Board of Directors

David C. Hodgson (Chairman), General Atlantic, LLC
William A. Ackman, Pershing Square Capital
Maya Ajmera, The Global Fund for Children
Esther Benjamin, United States Peace Corps
Peter J. Campbell, Educational Capital Partners
Guy de Chazal
Cheryl L. Dorsey (ex-officio), Echoing Green
Betsy Fader, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation
Marianne Gimon, Consultant
Andrew R. Kassoy, B Lab
Diana Propper de Callejon, Expansion Capital Partners, LLC
Jerome C. Vascellaro, TPG Capital LP
Dan Weiss, St. Martin's Press

David Hodgson, Chair

David Hodgson is a Managing Director of General Atlantic, a global private equity firm. In addition to serving as a director for a number of public and private companies, David is a board chair for Boys and Girls Harbor and Playing to Win. He is a member of the board of directors of the Manhattan Theater Club, a member of Dartmouth College's President's Leadership Council, serves on the Stanford Business School Advisory Council, and is a trustee of Johns Hopkins University, and of the Spence School in New York. David graduated from Dartmouth College and the Stanford University Graduate School of Business.

William A. Ackman

William A. Ackman is the founder of Pershing Square Capital Management, L.P., a registered investment adviser with hedge fund assets under management in excess of $5 billion. Prior to forming Pershing Square Capital Management, L.P., Mr. Ackman co-founded Gotham Partners Management Co., LLC, an investment adviser which managed public and private equity investments.

Mr. Ackman received an MBA from the Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard College where he graduated magna cum laude.

Maya Ajmera

As a 1994 Echoing Green Fellow, Maya Ajmera founded the Global Fund for Children, where she continues to serve as the President. She currently serves on the National Executive Board of the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute and the Washington Area Women's Foundation. She is on the advisory boards of Youth Philanthropy Worldwide, Whole Child Initiative, Room to Read, and the Emerging Markets Foundation. Maya earned her BA from Bryn Mawr College and her MPP from the Sanford Institute for Public Policy at Duke University.

Esther T. Benjamin

Esther Benjamin is the Director of Global Operations for the United States Peace Corps. Prior to joining the Peace Corps, Esther was the Executive Director for Resource Development at International Partnership for Microbicides. Previously, she served as Vice President for Business Development at the International Youth Foundation, where she focused on developing strategic partnerships and programs to support children and youth initiatives around the world. During the 1993 to 1994 humanitarian crisis in Somalia, Esther was appointed United Nations Humanitarian Affairs Officer, the youngest person appointed in this position, and in 1999 President Clinton appointed her a White House Fellow. Esther's private sector experience includes management consulting with Andersen, with Grant Thornton LLP, and with Richard S. Carson & Associates. Esther is Co-Founder of the Good Samaritan Fund and currently serves on the board of directors of Women in Community Service. As a College Scholar, Esther earned her undergraduate degree in political science and English from North Central College, and she earned graduate degrees in applied economics and international affairs from American University, where she was a Graduate Fellow.

Peter Campbell

Peter Campbell is a Managing Partner at Educational Capital Partners. He previously served as a Partner at Generation Partners, a private investment firm. Peter joined Generation Partners in 2000 as entrepreneur-in-residence; he was named a partner in 2001. Prior to joining Generation Partners, Peter worked in global marketing at Colgate Palmolive. He currently serves on the Board of Trustees at Quality Committee of Norwalk Hospital. Peter earned his BA from Middlebury College and his MBA from Harvard Business School.

Guy de Chazal

Until recently, Guy was a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley and President of Morgan Stanley Venture Partners (MSVP). He remains on the board of one of MSVP's portfolio companies, Thrupoint Technologies and a previous portfolio company, Lionbridge Technologies (LIOX). He also serves on the board of Uhlig in Kansas and AMC, the Asset Management subsidiary of IFC. He served on the board of the National Venture Capital Association, co-chairing the Education Committee and chairing the Annual Convention in 2005. In 2004 and 2005, he was an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School, teaching Venture Capital to second year MBA students. Prior to his twenty-two years at Morgan Stanley, he worked at Citicorp Venture Capital and, before that, McKinsey and Co. In the nonprofit sector, Guy serves on three boards in addition to Echoing Green; Fountain House, a residential, service and advocacy program for people living with mental illness and two Connecticut schools, Eagle Hill and Suffield Academy. Guy has a BS in Engineering from Manchester University in the UK and an MBA from Harvard Business School. He is married to Kitty Choate and has two teenage children, Justine and David.

Cheryl Dorsey

An accomplished social entrepreneur with expertise in health care, labor issues and public policy, Cheryl Dorsey was named President of Echoing Green in May 2002. She is the first Echoing Green Fellow to lead the social venture fund, which has awarded over $28 million in start-up capital to over 450 social entrepreneurs worldwide since 1987. Read more.

Betsy Fader

Betsy Fader is the Chief Program Officer at the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. Ms. Fader assists with strategic planning for the Foundation's program areas and properties, and oversees the Foundation's grants program on Child Abuse Prevention, as well as the grants program of the Doris Duke Foundation for Islamic Art. Prior to her arrival to DDCF, Betsy was the Executive Director of Student Pugwash USA -- the "junior" arm of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs (which in 1995 won the Nobel Prize for Peace). Betsy also worked as a legislative assistant in Washington, DC and as a Parliamentary Assistant in the House of Commons in London, where her work focused on alternative energy technology, biomedical research policy, higher education policy and ethics in research. Betsy holds a Master's degree in Education and Social Policy from Harvard University and a BA in Political Science from Vanderbilt University. She also serves on the boards of Computers for Youth and the Women's Law Initiative.

Marianne Gimon

Marianne Gimon works as an independent consultant specialized in gender and international development. She worked with the UNICEF Syria Country Office on developing protection interventions for vulnerable adolescent Iraqis living in Syria. She previously worked for the Population Council, the Social Science Research Council, the United Nations Development Program and Equilibres et Populations. She taught English in Yantai, China as a Worldteach volunteer. Marianne is a family council member of the Flora Family Foundation, a board member of the Hewlett Foundation, and a board member of Echoing Green. She earned her Bachelor of Arts at Brown University and her Master's Degree from the School of International and Public Affairs of Columbia University.

Andrew Kassoy

B Lab is a non-profit organization whose mission is to create a new sector of the economy that harnesses the power of business to solve social and environmental problems. B Lab certifies B Corporations, creates standards to measure the social and environmental impact of business and to transform corporate accountability, and promotes public policy and capital markets innovations that will accelerate the growth of beneficial business. B Corporations are a new kind of company for this new economy. B Corporations meet higher standards of accountability, transparency, and social and environmental performance. There are over 210 Certified B Corporations in 31 industries and 25 states, alleviating poverty, improving the environment, creating great places to work, and building local living economies.

Prior to co-founding B Lab, Andrew spent 16 years in the private equity business; as a Partner at MSD Real Estate Capital, an affiliate of MSD Capital, the $12 billion investment vehicle for Michael Dell, and as Managing Director in Credit Suisse First Boston's Private Equity Department, a founding partner of DLJ Real Estate Capital Partners, and President of its international business.

He is a Board Member of the Freelancers Union and the Freelancers Insurance Company, a Board Member of Echoing Green, a member of the investment committee of the Patient Capital Collaborative, and an Advisor to the NYU Reynolds Fellows Program. He was raised in Boulder, Colorado and graduated with Distinction from Stanford University where he was a Truman Scholar and President's Award winner. He is a Henry Crown Fellow at the Aspen Institute. Andrew lives in New York City with his two sons, the Emperor Maximilian (five years) and the Boy King Jedidiah (three years).

Diana Propper de Callejon

Diana has more than fifteen years of work experience in Clean Technology, in the areas of energy, water, advanced materials and transportation, combined with recognized domain expertise and a global network of entrepreneurs, venture capital investors and large corporations active in Clean Technology. Her background encompasses work with Fortune 500 companies, venture-backed technology companies, financial institutions and private investors in Clean Technology. Prior to Expansion Capital, Diana was the co-founder and Managing Director of EA Capital, a financial services firm that advised clients on new business and investment opportunities in resource efficiency and productivity. One of the first firms specialized in this area, EA Capital established itself as a leading investment advisory firm focused on Clean Technology.

Diana is a frequent speaker at Clean Technology related conferences and investment forums (e.g. Cleantech Venture Network, Triple Bottom Line, NREL Growth Forum, and the Hewlett and Rockefeller Foundations) and has written on venture capital investing in Clean Technology, for such publications as Morgan Stanley's Investor Outlook and Sustainable Business Investor. Diana is Co-Editor of the ground breaking report, Cleantech Venture Investing: Patterns & Performance, which was published in March of 2005. Diana holds a BA, summa cum laude, from Duke University, and an MBA from the Harvard Business School.

Jerome Vascellaro

Jerome Vascellaro is a Partner at TPG San Francisco office. Prior to joining TPG, Jerome served as Senior Director of McKinsey & Company, an international management consulting firm. He joined McKinsey in 1978 and during his twenty-seven years at McKinsey, he has served clients in the United States and Europe to improve the effectiveness of their organizations, develop strategies for entering new businesses and markets, and turn around troubled businesses. Jerome is very active at his alma mater, Brown University. He serves as Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees. He is past President of the Brown Alumni Association, as well as past National Chair of the Brown Annual Fund, and is currently Co-Chair of Brown's current Campaign. Jerome holds a BS in engineering and economics from Brown University, where he graduated with highest honors, and an MBA from the Harvard Business School, where he graduated as a Baker Scholar. He is also a board member of the Academy of Sciences.

Daniel Weiss

Daniel (Dan) Weiss is the Publisher at Large at St. Martin's Press. Prior to joining St. Martin's Press, Dan was a Publisher of Quamut.com and Sparknotes.com units of Barnes & Noble. He has worked for over thirty years in the fields of communications and publishing, producing books, magazines, and multi-media for children and adults, with a focus on education. A graduate of NYU's School of the Arts in Film and Television, Dan began his career in educational television, making short animated films for Sesame Street, documentaries for the government and public service organizations, and political commercials. In the early seventies, he transitioned into book publishing, working at Golden Press, Scholastic, and Simon and Schuster, prior to forming his own company, Dan Associates, Inc. (DWAI), in 1980. DWAI was the producer of numerous bestsellers, including the SWEET VALLEY HIGH series of books, merchandise and television entertainment; adult how-to books, fiction and magazines. Dan sold DWAI in 2000 to AlloyOnline, a teen marketing company. In 2001, Dan initiated and closed the transaction wherein SparkNotes.com, a start-up online publisher, was acquired by Barnes & Noble, Inc. The company, presently known as Spark Publishing, LLC, is a wholly owned subsidiary with over 550 titles in print after 4 years, and a website that has grown to become the largest educational site on the Internet.