Marie C. Wilson

Marie C. Wilson President, The White House Project / Women's Leadership Fund. "An advocate of women's issues for more than 30 years, Marie Wilson is founder and president of The White House Project, co-creator of Take Our Daughters to Work Day and author of Closing the Leadership Gap: Why Women Can and Must Help Run the World (Viking 2004). Wilson founded The White House Project in 1998 in recognition of the need to build a truly representative democracy - one where women lead alongside men in all spheres.

"Wilson started The White House Project while she was still president of the Ms. Foundation for Women, a position she has held since 1984. She stepped down as president of the Ms. Foundation on June 30th, 2004 to devote her full energy to The White House Project. She was president of both organizations for six years. In honor of her work, the Ms. Foundation has created The Marie C. Wilson Leadership Fund, which will be under her sole advisement...

"Over the last thirty years, Wilson's accomplishments span becoming the first woman elected to the Des Moines City Council as a member-at-large in 1983, co-authoring the critically acclaimed Mother Daughter Revolution (1993, Bantam Books), and serving as an official government delegate to the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, China in 1995. And in the year 2000, in conjunction with Mattel, Wilson brought the world President Barbie.

"As president of the Ms. Foundation for Women, Wilson increased the Foundation's budget from $400,000 to $8.6 million, established an endowment fund, which now stands at $22 million and created innovative and sustainable programming...

"Marie Wilson, was recognized in September 2006 by Civic Ventures, a think tank that works to reframe the debate about aging in America and redefine the second half of life as a source of social and individual renewal." 


 * Director, State of Change
 * Winner of the 2002 Robert W. Scrivner Award for Creative Grantmaking