Susan Vail Berresford (born 1943) is an American foundation executive. She was the president of the

Ford Foundation The Ford Foundation is an American private foundation with the stated goal of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a US$25,000 gift from Edsel Ford. By 1947, after the dea ...

from 1996-2007. Since November 2008 she has worked as a philanthropy consultant out of the offices of

The New York Community Trust The New York Community Trust is the community foundation for New York City, with divisions in Westchester and Long Island. It is one of the oldest and largest community foundations in the United States and one of the largest funders of New York C ...

Education

Susan Vail Berresford was born in 1943 and attended the

Brearley School The Brearley School is an all-girls private school in New York City, located on the Upper East Side neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan. The school is divided into lower (kindergarten – grade 4), middle (grades 5–8) and upper (grades 9– ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

. She attended

Vassar College Vassar College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Poughkeepsie, New York, United States. Founded in 1861 by Matthew Vassar, it was the second degree-granting institution of higher education for women in the United States, closely fol ...

for two years and then transferred to study American history at

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and he ...

, where she graduated cum laude in 1965.

Career

Berresford served as a program officer for the Neighborhood Youth Corps from 1965 until 1967. In 1967-68, she worked for the Manpower Career Development Agency. Berresford joined the

in 1970 as a project assistant in the Division of National Affairs. Between 1972 and 1980 she served as a program officer in that division. In 1980 she was named officer in charge of the foundation's women's programs. She became vice president for the foundation's U.S. and International Affairs programs in 1981, and subsequently served as vice president of the Program Division in charge of worldwide programming. She later became executive vice president and chief operating officer of the foundation before being elected the first female president of the foundation on April 3, 1996. In 2003, she co-founded the

United States Artists United States Artists (USA) is a national arts funding organization based in Chicago. USA is dedicated to supporting living artists and cultural practitioners across the United States by granting unrestricted awards. Mission The organization' ...

and is currently a trustee. In 2019, the philanthropic foundation founded the Berresford Prize which recognizes a cultural practitioner for their work for artists. Berresford joined the U.S. Fund for UNICEF's national Board in October 2008.

Board of directors

Berresford is a board member of the Council on Foundations and th
Japan Center for International Exchange (JCIE/USA)
and a member of the

Trilateral Commission The Trilateral Commission is a nongovernmental international organization aimed at fostering closer cooperation between Japan, Western Europe and North America. It was founded in July 1973 principally by American banker and philanthropist David R ...

and has served on the Boards of the Chase Manhattan Corporation and the Hermine and Robert Popper Foundation. She serves as an advisory board member of the Trinidad Trust Fund (California), and is a member of the

Council on Foreign Relations The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an American think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international relations. Founded in 1921, it is a nonprofit organization that is independent and nonpartisan. CFR is based in New York Ci ...

. She is a trustee of The California Endowment and the

Kaiser Family Foundation KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation), also known as The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, is an American non-profit organization, headquartered in San Francisco, California. It prefers KFF since its legal name can cause confusion as it is no longer a ...

. She is the convener of the U.S.–Vietnam Dialogue Group on Agent Orange/Dioxin.

Awards

She was elected a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, ...

in 1998.

References

External links

The Ford Foundation

The New York Community Trust

Profile
at

SourceWatch The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) is a progressive nonprofit watchdog and advocacy organization based in Madison, Wisconsin. CMD publishes ExposedbyCMD.org, SourceWatch.org, and ALECexposed.org. History CMD was founded in 1993 by progre ...

United States Artists

Kaiser Family Foundation

The Japan Center for International Exchange (JCIE/USA)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Berresford, Susan 1943 births Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Living people People from New York (state) UNICEF people Vassar College alumni Radcliffe College alumni American chief operating officers