Hilary Pennington
Director of Special Initiatives
U.S. Programs
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Ms. Pennington currently serves as Director of Special Initiatives, U.S. Programs for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She co-founded Jobs for the Future, widely recognized as one of the leading research and policy development organizations in the United States regarding issues of education, workforce development, and future work requirements. She also served as its CEO for 21 years, from its founding in 1983 until October 2004, when Marlene B. Seltzer became president and CEO.

As vice chair of the JFF Board of Directors, Ms. Pennington focuses on JFF's long-term goals and program development. In addition, as senior advisor for JFF's initiatives in education reform, she helps guide work on practices and public policies that promote the advancement to and through college of populations most at risk of being left behind in new economy.

Since 1983, Ms. Pennington has overseen JFF's extensive research and policy agenda, as well as its consulting to over 20 states and many communities on the issues of economic change, youth transitions, and workforce development. Jobs for the Future's policy work has been nationally influential, and its designs for a comprehensive approach to workforce development have been implemented by seven governors. Ms. Pennington and JFF worked with the Secretaries of Labor and Education to design landmark federal legislation, the School To Work Opportunities Act, which provided over $1 billion to help states and communities build better systems for supporting youth transitions from high school to postsecondary education and rewarding careers.

Ms. Pennington has been an advocate for better support for young people making the transition to adulthood, for more effective education and training policies, and for expanded access to economic opportunity for low-income individuals. She has served as a consultant to national foundations and corporations as they develop programs on these issues.

Ms. Pennington has worked on the national level on a variety of initiatives joining work and lifelong learning. As senior advisor to JFF on education, she currently plays a leading role in the Early College High School Network. Since 2001, the Early College High School Network has received more than $124 million in support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, and the Ford Foundation. By fall 2008, more than 180 early college high schools will exist throughout the country, ultimately serving more than 65,000 students. JFF leads the implementation of the network.

Ms. Pennington was a member of Clinton's Presidential Transition team in 1992 and co-chaired the Presidential Advisory Committee on Expanding Training Opportunities until 2002. She has advised President Clinton and the first Bush administration on workforce and education policies.

In 1999, the National Academy for Human Resources selected Ms. Pennington for membership, recognizing her leadership in the field of human resources and workforce development. She has written for numerous publications, including the Harvard Business Review, Women's Policy Journal, Christian Science Monitor, and The Boston Globe. She has appeared extensively on national and regional television and radio, including the Today Show and National Public Radio. Sought after as a public speaker, she has keynoted annual meetings of many national education and business associations, both in the United States and abroad. She spoke at President Clinton's Economic Summit in Little Rock in 1992 and keynoted U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair's New Deal conference in 1999.

A frequent author, Ms. Pennington's recent writings include Fast Track to College: Increasing Postsecondary Success for All Students (prepared for the Center for American Progress and the Institute for America's Future), Ready for Tomorrow: Helping All Students Achieve Secondary and Postsecondary Success (with Richard Kazis of JFF and Kristin Conklin of the National Governors Association), "Accelerating Advancement in School and Work," prepared for Brookings Papers on Education Policy (Diane Ravitch, ed.), and Bridge to Postsecondary Success (with Joel Vargas of JFF).

Prior to founding Jobs for the Future, Ms. Pennington worked in corporate strategy and public policy at Aetna and the Boston Consulting Group. She is a graduate of the Yale School of Management and Yale College, where she graduated summa cum laude. She also holds a graduate degree in Social Anthropology from Oxford University. In 2000, Ms. Pennington was a Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, on a one-year sabbatical from Jobs for the Future.

Ms. Pennington serves on the boards of the Milton Hershey School and the Hershey Trust Company, the Independent Sector, the Corporation for Enterprise Development, and the Massachusetts Institute for a New Commonwealth. She also serves on the MIT Task Force on Changing Labor Market Institutions, the Board of Overseers of the Annenberg Institute, and the Board of Visitors of the Women's Educational and Industrial Union.