The purpose of the Policy Council is to serve as a source of ideas for new activities the Foundation might undertake and to advise the Trustees about overall policies and the direction of the Foundation. The Policy Council and the Trustees meet twice per year, and the meetings provide a forum to discuss the future of US diplomacy and how to best support the Foreign Service. Over the last several decades, we are fortunate to have had an impressive roster of distinguished diplomats, business executives, and philanthropists on our Policy Council.

Charles Ray, chair (2018-2021)

Charles Ray served 30 years in the Foreign Service (from 1982 to 2012), after completing a 20-year career in the U.S. Army. His Foreign Service assignments were Guangzhou and Shenyang, China; Chiang Mai, Thailand; PM bureau/ DCM in Freetown, Sierra Leone; Consul General in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam; ambassador, Phnom Penh, Cambodia; Diplomat in residence, University of Houston; deputy assistant secretary of defense for POW/Missing Personnel; and ambassador, Zimbabwe.

He has a B.S. from Benedictine College, Atchison, KS; an M.S. from the University of Southern California; and an M.S. the National War College. He’s also a graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, the Army War College’s Land Forces Commander Course, and the Defense Intelligence School’s Postgraduate Intelligence Course.

Julie Chung (2017-2021)

Julie Chung is currently the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs. A career member of the Senior Foreign Service, class of Minister-Counselor, she served previously as Director for Japan in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs and as Deputy Chief of Mission in Cambodia and Economic Counselor in Thailand. From 2009-2010 she served as the Chief of Staff for Transition in Baghdad coordinating civilian-military foreign assistance. While working on the Korea Desk in Washington, she traveled to Pyongyang multiple times to coordinate programs with the Korean Energy Development Organization. She also served in Bogota, Hanoi, Tokyo, and Guangzhou. She received a B.A. in Political Science from the University of California San Diego and an M.A. in International Affairs from Columbia University. Julie is a member of the first cohort of the Pickering Fellows.

Stuart Jones (2017-2021)

Stuart Jones was Acting Assistant Secretary of State for the Near East Affairs Bureau in 2017. Prior to this appointment, he served as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in 2016 and US Ambassador to Iraq from 2014-2016 and as Ambassador to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan from 2011-2014. Ambassador Jones has extensive experience in Iraq as the Deputy Chief of Mission at the American Embassy in Baghdad, Governorate Coordinator in Al Anbar Province, and Country Director for Iraq at the National Security Council. Other overseas postings include Egypt, Turkey, El Salvador and Colombia. Ambassador Jones is a graduate of Duke University and the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Alberto Mora (2017-2021)

Alberto J. Mora is a Senior Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. An attorney by profession, Mora has served in a variety of law firm, corporate, and government posts during the course of a career that has balanced private practice with extensive public service in law, diplomacy, and national security, including service as a Foreign Service Officer and as General Counsel of USIA, Navy, and Mars, International. Mora holds a BA and Honorary Doctorate from Swarthmore College and a JD from the University of Miami School of Law. Mora attended Harvard University as a 2014 Advanced Leadership Fellow. In 2006, Mora was awarded the John F. Kennedy Memorial Foundation’s Profile in Courage Award in recognition of his opposition, while in the Bush administration, to the cruel interrogation of detainees in the post-9/11 period.

Anne Patterson (2018-2021)

Ambassador Patterson was the Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern and North African Affairs at the Department of State (2013-2017). She served as Ambassador to Egypt (2011-2013), to Pakistan (2007-2010), to Colombia (2000-2003) and to El Salvador (1997-2000). She recently retired with the rank of Career Ambassador after more than four decades in the Foreign Service. Ambassador Patterson also served as Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs and Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations, among other assignments. She is currently a senior fellow at the Jackson Institute for Global Affairs at Yale and a member of the Commission on National Defense Strategy.

Glyn Davies (2019-2022)

Ambassador Glyn T. Davies was a Foreign Service Officer with the Department of State for 38 years, serving in Australia, Africa, Europe and Asia. He retired in November 2018 after three years as Ambassador to the Kingdom of Thailand. His other assignments included Permanent Representative to United Nations Agencies in Vienna (2009-2011), Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in London (1999-03), Executive Secretary of the National Security Council Staff at the White House (1997-1999), and Deputy Spokesman of the Department of State (1995-1997). Amb. Davies has a Bachelor of Science degree in International Politics from Georgetown University as well as a Master of Science degree in National Security Strategy from the National Defense University in Washington D.C.

Jo Ellen Powell (2019-2022)

Jo Ellen Powell served as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Human Resources (2016-2017), U.S. Ambassador to Mauritania (2010-2013), and Consul General in Frankfurt, Germany (2006-2009).  She grew up in a Foreign Service family, living in Panama, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, India, Iran, and Laos.

Ms. Powell joined the Foreign Service in January 1980 and has served in Jordan, Lebanon, Italy, France, Australia, Germany, and Mauritania, in addition to domestic assignments including the Operations Center, the Bureaus of European Affairs and Western Hemisphere Affairs, the Bureau of Human Resources, and the Office of the Secretary, Executive Secretariat.  Ms. Powell is a graduate of Centre College of Kentucky.

Kevin Whitaker (2019-2022)

Kevin Whitaker is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, rank of Career Minister.  He served for over five years as ambassador to Colombia, the longest-serving U.S. ambassador to that nation in a century.  Prior to his ambassadorial service, he held a variety of senior positions in the Department, including deputy assistant secretary and deputy executive secretary.  He has been awarded the Department’s Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards on multiple occasions.

Ambassador Whitaker is a graduate of the University of Virginia, and has three sons.  His spouse Elizabeth had a distinguished career in the Foreign Service.