The Business-Higher Education Forum Welcomes New Board Members and Announces Board Leadership for 2025–2026
Washington, D.C. The Business-Higher Education Forum (BHEF), the nation’s leading network of senior business and university executives, has announced the addition of new board members and leadership appointments for fiscal year 2025–2026. These leaders bring deep expertise in business, technology, and education and will guide BHEF’s mission to strengthen America’s talent pipelines, accelerate innovation, ensure U.S. competitiveness, and enhance economic mobility for our people.
BHEF is proud to welcome four distinguished leaders who bring deep expertise in human capital and workforce innovation, technology, and higher education:
- Valerie Singer, General Manager, AWS: Brings extensive leadership as a technology executive along with cutting-edge expertise in AI and cloud innovation. Her work has designed pathways that meet the acute needs of employers around the globe, matching skilled job seekers to good paying jobs, and advancing the adoption of cloud-based technology, directly aligning with BHEF’s focus on future-ready talent.
- John B. King, Jr., Chancellor, SUNY: Represents one of the nation’s largest higher education systems, with a commitment to delivering economic development and upward mobility for the students SUNY serves. He has set an ambitious goal that every undergraduate student will complete an internship or other experiential learning opportunity before they earn their degree, an area in which BHEF is leading the development of scaled education-to-workforce solutions.
- Philomena Mantella, President, Grand Valley State University: Brings leadership and a track record of growth and disruption to higher education, redefining what it means to deliver for the public good and regional economic development. To ensure that graduates are equipped with the competencies and mindsets to succeed in a dynamic knowledge economy, she has created unprecedented partnerships with the business community. Her innovative leadership of next generation human capital partnership models strengthens BHEF’s core mission.
- Mark Nemec, President, Fairfield University: Leads a growing private institution committed to the powerful combination of liberal arts and workforce relevance. His leadership has focused on ensuring higher education is meeting the challenges of the 21st century through innovation in teaching, embracing the potential of emerging technologies, launching programs to meet the needs of lifelong learners, and fostering industry partnerships. His embrace of the duality of the liberal arts and science foundation blended with future-ready skills and experiences advances BHEF’s mission.
Each of these new board members will strengthen BHEF’s work to advance cross-sector partnerships that prepare students for the future workforce and address the nation’s most pressing talent challenges.
In addition, BHEF announced updates to its board leadership for fiscal year 2025–2026. Laura Ipsen, CEO, Ellucian, will serve as board chair, and Jeffrey D. Armstrong, president, California Polytechnic State University, will serve as vice chair. They will be joined on the executive committee by continuing board members:
- Ryan Oakes, Global Health & Public Service Industry Practices Chair, Accenture
- Madeline Pumariega, President, Miami Dade College
- Timothy D. Sands, President, Virginia Tech
- Valerie Singer, General Manager, Amazon Web Services
Together, BHEF’s full board of directors represent the breadth of business and education actors needed to drive action at scale. Their guidance will be instrumental in advancing BHEF’s network-driven priorities, including equipping workers with AI competencies, expanding work-integrated learning to all learners, and accelerating regional talent competitiveness. Our board of directors ensures that BHEF catalyzes innovation across the workforce and education ecosystem and continues to be the preferred place where business and education innovators build agile solutions for the workforce of the future.