Meet the Board
The ANWC Board of Governors is developed by a nominating committee. The slate of nominees is voted on by the Club membership. Members serve for two-year terms. To be considered for serving on the next board, please contact the club president.
ANWC Board of Governors 2012–2013
(Standing left to right): Jing-yi Hong Liu, M. Eileen Higgins, Claire Sanders Swift, Margaret Ryan, Virginia Daly (Lower
left to right): Donna St. John, Margot Raphael and Karen James Cody
PRESIDENT
Claire Sanders Swift
Executive Managing Partner, Swift Global Media
president@anwc.org
Currently a national media strategist, Claire spent two decades in the trenches producing for ABC News, NBC News in New York, Harpo Productions/Paramount Pictures in Los Angeles and in home town Washington, DC, on landmark TV series for HBO and PBS. She is the recipient of two Emmys, a National Headliner Award and was nominated for an Emmy. As Executive Managing Partner of Swift Global Media, her boutique media and communications firm, she represents a range of high profile clients and nonprofits. She joined the American News Women’s Club (ANWC) in 2008, moving quickly to the Board as Vice President of Strategic Development; she was the Benefit Chair for ANWC's successful Roast and Toast of Diane Rehm in 2011. She is on the board of two other nonprofit organizations and is a voting member of the National Television Academy.
TREASURER
Margaret L. Ryan
Washington Correspondent, AOL Energy Online Business News
Currently Washington correspondent for AOL Energy online business news and covering U.S. natural gas regulation for Interfax’s Natural Gas Report, Margaret is a veteran of three decades of reporting and analyzing energy and environment issues in Washington and around the world. She was executive editor for EnergyNOW!/Clean Skies News, and reported from the 2008 Democratic and Republican National Conventions. She served as editorial director of the multi-platform global nuclear and coal groups of McGraw-Hill's Platts energy information service. A member of ANWC since the late 90s, Margaret was ANWC President from (2003–2005) and has led the ANWC Scholarship Committee for the last three years.
SECRETARY
Margot Raphael
Retired Information/Publications Manager
Retired Information/Publications Manager Margot Raphael’s expertise includes all aspects of publication development and dissemination. She managed the development and publication of the last three published Surgeon General Reports on Smoking and Health and five volumes in the National Cancer Institute Tobacco Control Monograph Series. Margot has been a member of ANWC for nearly 40 years, serving on the Board in the early 80s.
VICE PRESIDENT- MEMBERSHIP
Donna St. John
Assistant Editor, National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association
vpmembership@anwc.org
Donna is the Assistant Editor on a magazine published by the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association (NARFE), Donna St. John previously was Vice President of Communications at USO World Headquarters, where she accompanied USO tours to Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, UAE, Cuba, Egypt and Turkey and was responsible for directing and coordinating media relations and tour publicity. Previously, she had been news service director at the Department of Veterans Affairs, and worked on magazines at AARP and the United States Information Agency.
VICE PRESIDENT – COMMUNICATIONS/HOUSE
M. Eileen Higgins, D.M.
Communications, Professor of Management, Writer, Visiting Professor
shoptalk@anwc.org
After recently retiring as a university professor, Dr. Higgins has returned full circle to her publishing career roots. Her first position after college was for Signal Magazine in Washington, DC. She has worked as an independent writer and editor for firms and newspapers in the Washington, DC, and Baltimore area, at Aspen Publishers as a senior managing editor, as publications director for the American Society for Parental and Enteral Nutrition, and as book editor for The Aspen Institute in Wye, Maryland. She joined the American News Women’s Club in the late 70s.
GOVERNOR AND PAST PRESIDENT
Karen James Cody
Communications Director, Bloomberg BNA
Karen is the Communications Director at Bloomberg BNA. Her communications background includes strategic planning, media relations, marketing, graphic design project management, environmental technical writing, and academic and technical editing. Karen previously served on the ANWC Board of Governors from 1999–2003 and as its President from (2001–2003). She has been active for many years with the DC nonprofit For Love of Children, and its subsidiary Fred Taylor Scholarship Program and Educational Guidance & Advocacy Program. She is also on the Board of Black Women Playwrights’ Group of Washington, DC. In her spare time, she writes and edits fiction.
GOVERNOR AND PAST PRESIDENT
M. Virginia (Ginny) Daly
President of Washington D.C. Communications Company
President of her own communications firm in Washington, DC, for more than 30 years, Ginny’s clients included National Geographic, the Washington Post, the Smithsonian, Kiplinger Washington Editors, U.S. News &World Report, Time-Life Books, the Metropolitan Museum, and numerous trade associations. She was president of ANWC from (1986–1988), chaired three benefit galas, and served on the Board of Governors several times since becoming a member in 1977. She authored the million-copy “Expect the Unexpected” for the American Red Cross. Ginny was named “Woman of the Year” by the Women’s Direct Response Group, and has served on the board of the national Direct Marketing Association and as its President. She was elected the first woman to chair the 100,000-member national Rails-to-Trails Conservancy, is the Delaware editor of Shore Life magazine, and is a distinguished member of the Cosmos Club.
GOVERNOR
Jingyi H. Liu, Ph.D.
Consultant/Lecturer Cross-Cultural Communication, Independent TV Producer
Jing-yi is a cross-cultural communication consultant/lecturer and independent TV producer. She co-produced with WNVC an award-winning broadcast from China to the US, entitled Shangdong: China’s New Open Door, and produced interview programs for CCTV’s Business Half Hour. She was a contract interpreter for the Department of State over a span of two decades (1981-2003) and served as a coordinator/interpreter for ABC, NBC and CBS news networks during TV coverage of President Nixon’s visit to China, President Ford’s visit to China, and the interview of Deng Xiaoping on the normalization of US-China relations. Jing-yi worked with Pulitzer award winning journalists David Broder, Haynes Johnson, William Raspberry, and Jonathan Kaufman during their trips to major Chinese universities as participants in the ‘Journalist in Residence’ program organized by US-China Education Trust (2004–2007). She joined the ANWC in the late 90s.
IMMEDIATE PAST PRESIDENT
Lynn Donnelly Gorton
President and Principal, Gorton Channing Associates, LLC
Lynn Gorton is the Principal and Co-Founder of Gorton Channing Associates, LLC, a strategic communication and management consulting firm. She has served ANWC as its President (2010–2012); President Elect (2008–2010); and Vice President, House (2007–2008). She also chaired the 2012 Benefit Gala, Co-Chaired the 2010 Benefit Gala (with Theresa Werner), and served on benefit committees in 2006, 2009, and 2011.
Committee Chairs
CHAIR OF PROGRAMS
Joyce Beattie
For any information or to volunteer to join a Committee, please contact Janina Roncevic, Staff Liaison, phone 202-332-6770 or via email anwclub@comcast.net.