Blog Archives

Robyn Hullihan is a Senior Philanthropic Director at Foundation Source, the nation’s largest provider of comprehensive support services for private foundations. An expert in the field of philanthropy and private foundations, she works with clients in the Central and Eastern Regions of the U.S.

With more than 30 years of experience in the charitable giving sector, Robyn helps clients accomplish their philanthropic goals in areas that include strategic planning, grantmaking and evaluation, governance, and family engagement and at all stages in a private foundation’s life cycle.

Prior to joining Foundation Source, Robyn spent 12 years running her own philanthropic consultancy advising foundations and ultra-high-net-worth individuals on board development, administration, program research and design, and organizational and project analysis.

Previously, she served as the Executive Director of the Joyce and Irving Goldman Family Foundation, Associate Director of The Tow Foundation, Program Officer at The William Randolph Hearst Foundations, and Program Director and Acting President of the Toshiba America Foundation.
Robyn earned a B.A. from Mount Holyoke College; a post-graduate diploma from London University, London School of Economics and Political Science; and an M.B.A. from New York University, Leonard N. Stern School of Business.

Holly co-founded H.J.K. Strategies, a full-service Washington, D.C.-based government affairs firm. She is a well-recognized policy, legislative, and political strategist, having been involved in some of the most high-profile legislation and Democratic campaigns of the past 17 years.

At H.J.K. Holly oversees the firm’s corporate clients, providing strategic advice to senior executives from the nation’s leading corporations and nonprofits in the financial services, insurance, and defense industries. Many organizations, from Fortune 50 companies to nonprofit startups, turn to Holly for her skills in developing effective strategies to address emerging issues and crises. She specializes in building coalitions and brand awareness strategies for corporations while effectively managing their state and local public policy issues.

Holly effectively manages high-profile legislative, regulatory, political, and crisis communication issues. She has gained substantial experience working for significant officials, including U.S. Sen. John Glenn, U.S. Rep. Ted Strickland, and President Clinton, as a senior advance team member and Senior Advisor at the U.S. Department of the Treasury and National Association of Insurance Commissioners. Holly’s proven track record of working across the aisle, from resolving crises to assembling significant events, has been built by harnessing her creative imagination with strategic solutions for successful outcomes.

Martin Evans is a military and veteran reporter for Newsday, where he writes about the deaths of U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and the war’s impact on local communities at home. Since joining Newsday in 1996, Evans has investigated many traumatic events, including the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the 1996 crash of T.W.A. Flight 800, for which Newsday won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Spot News coverage. Before coming to Newsday, Evans was the Pacific Rim Reporter for the Orange County Register, where he covered cultural, economic, and social links between the Pacific Rim nations and southern California, including the 1995 earthquake in Kobe, Japan, and a Vietnamese refugee camp in the Philippines that was swept by a deadly fire. Evans began his career at the Baltimore Afro-American, covering violent crime in Black families and communities.

Javier Garza is a journalist based in Torreón, México, specializing in security and protection protocols and training for newsrooms and individual journalists. He runs the local news platform Horizonte Lagunero and co-hosts El Noti, one of the most popular news podcasts in México. He has extensive experience covering violence and organized crime. From 2006 to 2013, he was the editorial director of El Siglo de Torreón, one of the most critical newspapers in northern México. In response to violence by organized crime, he developed safety protocols for reporters and editors, which later became a model for other newsrooms in México and Latin America.

He was a 2014 Ochberg Fellow at the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma and a Knight Fellow at the International Center for Journalists, focusing on digital security. Garza is a Safety Advisor for the World Association of Newspapers. He serves on the boards of international organizations dedicated to press freedom, such as Article 19 and the World Editors Forum. Garza has a bachelor’s degree from Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City and a master’s degree from the University of Texas at Austin. In 2022, Columbia University awarded him the Maria Moors Cabot Prize for Journalism in the Americas.

Amy Putman is a mixed media and hand cut collage artist based in Montclair, New Jersey. Raised outside of Boston, Amy received her BFA from the College of Visual and Performing Arts at Syracuse University. Her passion for issues of social justice was fueled by her 17-year career as a Creative Director at CBS News. While at CBS, she became an activist, helping to create, brand and launch the Million Mom March for Common Sense Gun Laws on the National Mall in Washington DC, Mother’s Day 2000, considered the largest march of its time. In 2014 Amy co-founded Pinkwater & Putman, an award- winning marketing consultancy dedicated to “Harnessing the Power of Good” by putting purpose at the core of business and communications strategy. After the 2016 election, Amy’s focus turned to creating art full- time. Her work has drawn the attention of local and national press including NBC and Newsweek magazine. Amy exhibits her work in galleries, museums, and exhibitions both in the USA and internationally and has works in numerous private collections. She is a Trustee of the Trust for Trauma Journalism, the Montclair Art Museum in New Jersey, SKIP of New York, a founding member of the New York Collage Ensemble, and Co-Chair of the Artists and Talent Peer Group for the Impact Guild. Her studio is in Manufacturer’s Village Artists, East Orange, New Jersey.

Julia Pierson is an experienced federal law enforcement executive and a former Director of the United States Secret Service. During her tenure, Director Pierson was involved in the security and recovery efforts following the Oklahoma City bombing, the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington D.C., and the Boston Marathon bombing. From these experiences, Director Pierson has advocated for and implemented crisis intervention and employee assistance programs within the Secret Service to support first responders exposed to traumatic incidents. She also aims to ensure support services are available to journalists covering violence and tragedy.

Throughout her 30-year career, serving five presidential administrations, Director Pierson led significant improvements in agency operations by spearheading change and developing state-of-the-art technology solutions. These solutions were designed to mitigate emerging threats, improve global protective and investigative capabilities, enhance critical information sharing, support operational effectiveness, and streamline organizational processes. Director Pierson is a recipient of the Presidential Meritorious Executive Rank Award and has received multiple special recognition and Secret Service performance awards.

Director Pierson is a graduate of Harvard University’s National Preparedness Leadership Initiative (NPLI) and lectures on crisis and threat management practices to senior government and business executives. She has lectured at institutions including the National Preparedness Leadership Initiative, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, Academy for Critical Incident Analysis, Research Center, and the Center for Mass Violence Response Studies within the National Police Foundation. She is a board member of the Safe Community Cooperative and an active member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), the Police Honor Roll, and the Concerns of Police Survivors (COPS) foundations.