Network Experts

The National Council for Research on Women’s highly informed, articulate experts can address some of today’s most complex issues and make them accessible to a wide range of audiences. From sustainable development to pay equity, and from women’s human rights to health care, the more than 2,000 researchers and specialists in our network are sources of information, analysis and inspiration.

If you have a conference, a panel or a news story in preparation and need some expertise, search our database of leaders and change-makers using the filter below or contact us directly at ncrw@ncrw.org.

Anne Erni
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New York , New York

Anne Erni is an innovative leader who is Global Head of Leadership, Learning and Diversity at Bloomberg where she manages global initiatives and develops people to reach their potential. At Bloomberg, she manages global initiatives in leadership and diversity. Prior, she was Chief Diversity Officer at Lehman Brothers pioneering global efforts in the retention and advancement of women and under-represented groups in financial services and she created the award-winning Encore program, to re-train individuals resuming their careers. Anne has 15 years of banking and capital markets experience with private and public sector clients. She received her BA and MA from The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and Bologna, Italy.

Saru Jayaraman & Fekkak Mamdouh
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New York , New York

Saru Jayaraman, Co-Founder and Co-Director of the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC-United), is an attorney, organizer, and a professor. Saru is a graduate of Yale Law School and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and co-editor of The New Urban Immigrant Workforce, (ME Sharpe, 2005).

Fekkak Mamdouh, Co-Founder and Co-Director of the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, is an immigrant from Morocco with over 14 years of experience in the New York City Restaurant Industry. Mamdouh was always a staunch worker advocate and his life has been profiled in the book , The Accidental American, published September 2008 by Barrett-Koehler Press.

Kadija Ferryman
New York , New York
As Member Center Relations Liaison, Kadija Ferryman coordinates the activities pertaining to NCRW’s over 100 Member Centers. At the Council she builds relationships with existing members, conducts outreach with potential centers, connects Member Centers to research opportunities within the Council and beyond, and works on special projects such as the annual Member Center Awards and Annual Conference. She worked for six years as a public policy researcher at the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C. where she conducted in-depth research on public housing transformation in cities across the country. She is a graduate of Yale University and is currently pursuing a PhD in Anthropology at the New School where she completed her Master’s degree.
Deborah Frett
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Washington , District Of Columbia

Deborah L. Frett joined the Business and Professional Women's Foundation (BPW) as CEO in May 2005 after more than 30 years of providing strategic direction and executive management to associations as well as for-profit and start-up organizations. She is a leading advocate for working women, women veterans, green job development for women, Gen Y women in the workplace and redefining the workplace to meet the needs of the 21st century. She is a frequent speaker and panelist and has provided congressional testimony and served as an expert for briefings on issues impacting working women, families, and veterans.

Deborah A. Freund
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Claremont , California

Professor Deborah A. Freund is the 15th President of Claremont Graduate University (CGU) and is an internationally known health economist and outcomes researcher. She is particularly known for her work on total knee replacement and Medicaid. She brings extensive administrative experience to her service as president of Claremont Graduate University. Freund was vice chancellor and provost at Syracuse University from 1999-2006, and held the title of Distinguished Professor of Public Administration and Economics from Syracuse’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs beginning in 2004. In addition to her faculty position at the Maxwell School, she was a senior research associate at the school’s Center for Policy Research. She came to Syracuse University from Indiana University Bloomington (IU) where she was vice chancellor and dean of the faculties, and special advisor to the president and vice president of the IU System on Academic Affairs for five years.

Mildred Garcia
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Fullerton , California

Mildred García, Ed.D., is the incoming president of California State University, Fullerton, and currently serves in that capacity at CSU Dominguez Hills, where she has been since 2007. She is the first Latina president of the CSU system. During her tenure, García has cut costs, boosted enrollment, increased student graduation rates and expanded fundraising. She facilitated the first endowed professorship, the Wallis Annenberg Endowed Professor for Innovation in STEM Education.

García is a scholar in the field of higher education, and her research and publications have concentrated on equity in higher education and its impact on policy practice. She is a much sought-after speaker at national and international conferences, and serves on the boards of many higher education organizations.

Mary Gatta
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Washington , District Of Columbia

Dr. Mary Gatta is currently a Senior Scholar, at Wider Opportunities for Women. Prior to that she served as a Director, Gender and Workforce Policy at the Center for Women and Work, and on the faculty in the Department of Labor Studies and Employment Relations at Rutgers University. She holds a PhD and M.A. in Sociology from Rutgers University and a B.A. in Social Science from Providence College. Her areas of expertise include gender and public policy, low wage workers, earnings inequality, and evaluation research on workforce projects.

Jessica Gonzalez-Rojas
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New York , New York

Jessica González-Rojas is the Executive Director of the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health, the only national reproductive justice organization that specifically works to advance reproductive health and rights for Latinas.  Jessica spearheads research, field organizing, and advocacy operations in the organization's New York headquarters as well as its Washington DC policy office, and is a national spokesperson and leading national advocate for Latinas.  She has been a member of the strategic management team at NLIRH for five years, where she played a pivotal role in establishing the organization as a leading voice for Latinas in national policy discussions in Washington DC and in targeted states, and where she forged new partnerships with allied movements such as immigration, sexual health and rights, and anti-violence. 

Fatima Goss Graves
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Washington , District Of Columbia

Fatima Goss Graves is Vice President for Education and Employment at the National Women's Law Center, where she works to promote the rights of women and girls at school and in the workplace, with a particular emphasis on improving dropout rates for girls, ensuring nondiscrimination in athletics and nontraditional fields for women, advancing equal pay for equal work and the development of fundamental legal principles of equal opportunity. She uses a number of advocacy strategies in her work on these issues ranging from public education and legislative advocacy to litigation, including briefs in the Supreme Court and federal courts of appeals. Prior to joining the Center, she worked as an appellate and trial litigator at Mayer Brown LLP. She began her career as a law clerk for the Honorable Diane P. Wood of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Ms. Goss Graves is a graduate of the University of California at Los Angeles and Yale Law School.

Beverly Guy-Sheftall
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Atlanta , Georgia

Beverly Guy Sheftall, Ph.D., is the founding director of the Women's Research and Resource Center and the Anna Julia Cooper Professor of Women's Studies at Spelman College.  She is also adjunct professor at Emory University's Institute for Women's Studies where she teaches graduate courses. At the age of sixteen, she entered Spelman College where she majored in English and minored in secondary education.  After graduation with honors, she attended Wellesley College for a fifth year of study in English.  In 1968, she entered Atlanta to pursue a master's degree in English; her thesis was entitled, "Faulkner's Treatment of Women in His Major Novels."  A year later she began her first teaching job in the Department of English at Alabama State University in Montgomery, Alabama.