Risa Lavizzo-Mourey Appointed to Smithsonian Board of Regents

Risa Lavizzo-Mourey has been appointed a member of the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents. President Barack Obama signed the resolution Feb. 21 appointing her as a citizen regent. Her six-year term begins immediately. Lavizzo-Mourey replaces Martha’s Table CEO Patty Stonesifer, who served two six-year terms, including three years as Chair of the Board.

The 17-member Smithsonian Board of Regents includes nine citizen members, three members of the House of Representatives and three members of the Senate, as well as the chief justice of the United States and the vice president, both ex officio voting members. The Board of Regents is the governing body of the Smithsonian Institution. The Board of Regents meets four times a year at the Smithsonian. Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. presides over the meetings as chancellor, and John McCarter is the Chair of the Board.

 “It is the greatest honor and privilege to be entrusted with the shared stewardship of one of the most important repositories of knowledge, history and research in our nation,” said Lavizzo-Mourey. “I look forward to working with the other distinguished regents to safeguard our nation’s heritage and expand and share the knowledge contained within the Smithsonian.”

Lavizzo-Mourey is the president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, a position she has held since 2003. The foundation is the nation’s largest philanthropy focused solely on health and health care, including initiatives to establish the 911 EMS system and reduce tobacco use.

Currently Lavizzo-Mourey is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies and the President’s Council for Fitness, Sports and Nutrition. She has served on multiple federal advisory committees, including the Task Force on Aging Research, the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics and the President’s Advisory Commission on Consumer Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry. She served as deputy administrator of what is now the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

Lavizzo-Mourey has received commendations for her work from the Harvard School of Public Health, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the American College of Physicians, the National Library of Medicine, the American Medical Women’s Association, the National Medical Association and the University of Pennsylvania.

Lavizzo-Mourey attended the University of Washington and the State University of New York at Stony Brook as an undergraduate. She earned her medical degree from Harvard Medical School and completed her residency in internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. She was a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar and trained in geriatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. She also earned a Master of Business Administration from the Wharton School.

Lavizzo-Mourey and her husband of nearly 40 years have two adult children and one grandchild.

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