The Hague, The Netherlands – 29 April 2009. The Bernard van Leer Foundation is pleased to announce Ms. Lisa Jordan as the new Executive Director as of 1 July 2009. Ms. Jordan is currently with the Ford Foundation, where she has worked since 2000. Ms. Jordan replaces Monique van ‘t Hek, who has served the Foundation since July 2008 as the interim Executive Director.Ms. Jordan has a long and distinguished career working within civil society, foundations and governments on cross-cutting social and economic issues. She has worked for the U.S. Congress, with Members of the European Parliament and with the Japanese Diet on global environmental issues. She has previously studied and worked in the Netherlands. In her most recent role as Acting Director of the Governance and Civil Society Unit at the Ford Foundation, she was responsible for programming a budget of US$75m across ten field offices. She has degrees from the University of Michigan and the Institute for Social Studies, and has published books and articles on the topics of globalization, global civil society and NGO accountability.
The Foundation’s Board of Trustees was impressed by Ms. Jordan’s experience of working internationally and across sectors with governments and non-governmental organisations in order to improve broad social welfare. As her career has regularly involved creating the conditions for multiple parties to be engaged in public policy negotiations, she brings a wealth of experience to policy debates impacting children.
As the Foundation’s Chair Trude Maas-de Brouwer states: “We are confident that Lisa will reinforce the Foundation’s reputation as an innovative and effective agent in Early Childhood Development in both developing and industrialised countries’.
An American national, Ms Jordan is married to a Dutch national and has two children of primary school age.
For further information you can contact Jane Hartman at: jane.hartman@bvleerf.nl
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