Leila Hessini serves as Director of women’s organizing and community outreach at Ipas, a global organization that promotes women’s sexual and reproductive rights. She co-founded Strategic Analysis for Gender Equity promoting gender and economic justice and global equity. She serves on the boards of the SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Health Collective, the Women’s Global Network for Reproductive Rights and the Mediterranean Women’s Fund. Leila has published widely on issues related to Muslim women, reproductive rights and social justice.

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Marissa C. Wesely is a corporate partner at Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett LLP. She is a member of the board of directors of Legal Momentum, and on the executive committee of DirectWomen. She is a member of her firm's Executive Committee, and the chair of her firm’s Women’s Committee and the founder of a leadership group of senior women lawyers in New York, the Kate Stoneman Project. Marissa is a regular public speaker on issues relating to her practice and on women and leadership. She has designed and taught courses in China and Indonesia on international trade and financing for the (former) Harvard Institute of International Development. She received a 2010 Diversity Champion Award from the Association of the Bar of the City of New York and the 2009 Kay Crawford Murray Award from the State Bar Association in recognition of her efforts to mentor women and promote diversity in the legal profession. Marissa is a graduate of Harvard Law School.

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Dina Dublon serves on the board of directors at Microsoft, PepsiCo, and Accenture. She is a trustee of Carnegie Mellon University. She was also on the faculty of Harvard Business School from 2011-2012. Ms. Dublon is the former Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of JPMorgan Chase, and played a key role in negotiations and merger integration of Chemical Bank with Manufacturers Hanover, Chase, JPMorgan, and Bank One. She was on the Fortune list of the 50 most powerful women in business for several years. She is an active advocate for women’s issues ranging from women in business to refugee women, formerly co-chairing the board of the Women’s Refugee Commission. Born in Brazil, Ms. Dublon holds a Bachelor’s degree in economics and mathematics from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and a Master’s degree from the Business School at Carnegie Mellon University. She is married and has two children.

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Kozue Akibayashi is an Associate Professor at the College of International Relations, Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto, Japan, where she teaches English, Gender Studies, and Peace Education Studies. She served as the International Vice President of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom from 2007 to 2011. She is currently an active part of several international networks on peace, security and gender justice. Her recent research focuses on Okinawa Women Act Against Military Violence, a feminist peace and human rights advocacy movement in Okinawa.

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Julie Parker Benello has over 15 years experience in producing/executive producing award-winning documentaries on global social justice issues that have broadcast in the US and internationally. She is the co-founder of Chicken and Egg Pictures, an innovative nonprofit film fund and production company that provides grants and mentorship to women documentary filmmakers. Chicken & Egg's portfolio of films includes Oscar winners Freeheld and Saving Face along with The Barber of Birmingham and Semper Fi: Always Faithful. She currently invests in social issue cinema via Impact Partners and is an active member of the Women's Donor Network and The Philanthropy Workshop West.

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Charlotte Bunch, Founding Director and Senior Scholar of the Center for Women's Global Leadership, Rutgers University, has been an activist, writer and organizer in feminist and human rights movements for over four decades. A Distinguished Professor in Women’s and Gender Studies, Bunch was previously a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies in DC and a founder of Washington DC Women’s Liberation, The Furies and Quest: A Feminist Quarterly. She has served on the Board of Directors of many organizations and is currently on the board of the Advisory Committee for the Women’s Rights Division of Human Rights Watch and the Global Civil Society Advisory Group for UN Women. She has written numerous influential essays, edited nine anthologies and authored Passionate Politics: Feminist Theory in Action and Demanding Accountability: The Global Campaign and Vienna Tribunal for Women's Human Rights. She is the recipient of several women’s and human rights awards including induction into the National Women’s Hall of Fame, the White House Eleanor Roosevelt Award, and being one of the 1000 women nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

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Abigail Disney is a filmmaker. Her 2008 film, Pray the Devil Back to Hell, won the Best Documentary award at the Tribeca Film Festival. She is also the founder and president of the Daphne Foundation, which provides operating support to grassroots organizations working with low-income communities in New York City. She serves on the board of the White House Project, the Fund for the City of New York and the Roy Disney Family Foundation, and serves as Vice Chair of the board of Shamrock Holdings of California.

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Nurgul Djanaeva is President of the Forum of Women’s NGOs of Kyrgyzstan. She is a founder of a national program that enabled 50 local women to join the Kyrgyz Parliament and other decision-making positions. Nurgul was the vice-president of the International University of Kyrgyzstan, is currently a Steering Committee member of the Asia Pacific Women Watch, and the national Kyrgyzstan coordinator for the UN NGO Network (IRENE), in addition to playing a vital co-ordinating or liaising role with international organizations. She is widely published and is the author of a book “Kyrgyzstan Women in Transition.”

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Lydia Alpízar Durán is the incoming executive director of the Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID). She is co-founder and advisor of ELIGE - Youth Network for Reproductive and Sexual Rights (Mexico), and co-founder of the Latin American and Caribbean Youth Network for Reproductive and Sexual Rights. She serves on the boards of the International Council of Human Rights Policy and the International Committee for the Peace Council.

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Hoda Elsadda holds a Chair in the Study of the Contemporary Arab World at Manchester University and is Co-Director of the Centre for the Advanced Study of the Arab World (CASAW). Before moving to the UK in 2005, she was Professor of English Literature at Cairo University. She co-founded and co-edited Hagar, an interdisciplinary journal in women's studies published in Arabic. Hoda also co-founded and currently chairs the Women and Memory Forum, a feminist research organization based in Egypt, which focuses on gender and Arab cultural history. Hoda is a widely published scholar and activist and her work has focused on Arab and Muslim women’s history and narratives, comparative literature and feminist issues.

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Linda Gruber is a long-time community volunteer and president of the Gruber Family Foundation which funds in the areas of education, progressive media, the arts and women’s issues, including reproductive rights. She also serves on the boards of the San Francisco Museum of Art and Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

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Boriana Jonsson brings many years of expertise in women’s human rights and organizing in conflict areas as a result of her work in the Balkans and most-recently in the Middle-East as a regional coordinator for Kvinna till Kvinna (KtK), a Swedish foundation. Boriana is part of the France-based European Feminist Initiative that is currently lobbying for new Defense and Security policies with the European Union and for a different Europe. She is fluent in Bulgarian, Swedish, English, Russian, and Macedonian/Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian.

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Gay McDougall served as the United Nations Independent Expert on Minority Issues from 2005 to 2011. She is the former executive director of Global Rights. She has also served on the U.N. Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights and the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. She was appointed the only American member of the 1994 Electoral Commission of South Africa, which facilitated the election of Nelson Mandela. In 1999 she was awarded the prestigious MacArthur Foundation Fellowship.

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Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka joins us after a long career in South African politics. With a degree in Social Science and Education from the National University of Lesotho and a Master’s degree in Gender Policy and Planning from the University of Cape Town, Mlambo-Ngucka has also served as a member of the South African Government. As the first woman to hold the position of Deputy President of South Africa, she brings a poignant reminder to our efforts. Although she is no longer directly involved in politics, she continues to be a driving force in social justice. Mlambo-Ngucka has worked closely in youth development issues as Youth Director for the Young Women’s Christian Association and Founder of the Young Women’s International Program. Currently, she is the Executive Chairperson of the Umlambo Foundation.

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Supriya Pillai is one of our youngest Board Members. With a Bachelor’s of Arts in Anthropology from Washington University and a Master’s Degree in International Affairs from Columbia, Pillai has continued to actively participate in social justice movements. While serving as the Executive Director of the Funders’ Collaborative on Youth Organizing, she has helped strengthen youth organizing and grassroots movements throughout the world. Prior, she worked with Population Services International to introduce contraceptive products for women and men in Cambodia and West Africa. She has also served as the Program Officer for Asia at the International Women’s Health Coalition. Read more about Supriya »

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Sakena Yacoobi is the founder and executive director of the Afghan Institute of Learning, one of the largest non-profit organizations in Afghanistan. She is vice president of the board of Creating Hope International. She is the recipient of the 2005 National Endowment for Democracy Award and the 2004 Peter Gruber Foundation - Women's Rights Prize. In 2006, she received the Citizen Leader Award from the University of the Pacific in Stockton, CA and the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship. In 2007, she received an honorary doctorate from the University of the Pacific for her human rights work.

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