FY 04-05 budget, Webster authored language
that began the implementation of the articulation and transfer policy
in Ohio’s state higher education system. Also during the previous
General Assembly he chaired the Nursing Facility Reimbursement Study
Council, which issued recommendations regarding the Medicaid
reimbursement system for nursing facilities. Most recently, Webster
served as Chairman of the Higher Education Funding Study Council, which
was created by the legislature to study all aspects of Higher Education
Funding, and issued its report May 31, 2006.
Rep. Webster is a 1973 graduate of the College of
Veterinary Medicine at Ohio State University. He served in the United
States Air Force as a Captain in the Veterinary Corps in Puerto Rico
until 1977. Prior to becoming a state legislator, Webster served as a
member of the Ross Local School Board from 1982-1993 and as a member of
the Butler County Educational Service Center from 1994-2000.
In addition to his role as a legislator, Webster
is a practicing small-animal veterinarian and owner of Lodder’s Plaza
Animal Clinic and Lodder’s Plaza Pet Bed and Breakfast. He and his
wife, Penny, reside in Hanover Township. The Webster’s have three adult
children.
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Dr. Jesse L. White, Jr.
Dr. Jesse L. White, Jr., is Director of the
Office of Economic and Business Development at the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill. The mission of the OEBD is to connect North
Carolina communities and businesses to the unique economic development
resources of UNC-Chapel Hill. He also holds the title of Adjunct
Professor in the School of Government. Dr. White is a nationally
recognized authority on regional economic development.
Prior to coming to UNC-Chapel Hill in January
2003, he served for almost nine years as Federal Co-Chairman of the
Appalachian Regional Commission. Appointed by the President and
confirmed by the Senate, Dr. White led in the revitalization of the
agency, securing its first full reauthorization by Congress in almost
two decades.
From 1990 to 1994, Dr. White was a consultant,
lecturer, and writer in the field of economic development and strategic
planning. From 1982 to 1990, he led the Southern Growth Policies Board
as its executive director, again revitalizing the organization and
bringing it to prominence as one of the most respected “think tanks” on
economic development in the nation. He also served as chief policy
planner in the newly created U.S. Department of Education and a staff
assistant to U.S. Senator John C. Stennis. From 1972-1976 he was
Secretary of the Mississippi Senate.
Dr. White, a native Mississippian, received his
B.A., summa cum laude, at the University of Mississippi in political
science and history. He was Mississippi's first Marshall Scholar,
receiving his master's degree in international relations from the
University of Sussex. He was awarded the Ph. D. degree in political
science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1979.
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Chad Wick
Chad Wick leads KnowledgeWorks Foundation in its
mission to increase the number and diversity of people who value and
access public education. As the founding president and CEO, he has led
the Foundation to achieve this mission by providing not only seed
grants and operating funds, but extensive technical assistance and
training that promotes and supports sustainable, system-wide changes.
Chad serves on the boards of numerous
organizations that work in education, the arts, and public health,
including the Public Education Network, Operation Respect and the
National College Access Network. He has been recognized by multiple
organizations since the Foundation's inception including the Friend of
Public Education award from the Ohio Federation of Teachers, the Merlin
G. Pope, Jr. Award for Promoting Acceptance of Diversity from the
Cincinnati Human Relations Commission, Peace of the City award from the
Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, Friend of Education Award from the
National Association of School Boards of Education as well as the Ohio
Philanthropy Award from the Ohio Grantmakers Forum.
Chad is a veteran of the U.S. Air Force. Prior to
leading KnowledgeWorks Foundation, he was president and CEO of Rise
Learning Solutions. He has also served as president of Mayerson
Company, executive vice president of the PNC Bank, and CEO of Southern
Ohio Bank.
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Reggie Wilkinson
Reginald Wilkinson is the Executive Director of
the Ohio Business Alliance for Education and the Economy. The alliance,
an affiliate of the Ohio Business Roundtable, serves as a catalyst to
increase the role of higher education in the state's economy, including
increasing the number of degrees awarded in science, technology,
engineering and mathematics.
Mr. Wilkinson has served in a variety of State of
Ohio positions including superintendent of the Corrections Training
Academy, warden of the Dayton Correctional Institution, and deputy
director of prisons. He was appointed Director of the Department in
1991 and served in this position until 2006. He is a Past President of
ACA, the Ohio Correctional and Court Services Association; the Ohio
chapter of the National Association of Blacks in Criminal Justice; and
the State of Ohio Training Association.
He has received numerous awards from a variety of
organizations including the National Governors ’ Association, the
International Community Corrections Association, the National
Associatio n of Blacks in Criminal Justice, the Volunteers of America,
the Ohio Community Corrections Organization, and the Ohio Correctional
and Court Services Association. He is a recipient of the Michael
Francke Award, the highest honor bestowed by ASCA, and the E. R. Cass
Correctional Achievement Award, ACA ’s most prestigious honor.
Wilkinson received B.A. and M.A. degrees from The
Ohio State University, and was awarded the Doctor of Education degree
from the University of Cincinnati.
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