FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: Grace Nicolette, Vice President, Programming and External Relations, CEP: 617-674-0763
Cambridge, MA — Tiffany Cooper Gueye, chief operating officer of Blue Meridian Partners, Inc. and former CEO of BELL (Building Educated Leaders for Life), has been elected to serve as the next chair of the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) Board of Directors. Gueye has been a member of CEP’s Board since 2013 and will succeed Heinz Endowments President Grant Oliphant, who has chaired CEP’s Board for more than six years, effective July 1, 2021.
“CEP has been incredibly fortunate to have benefitted from Grant’s leadership as board chair and we’re equally fortunate to have Tiffany taking over this summer as his successor,” said CEP President Phil Buchanan. “Tiffany brings to the chair role a perspective informed by her experiences as a nonprofit leader, a funder who works with individuals and foundations, and an expert in measurement and evaluation. I can’t think of a better combination for CEP’s next chapter.”
In her role as chief operating officer at Blue Meridian Partners, a partnership of philanthropists that funds scalable solutions that transform the life trajectories of young people and families in poverty, Gueye provides strategic leadership for the organization’s operating systems and shared services. She also leads cross-functional efforts such as strategic planning, the continuous improvement of Blue Meridian’s operating model, and organizational performance.
Previously, Gueye served as chief executive officer of BELL (now called BellXcel), a national youth-serving organization, from 2008 to 2017. Gueye started her career at BELL in 1998 and served in a variety of roles prior to being named CEO, including program manager, director of evaluation, and chief operating officer. During her tenure at the organization, Gueye was a driving force in creating a data-driven culture of continual improvement and leading the organization’s growth to annually serve more than 15,000 students in schools across 28 states. BELL’s expanded learning programs, partnership model, and evaluation methods have become nationally recognized as best practices in expanded learning programs.
“I am honored to serve an organization whose mission to influence donor and foundation effectiveness has contributed so much to the field,” said Gueye. “I have seen firsthand both the power of effective philanthropy to improve lives and the costs and missed opportunities associated with weak funder practices. As an organization with the highest standards when it comes to data analysis, CEP has been an important force for good in philanthropy over the past two decades, and I am thrilled to be able to serve in this capacity.”
Gueye holds a B.A. in Psychology and a Ph.D. in Educational Research, Evaluation and Measurement, both from Boston College, which has honored her with a Donald J. White Teaching Excellence Award and an honorary Doctor of Science in Education degree. She has been recognized by The Network Journal and by The Boston Business Journal as a “Top 40 Under 40” achiever, and she has won the “Be the Change Award” from the Massachusetts Conference for Women. She was also profiled as an exceptional nonprofit leader in Buchanan’s 2019 book, Giving Done Right: Effective Philanthropy and Making Every Dollar Count, and was a guest on Season 1 of CEP’s Giving Done Right podcast.
During Oliphant’s tenure as Board chair, CEP has grown and expanded its influence significantly — working with more than 150 foundations for the first time, increasing its presence outside the U.S., expanding its knowledge resources to focus on individual donors, and growing its revenues from $6 million annually to a projected $10 million this year. CEP’s YouthTruth initiative has also grown dramatically during this time.
“I’m incredibly grateful for all the ways in which Grant has contributed to CEP in his time as chair,” Buchanan said. “During a time of national turmoil, he has been a strong voice who has reminded us of the powerful role of philanthropy and the nonprofit sector while simultaneously calling on foundations to be better. He has also been a coach and mentor to me, and thanks to his leadership and counsel, CEP is a stronger organization that is well positioned to execute on our mission of providing data and creating insight so philanthropic funders can better define, assess, and improve their effectiveness.”
Gueye will chair a Board that, in addition to Oliphant and Buchanan (in an ex officio capacity), includes: Paul Beaudet (Executive Director, Wilburforce Foundation), Stephanie Hull (President and CEO, Girls, Inc.), Richard Ober (President and CEO, New Hampshire Charitable Foundation), Hilary Pennington (Executive Vice President for Program, Ford Foundation), Christy Pichel (former President, Stuart Foundation), Anthony Richardson (Executive Director, Nord Family Foundation), Vince Stehle (Executive Director, Media Impact Funders), Kelvin Taketa (Senior Fellow, Hawai’i Community Foundation), and Fay Twersky (President, The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation).
About the Center for Effective Philanthropy
The Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) is a nonprofit organization with a mission to provide data and create insight so philanthropic funders can better define, assess, and improve their effectiveness and impact. CEP received initial funding in 2001 and has offices in Cambridge, Massachusetts and San Francisco, California. For more information on CEP’s work, including its research, assessments, advisory services, and programming, visit www.cep.org.
