Press Releases

Celebrating a Remarkable Career of Leadership

Ms. Berresford, with staff and recipients of the International Fellowships Program, announcing a $75 million extension of the program through 2014.

NEW YORK, 2 January 2008—The Ford Foundation this week celebrates the remarkable career of Susan V. Berresford, who retires on Friday after 12 years as president of the foundation.

Ms. Berresford's distinguished career at the Ford Foundation began 38 years ago. After joining the staff as a program assistant in 1970, she held a variety of positions, including vice president for programs and chief operating officer, before succeeding Franklin Thomas as president in 1996.

Under her leadership, the Ford Foundation expanded its 70-year record of achievement in advancing human welfare by focusing on the most marginalized. Partnering with thousands of grantees in the United States and around the world, the foundation continued its work on advancing economic opportunity, strengthening the arts, ensuring access to education, promoting good governance, reducing poverty and protecting human rights and women's rights.

"Susan has been a tremendous steward of the Ford Foundation, inspiring staff and grantees to find bold new approaches to some of our world's most pressing problems," said Kathryn S. Fuller, chair of the Board of Trustees. "Her tenure is marked by a series of innovative and ambitious programs that will continue to create opportunity, strengthen communities, and improve lives for years to come."

Among the major initiatives Ms. Berresford oversaw: a major graduate fellowship program for thousands of marginalized men and women around the world; a national initiative to support artists; and major investments in homeownership and matched savings for tens of thousands of low-income Americans.

"Her commitment to supporting courageous people, her dedication to the spirit of fairness and to democratic values, and her vision and leadership form a truly unique combination," Fuller said. "She has lived the values that lie at the center of this institution's charter and mission, and the Ford Foundation is better for it."

Throughout her presidency, the foundation continued to build new organizations to help address long-term challenges such as conflict and AIDS. It was the prime funder behind the creation of the International Center for Transitional Justice, which helps societies emerging from conflict create processes that secure sustainable peace. Under her leadership, the foundation supported the creation and capitalization of nearly two dozen new foundations around the world that tackle human rights and other difficult issues at the local level. Also during her tenure, Ford launched a worldwide foundation initiative to empower grassroots organizations working on the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

Ms. Berresford will be succeeded by Luis A. Ubiñas, who will become the foundation's ninth president on January 7, 2008. His appointment followed a national and international search that began a year ago after Ms. Berresford announced plans to retire.

"Ford will always be committed to people struggling for equity and fairness, for opportunity, for the expression of ideas and knowledge, and for principles of democratic decision-making and accountability," Berresford told foundation staff. "No one could feel luckier than I do to be associated with each of you, who have in various ways made possible the accomplishments of our remarkable grantees."

To learn more about the 70-year history of the Ford Foundation, explore our interactive timeline.

Photos:
John Harrington
Stephen Jaffe
Tran Viet Dungz

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The Ford Foundation is an independent, nonprofit grant-making organization. For more than half a century it has been a resource for innovative people and institutions worldwide, guided by its goals of strengthening democratic values, reducing poverty and injustice, promoting international cooperation and advancing human achievement. With headquarters in New York, the foundation has offices in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Latin America, and Russia.