Speakers and Special Guests
Town Hall with Chris Jansing
Building a New American Dream
Veteran journalist Chris Jansing hosts "Jansing and Co." weekdays on msnbc TV. An Otterbein University graduate with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Broadcast Journalism, Jansing joined NBC News in June 1998. Some of the many current events she has reported on include the Torino and Vancouver Olympics, the deaths of Michael Jackson and John F. Kennedy, Jr., and the Columbine shootings. Jansing has traveled the world in pursuit of other major stories as well. She has also reported from the 2000 and 2004 Presidential campaign trails, national conventions, and the Presidential Inaugurations.
In addition, Jansing's duties extend to NBC News, serving as correspondent, substitute anchor, and hosting primetime specials for msnbc. Throughout her extensive career Jansing has received an Emmy Award (coverage of the 1996 Olympic bombing in Atlanta), a "Best Documentary" award ("In The Land of Plenty," a report on hunger in NY state) and numerous awards for excellence in journalism. She has also received many community service awards for her commitment to children. Jansing is a native of Fairport Harbor, Ohio.
Shirley Sagawa
Shirley Sagawa is the author of the recent book, The American Way to Change: How National Service and Volunteers are Transforming America, and co-author of two award-winning books, The Charismatic Organization and Common Interest, Common Good. She is co-founder of sagawa/jospin, a consulting firm that has, since 2001, provided strategic counsel to nonprofits and foundations, including Bloomberg Philanthropies, America Forward, The Presidio Trust, YouthBuild USA and America’s Promise. Sagawa also serves as a visiting fellow at the Center for American Progress, where she is a leading expert on national service policy, and blogs regularly for the Huffington Post.
In the field of social innovation, Sagawa was the lead architect of legislation creating AmeriCorps and the Social Innovation Fund. Sagawa served as a presidential appointee in both the first Bush and Clinton Administrations and led the Obama Transition for the Corporation for National and Community Service. As special assistant to President Clinton for domestic policy, she drafted the legislation that created AmeriCorps and the Corporation for National and Community Service. After Senate-confirmation as the Corporation’s first managing director, she led the development of the new agency and its programs. She also served as deputy chief of staff to First Lady Hillary Clinton.
Sagawa was the founding executive director of the Learning First Alliance, a partnership of national education associations. She served as the chief counsel for youth policy for the Senate Labor Committee and as senior counsel to the National Women’s Law Center. She serves on numerous nonprofit boards and advisory councils.
Sagawa is a cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School, holds a master’s degree from the London School of Economics and graduated magna cum laude from Smith College.
Caryn McTighe Musil
 Caryn McTighe Musil is the Senior Vice President at the Association of American Colleges and Universities and oversees the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Global Initiatives. Under her leadership, the office has been working to mobilize powerful and overlapping educational reform movements involving civic, diversity, global learning, women’s issues, and personal and social responsibility. Dr. Musil has special expertise in curriculum and faculty development, which she applies through a variety of programming.
Dr. Musil also serves as Director of the Program on the Status and Education of Women, which produces an online newsletter "On Campus with Women", offers workshops on women's leadership, and provides national leadership on issues concerning women in higher education. In 2005, Dr. Musil received the Donna Shavlik Award for Sustained and Continuing Commitment to Women’s Advancement in Higher Education.
Current projects that Dr. Musil is involved with are "Core Commitments: Educating Students for Personal and Social Responsibility"- a multi-project national initiative, "Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement" – partnering with Global Perspective Institute (GPI) in a Department of Education project, and "General Education for a Global Century" which seeks to infuse global learning throughout the general education curriculum. For the past ten years, Dr. Musil has also served on the steering committee of the International Consortium for Higher Education, Civic Responsibility, and Democracy in partnership with the Council of Europe. She has been working with the Council of Europe to further the global aspect of civic engagement so that institutions can foster student learning about democratic cultures and human rights in our world.
Kerrii B. Anderson
Honorary Chair, Women and the New American Dream
Former Chief Executive Officer and President
Wendy’s International, Inc.
Kerrii B. Anderson is the former chief executive officer and president of Wendy’s International. She joined the company in September 2000 as executive vice president and chief financial officer. She was promoted to the CEO position in April 2006 and left upon the merger of Wendy’s with Triarc Companies, Inc., to form Wendy’s/Arby’s Group Inc. in September 2008.
Anderson provided leadership to the corporation as CEO in a time of transition, recognizing the need to transact while transforming Wendy’s. She developed a strategic vision and plan for the Wendy’s brand on a standalone basis, with support of the Board, which included activist shareholder nominees. She and her team executed the IPO and spin-off of Tim Hortons, creating $4 billion of value for shareholders. During this time of uncertainly, she engineered the turn-around of Wendy’s sales, as well as filled the product pipeline. She lead the reorganization of field operations and corporate to include early retirement and reduction of workforce to achieve a $100 million reduction in G&A and Field cost in 2007. Kerrii successfully executed a seamless transition of the merger of Wendy’s and Triarc, which resulted from a year long Board Strategic Committee process. She was a member of the company’s board of directors from 2001.
Prior to joining Wendy’s, she was senior vice president and chief financial officer for 14 years for M/I Schottenstein Homes, Inc., a NYSE company that is one of the nation’s leading builders of single-family homes.
Anderson’s financial career includes positions in accounting and investment firms, as well as public companies, including KPMG and RJR Nabisco.
Anderson sits on the boards of Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings (LH), Chiquita Brands International (CQB), P.F. Chang’s Bistro (PFCB) and Worthington Industries, Inc. (WOR). She also serves on the Columbus Foundation Audit Committee, Ohio Health Board of Trustees and Finance Committee member and Elon University Board of Trustees.
She is a certified public accountant and earned her master of business administration degree from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. Anderson graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in business administration and a minor in accounting and economics from Elon University in North Carolina.
She has been married to Douglas Anderson for 24 years and has two children: Alexa, 18, and Taff, 15.
Elizabeth Clay Roy
Deputy Director of Opportunity Nation
Elizabeth Clay Roy is the Deputy Director of Opportunity Nation. Opportunity Nation is a campaign to promote opportunity, social mobility, and access to the American Dream. It is a broad coalition of over 200 businesses, non-profits, educational institutions, and community groups creating a bipartisan plan to create better skills, better jobs, and better communities. Elizabeth lives in New York City, and volunteers with iMentor and the International Commission for Dalit Rights.
Before joining Be the Change, Inc. she served for three years in the Office of Governor Deval Patrick, as a Policy Advisor and then as Director of Grassroots Governance and Commonwealth Corps. Before joining the Patrick administration, she researched housing and community revitalization at Abt Associates.
Elizabeth is also the co-author of Shaping Vibrant Cities, a guidebook on effective community planning and political engagement for neighborhood organizations. It is based on community organizing work with Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy in Bangalore, India. She is a graduate from Columbia University and holds a Master in City Planning degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Elizabeth will present the Opportunity Index during the event's welcoming address on Saturday morning.
Justice Evelyn Lundberg Stratton
Supreme Court of Ohio
Justice Evelyn Lundberg Stratton, of the Supreme Court of Ohio, came to the bench by a very different route. Born to missionary parents in Bangkok, Thailand, she spent her childhood in Southeast Asia at the height of the Vietnam War. At age 18, she returned to America alone, with only a few hundred dollars in her pocket. In 1989, she became the first woman to be elected judge of the Franklin County Common Pleas Court. It was there that she earned her reputation as “The Velvet Hammer” for her approach to sentencing in serious felony cases. She has served on the Supreme Court of Ohio since 1996.
Justice Stratton’s efforts in the community and her commitment to family have led to major changes in adoption law and significant mental-health reforms in the courts, both in Ohio and nationally. She focuses on trying to divert persons with mental illness from the court system back into care in the mental-health system. This reduces costs, improves public safety and helps people regain their lives. Her latest focus in Ohio and nationally is on establishing veterans courts to help those returning veterans with PTSD and other issues, whose problems may lead to involvement in the criminal justice system.
She also is a wife and a mother who enjoys painting, Thai cooking, and fly fishing with her husband.
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