Jo Ann Jenkins

Last updated

Jo Ann Jenkins
AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins in New York City (2018).jpg
Jenkins in 2018
Born (1958-02-08) February 8, 1958 (age 66)
Mon Louis Island, Alabama, U.S.
Education Spring Hill College (BA)
SpouseFrank Jenkins
Children2

Jo Ann Jenkins (born February 8, 1958) is the former CEO of AARP. [1] She was appointed on September 1, 2014, having previously served as chief operating officer from 2013 to 2014. [2] She retired from the role at the end of 2024. [3] Between 1994 and 2010, she was a senior adviser, chief of staff, and chief operating officer of the Library of Congress. [2]

Contents

Early life and education

A native of Mon Louis Island, Alabama, Jenkins graduated from Theodore High School in Theodore, Alabama, in 1976 and went on to attend Spring Hill College. where she majored in political science. [2]

Career

After graduating from Spring Hill College in 1980, she became a voter outreach worker on Ronald Reagan's 1980 Presidential Campaign. [2] Following the campaign in 1981, she began working as an executive assistant at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and later moved to the U.S. Department of Transportation, where she served as special assistant to U.S. Secretary of Transportation Elizabeth Dole from 1985 to 1987. [2] In this role, Jenkins and Dole led an effort to bring women into leadership positions across the DOT. [1] [4] She spent three years in the private sector as a partner for quality management services from 1987 to 1990. [2] Jenkins then joined the U.S. Department of Agriculture as director of the department's Office of Advocacy and Enterprise, a position she held from 1990 to 1993. [2]

Library of Congress

Between 1994 and 2010, Jenkins was a senior adviser, chief of staff, and Chief Operating Officer of the Library of Congress. [2] In 2001 she worked with then-first lady Laura Bush and Librarian of Congress James H. Billington to launch the National Book Festival, [5] [6] an annual intergenerational event that promotes reading and literacy by bringing in authors, illustrators and poets for presentations, talks and book signings. The festival grew to become a large-scale event, with more than 200,000 people attending in 2016. [7] In 2008 she developed the Library of Congress Experience, [8] which digitized important written works including the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, and the Constitution of the United States. This allowed people visiting the library to compare the rough drafts of these founding documents with their final versions, showing edits, corrections and margin notes made by key authors including Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams. [9]

AARP

Jenkins joined AARP in 2010 as president of AARP Foundation, the organization's affiliated charity. In this role, she focused the foundation on four areas of work affecting Americans age 50 and up: income insecurity, housing, isolation and hunger. [10] She created a program with NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon [11] called Drive to End Hunger, which drew attention to the issue of food insecurity among older Americans by donating 36 million meals and providing funding to more than 100 organizations fighting hunger in the U.S. [12]

Following one year as chief operating officer, Jenkins was appointed CEO in 2014. According to The Washington Post , Jenkins "fundamentally recast the organization’s mission" [6] based on the trend of longevity. AARP was originally formed to serve people approaching and in retirement but she observed that as Americans are living longer they are working longer and are eschewing previous generations' definition of what lifestyles they choose to live at and beyond age 50. She described this shift, saying "we know that people who continue to work or even volunteer can live longer than people who don't. So all those misperceptions of what people want when they retire or what they want to do in their older life I think is being totally torn apart by the idea that people are going to live longer, healthier — and hopefully in better financial shape — than they had in the past." [13] Under Jenkins' tenure close to half of AARP's 38 million members are still working full- or part-time, [6] representing her strategy to evolve AARP as Boomers and Generation Xers desire and need to continue working longer than their parents' generations.[ citation needed ] She oversaw the introduction of new benefits designed to help AARP members find work at employers with age-friendly employment practices [14] and continued the organization's involvement in advancing legislation to strengthen federal age discrimination laws. [15] [16]

In March 2024, Jenkins announced she would retire as CEO at the end of the year. [17] She was succeeded in November 2024 by Myechia Minter-Jordan. [3]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chief executive officer</span> Highest-ranking officer of an organization

A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hunger</span> Sustained inability to eat sufficient food

In politics, humanitarian aid, and the social sciences, hunger is defined as a condition in which a person does not have the physical or financial capability to eat sufficient food to meet basic nutritional needs for a sustained period. In the field of hunger relief, the term hunger is used in a sense that goes beyond the common desire for food that all humans experience, also known as an appetite. The most extreme form of hunger, when malnutrition is widespread, and when people have started dying of starvation through lack of access to sufficient, nutritious food, leads to a declaration of famine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Summerville, South Carolina</span> Town in South Carolina, United States

Summerville is a town in the U.S. state of South Carolina situated mostly in Dorchester County, with small portions in Berkeley and Charleston counties. Summerville is seventh biggest city in the state. The town lies approximately five miles from the Ashley River. It is part of the Charleston-North Charleston-Summerville, SC Metropolitan Statistical Area. Summerville's population at the 2020 census was 50,915.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Food security</span> Measure of the availability and accessibility of food

Food security is the state of having reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food. The availability of food for people of any class and state, gender or religion is another element of food security. Similarly, household food security is considered to exist when all the members of a family, at all times, have access to enough food for an active, healthy life. Individuals who are food-secure do not live in hunger or fear of starvation. Food security includes resilience to future disruptions of food supply. Such a disruption could occur due to various risk factors such as droughts and floods, shipping disruptions, fuel shortages, economic instability, and wars. Food insecurity is the opposite of food security: a state where there is only limited or uncertain availability of suitable food.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">AARP</span> American nonprofit organization

AARP, formerly the American Association of Retired Persons, is an interest group in the United States focusing on issues affecting those 50 years old and older. The organization, which is headquartered in Washington, D.C., said it had more than 38 million members as of 2018. The magazine and bulletin it sends to its members are the two largest-circulation publications in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jo Ann Emerson</span> American politician (born 1950)

Jo Ann Emerson is an American politician who was the U.S. representative for Missouri's 8th congressional district from 1996 to 2013. The district consists of Southeast and South Central Missouri and includes the Bootheel, the Lead Belt and the Ozarks. Emerson is a member of the Republican Party. On January 22, 2013, Emerson resigned her seat in Congress to become the president and chief executive officer of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. She served as CEO until August 2015.

South Dakota v. Dole, 483 U.S. 203 (1987), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court considered the limitations that the Constitution places on the authority of the United States Congress to influence state lawmaking. The Court upheld the constitutionality of a federal statute that withheld federal funds from states whose legal drinking age did not conform to federal policy. The dissent argued that the minimum drinking age condition for states to receive federal highway funds was not sufficiently related to Congress' interests in expending the funds and consequently exceeded Article 1, Section 8, spending power.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jo-Ann Stores</span> US arts and crafts retail chain

Jo-Ann Stores, LLC, more commonly known as Jo-Ann, is an American fabric and crafts retail company based in Hudson, Ohio. It operates the retail chains JOANN Fabrics and Crafts and Jo-Ann Etc.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alliance for Retired Americans</span>

The Alliance for Retired Americans (ARA) is a 501(c)(4) non-profit organization and nonpartisan organization of retired trade union members affiliated with the AFL-CIO, which founded it in 2001. The group's membership also includes non-union, community-based activists. Its predecessor organization was known as the National Council of Senior Citizens (NCSC).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Jewish World Service</span> Nonprofit organization

American Jewish World Service (AJWS) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit international development and human rights organization that supports community-based organizations in 19 countries in the developing world and works to educate the American Jewish community about global justice. It is the first and only Jewish organization dedicated solely to ending poverty and promoting human rights in the developing world. Its headquarters are in New York City. AJWS has received a Four Star rating from Charity Navigator since 2002.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greater Chicago Food Depository</span> American nonprofit organization

The Greater Chicago Food Depository (GCFD) is a nonprofit organization that fights hunger throughout Cook County, Illinois. The GCFD distributes donated and purchased food through a network of 700 food pantries, soup kitchens, shelters and community programs, serving more than 800,000 adults and children every year. In fiscal year 2016, the GCFD distributed more than 70 million pounds of nonperishable food, produce, dairy products, and meat - the equivalent of more than 160,000 meals every day. Of the $96,883,955 spent in 2016, over 90% went to direct food distribution programs.

The McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program (IFEP) is a food aid program authorized in the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002 which provides for the donation of U.S. agricultural commodities and associated financial and technical assistance to carry out preschool and school feeding programs in foreign countries. Maternal, infant, and child nutrition programs also are authorized under this program. It is named after former U.S. Senators George McGovern and Bob Dole, who advocated in the U.S. Congress for its passage.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Epidemiology of malnutrition</span> Overview of global nutritional deficiencies

There were 735.1 million malnourished people in the world in 2022, a decrease of 58.3 million since 2005, despite the fact that the world already produces enough food to feed everyone and could feed more than that.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hunger in the United States</span> Food insecurity

Hunger in the United States of America affects millions of Americans, including some who are middle class, or who are in households where all adults are in work. The United States produces far more food than it needs for domestic consumption—hunger within the U.S. is caused by some Americans having insufficient money to buy food for themselves or their families. Additional causes of hunger and food insecurity include neighborhood deprivation and agricultural policy. Hunger is addressed by a mix of public and private food aid provision. Public interventions include changes to agricultural policy, the construction of supermarkets in underserved neighborhoods, investment in transportation infrastructure, and the development of community gardens. Private aid is provided by food pantries, soup kitchens, food banks, and food rescue organizations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy</span>

The Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy is a non-profit organization, headquartered in Washington D.C., supporting literacy as fundamental to the success of both families and the U.S. economy. The foundation promotes access to resources to build a stronger, more equitable America through literacy. The organization co-sponsored the Adult Literacy XPRIZE and produces a "Gap Map" literacy data mapping tool, the National Celebration of Reading, and other events.

Ann Mei Chang is the CEO of non-profit organization Candid. She is a technology expert, global development advocate, author, and public speaker.

The News Literacy Project (NLP) is an American nonpartisan national education nonprofit, based in Washington, D.C., that provides resources for educators, students, and the general public to help them learn to identify credible information, recognize misinformation and disinformation, and determine what they can trust, share, and act on. It was founded in 2008 by Alan C. Miller, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter at the Los Angeles Times Washington bureau.

The Indianapolis Community Food Access Coalition was recognized by the City-County Council of Indianapolis, Indiana, as part of the Division of Community Food Nutrition and Policy, which was established at the same time. The Division is intended to rectify "racial inequality in the food system" and decrease "food insecurity in Indianapolis" by funding local food growers. The Coalition was created through Indianapolis Ordinance 337, which was proposed in November 2020 and "recognized" in January 2021.

The 22nd AARP Movies for Grownups Awards, presented by AARP: The Magazine, honored films and television series released in 2022. Created by and about people over the age of 50, the ceremony was held on January 28, 2023, at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Los Angeles and hosted by Alan Cumming for the third time; the event was broadcast on PBS' Great Performances on February 17, 2023. This was also the first ceremony in four years to not present the Best Buddy Picture category. Nominations were announced on December 15, 2022, with The Fabelmans leading with six nominations. Jamie Lee Curtis received the Career Achievement Award.

References

  1. 1 2 Johnson, Roy S. (September 17, 2017). "From Mon Louis to AARP CEO: Jo Ann Jenkins' inspiring journey to power". AL.com. Retrieved November 26, 2017.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "How Did I Get Here? Jo Ann Jenkins". Bloomberg Businessweek . Bloomberg L.P. Retrieved November 26, 2017.
  3. 1 2 Jackson, Anna-Louise (November 12, 2024). "AARP has a new CEO: physician and public health advocate Myechia Minter-Jordan". Fast Company. Retrieved December 6, 2024.
  4. ↑ Johnson, Roy (September 17, 2017). "From Mon Louis to AARP CEO: Jo Ann Jenkins' inspiring journey to power". The Huntsville Times. Retrieved September 16, 2019. One of those people who looked out for Jenkins was Elizabeth Dole, the then-Department of Transportation Secretary for whom she served as special assistant for minority affairs between 1985-87. The department included 110,000 employees and the U.S. Coast Guard, which made Dole, Jenkins said, the first female to oversee a branch of the military. Together, the two trailblazers developed a 10-point program to promote women in the transportation department.
  5. ↑ Bush, Laura (May 4, 2010). Laura Bush (Autobiography). Simon and Schuster. ISBN   9781439155219 . Retrieved September 16, 2019. Together, with the help of his assistant JoAnn Jenkins and my staff, we established the National Book Festival
  6. 1 2 3 Cunningham, Lillian (November 5, 2015). "Why the Head of AARP Thinks you Shouldn't Retire". The Washington Post. Retrieved August 29, 2018. She was also the chief operating officer of the Library of Congress, where she developed the National Book Festival.
  7. ↑ Guadalupe, Patricia (September 25, 2016). "National Book Festival Highlights Prominent Latino/a Authors". NBC News. Retrieved August 29, 2018.
  8. ↑ I-Chun, Chen (May 13, 2014). "Jo Ann Jenkins Named CEO of AARP". Washington Business Journal. Retrieved October 29, 2019. She was the chief operating officer of the Library of Congress. During her 15-year tenure there, she developed and directed two of its most renowned projects, the National Book Festival and the Library of Congress Experience.
  9. ↑ Gross, Grant (April 9, 2008). "Technology Allows Close Perusal of the Declaration of Independence". PC World. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  10. ↑ Day, Christine L. (October 27, 2017). AARP: America's Largest Interest Group and its Impact. Praeger. p. 125. ISBN   9781440834110 . Retrieved September 16, 2019. The policy focus on the most vulnerable older persons has been reinforced under the leadership of Jo Ann Jenkins, who declared that 'low income is a passion of mine,' emphasizing the need to work with, and for, the 50+ population at all levels of income...The royalties, though, support the AARP Foundation, where Jenkins' focus on hunger, housing, income insecurity, and isolation among the most vulnerable elderly remain the primary issues.
  11. ↑ "Gordon embraces unique sponsorship". Fox Sports. May 3, 2011. Retrieved September 16, 2019.
  12. ↑ "Variety's 2017 Inclusion Impact Report". Variety. 2017. Retrieved October 1, 2018. Jenkins created Drive to End Hunger, a multi-year, nationwide campaign that has donated more than 36 million meals to local organizations serving hungry seniors and provides additional support to more than 100 anti-hunger organizations across the country.
  13. ↑ Skidmore Sell, Sarah (August 25, 2019). "AARP chief: How living to 100 changes our ideas about aging". Minneapolis Star Tribune / Associated Press. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  14. ↑ Wiener-Bronner, Danielle (April 24, 2019). "McDonald's is partnering with AARP to hire older employees". CNN. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  15. ↑ "World's Greatest Leaders 2019". Fortune. Retrieved October 30, 2019. About 24% of the U.S. workforce is 55 or above, and older workers face a disproportionate risk of being laid off. This spring, Jenkins rallied bipartisan support behind a long-dormant bill that would strengthen federal age discrimination laws.
  16. ↑ Hope, Katie (January 18, 2017). "Does living to 100 mean we'll work forever?". BBC. Retrieved October 1, 2018.
  17. ↑ Kline, Alan (March 22, 2024). "Longtime AARP chief executive stepping down later this year". Washington Business Journal. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.