SHAKESPEARE THEATRE COMPANY WELCOMES NEW BOARD MEMBERS

Nichole Francis Reynolds, Ambassador James K. Glassman, Dr. Michelle McMurry-Heath join the Board of Trustees at the nation’s premiere classical theatre

April 8, Washington, D.C.: Shakespeare Theatre Company (STC) welcomes three new members to the Board of Trustees: Nichole Francis Reynolds, Ambassador James K. Glassman, and Dr. Michelle McMurry-Heath.

“We have a very dedicated and engaged Board,” shared Chair of the Board Michael R. Klein, “and that was never more apparent than over the past difficult year as they helped support the theatre in multiple ways while it was shuttered by the pandemic. Our new Trustees bring both professional accomplishment and personal passion for the mission, which will add immeasurably to our work.”  

“James, Michelle, and Nichole bring a wealth of expertise and experiences with them and they will offer meaningful guidance to STC’s future” added Executive Director Chris Jennings. “I second Michael in welcoming them to the Theatre.” 

• Nichole Francis Reynolds: Vice President and Head of Global Government Relations at ServiceNow, Inc
• Ambassador James K. Glassman: Chairman and CEO at Glassman Advisory
• Dr. Michelle McMurry-Heath: President and CEO of the Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO)

The new Board Members join Michael R. Klein (Chair), Abbe David Lowell (Vice Chair), Rob Wilder (Treasurer), Emily Lenzner (Secretary), John Affleck, Nicholas W. Allard, Stephen E. Allis, Anita M. Antenucci, Michael Bahar, Jeffrey D. Bauman, Michael Beriss, Landon Butler, Gloria Dittus, Dr. Mark Epstein, Stefanie Erkiletian, David Grier, Barbara Harman, Jerry J. Jasinowski, Norman D. Jemal, Scott Kaufmann, Sudhakar Kesavan, DeDe Lea, J. Kendall Lott, Gail MacKinnon, Bernard F. McKay, Maureen McMurphy, Melissa A. Moss, Michael Paese, Vincent Roberti, Jane Roberts, Stephen M. Ryan, Pauline A. Schneider, Jonathan Sherman, Mary Streett, and Suzanne S. Youngkin.

BIOS:

Nichole Francis Reynolds is the Vice President and Head of Global Government Relations at ServiceNow, Inc. She leads the company’s global government relations, public policy, and advocacy agenda domestically and internationally. As a lawyer and the company’s top lobbyist, she works with Administration officials, Members of Congress, state and local public officials, the diplomatic community, and industry associations on domestic and international technology policy issues.

Prior to joining ServiceNow, she served as Vice President of Government and Public Affairs for the Interstate Natural Gas Association. Prior to that, she served for five years as Vice President of Public Policy & Community Relations at Mastercard. Prior to joining Mastercard, she spent ten years in Washington D.C., in a variety of senior roles on Capitol Hill including Chief of Staff to two Members of Congress, as District Director, and as counsel on the Homeland Security Committee. She also gained political experience working on national presidential elections and congressional races.

Ms. Francis Reynolds graduated cum laude and with honors with a Bachelor of Science in Political Science and Spanish from Eastern Michigan University and received her law degree from The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law. She is a Member of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Postsecondary Values Commission and serves as a Trustee on the Governing Board for Beauvoir, the National Cathedral Elementary School, Teach for America DC Region, Imagination Stage DC, Ed Farm, and the Corporate Advisory Council for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation. She lives in Washington, D.C., with her husband and two children.

James K. Glassman served from 2007 to 2009 as Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy as Chairman of the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors, which oversees Voice of America and other government-sponsored media. After a career in journalism that included serving as publisher of the New Republic and Atlantic Monthly magazines and chief investment columnist for The Washington Post, he became a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He served from 2009 to 2013 as Founding Executive Director of the George W. Bush Institute in Dallas. Ambassador Glassman currently chairs a communications strategy firm and in September was named Chairman of the Commission to Re-Ignite the Fight to End Smoking. He was host of three weekly public-affairs programs, two on PBS (“TechnoPolitics” and “Ideas in Action”) and one on CNN (“Capital Gang Sunday”), has written three books on finance, and currently writes a monthly investment column for Kiplinger’s Personal Finance. Ambassador Glassman is a graduate of Harvard University with a B.A. in government and was Managing Editor of the university daily, The Crimson.

Dr. Michelle McMurry-Heath assumed the leadership of the Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO) on June 1, 2020. A medical doctor and molecular immunologist by training, Dr. McMurry-Heath becomes just the third leader of the world’s largest biotechnology advocacy group since BIO’s founding in 1993. Based in Washington D.C., BIO represents 1,000 life sciences companies and organizations from 30 countries. 

McMurry-Heath has worked across academia, nonprofits, government, and industry, but her common focus has been broadening access to scientific progress so more patients from diverse backgrounds can benefit from cutting-edge innovation. Driven by her own past family experiences navigating clinical trials and funding challenges within the rare disease community, Dr. McMurry-Heath calls “the distribution of scientific progress the social justice issue of our age.”

She comes to BIO from Johnson & Johnson where she served as Vice President of Global External Innovation and Global Leader for Regulatory Sciences, leading an international team of 900 working in 150 countries. Earlier in her career, she served as a health and science adviser in the United States Senate. President Obama chose her to be a member of his science transition team before naming her associate science director in the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health

McMurry-Heath received her MD/PhD from Duke University’s Medical Scientist Training Program, becoming the first African American ever to graduate from the prestigious dual-degree program. She also spent 12 years as a laboratory scientist working at the research bench.