Aneesh Raman is LinkedIn’s Chief Economic Opportunity Officer, working with leaders across sectors and around the world to make LinkedIn’s vision of creating economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce a reality in our time.
Prior to LinkedIn, Aneesh served as a Senior Economic Advisor for California’s Governor, helping to shape and communicate the economic agenda for one of the world’s largest economies, as well as the state’s response to the global pandemic. Aneesh joined the Governor’s Office after five years in the tech industry, including as Head of Economic Impact at Facebook. From 2009-2013, he held multiple positions in the Obama Administration, including as a speechwriter to President Barack Obama and as speechwriter to the Treasury Secretary amidst a historic economic crisis. Aneesh started his career as a CNN correspondent, first in Southeast Asia and then across the Middle East, where he spent two years as a war correspondent in Iraq. A graduate of Harvard College and a former Fulbright Scholar, Aneesh is a Board member of Shanti Bhavan, an education non-profit that works with children from the most economically disadvantaged communities in India. He is also a former term member at the Council on Foreign Relations and former member of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library’s New Frontier Award Committee.
Arnoldo Avalos emigrated with his family from a small agricultural town in Mexico to another small town in the upper Sacramento Valley. He and his family worked as migrant farm workers, following the seasonal fruit harvest. After graduating from high school, he worked as an intern for the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Agriculture before arriving at the University of California, Berkeley, where he earned a history degree, graduating with honors. He earned a master’s degree in government from Harvard University.
Avalos has worked as a manager for major global companies including Cisco Systems, Google, and Facebook. Arnoldo sits on several nonprofit community boards, including the Latino Community Foundation, and Hermanos Unidos. Avalos also served a six-year term on the California Community College Board of Governors. In 2012, he and his wife, Alma-Ruth, established the Avalos Foundation to provide scholarships, mentorship, and a support network to low-income high school students from the Upper Sacramento Valley who are attending a University of California school.
Martha M. Escutia served in the California Senate until 2006 and is currently vice-president for state government relations and special counsel at the University of Southern California. Escutia was the first in her immigrant family to graduate from high school, college, and law school. She earned a bachelor’s degree in public policy from the University of Southern California and was awarded a full scholarship to Georgetown Law School.
Escutia was elected to both the California State Assembly (1992) and State Senate (1998), where she was the first woman to chair the judiciary committee. As a lawmaker, she introduced several initiatives focused on English language learners, most notably AB 748, which created the first-ever California standards to evaluate the English language development skills of English language learners. She also introduced a bill to expand access to Advanced Placement classes.
Kailesh Karavadra currently serves as a global coordinating partner for Ernst & Young (EY), one of the “Big Four” accounting firms and one of the largest professional services networks in the world.
Mr. Karavadra first joined EY as a chartered accountant in the United Kingdom before moving to the Bay Area in the 1990s during the dot-com era. He most recently served as managing partner for EY’s San Jose office where his leadership has supported the growth and success of companies in the Silicon Valley for over 25 years. He also led EY’s Growth Market strategy focusing on entrepreneurs, startups, family business, and venture capitalists.
Mr. Karavadra currently sits on the EY Social Justice Fund Board and the Bangor University Council/Board focused on education transformation. His previous board tenures include: the United Way Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley Directors Exchange, Joint Venture Silicon Valley, America’s National Kidney Foundation Board, and the NKF Innovation Fund. Mr. Karavadra was also named the chair of the board for the California Chamber of Commerce for 2022. As well as an Angel Investor, he is one of the owners of the United Kingdom professional soccer team, Luton Town FC.
Mr. Karavadra holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in electronic engineering from Bangor University in the United Kingdom, with a specialization in artificial intelligence. In 2017, he was awarded an Honorary Fellowship from Bangor University for his services to business and community. Mr. Karavadra has also participated in executive management leadership learning at Stanford University, Harvard University, London Business School, and the Kellogg School of Management.
Mr. Karavadra was elected to the board in December 2023.
Lenny Mendonca was the Chief Economic and Business Advisor to Governor Gavin Newsom of California and Chair of the California High Speed Rail Authority. He is a Senior Partner Emeritus of McKinsey & Company and a Lecturer on Inequality at the Stanford Business School.
He founded McKinsey’s U.S. state and local public sector consulting practice. He also oversaw their knowledge development, Chairing the McKinsey Global Institute and the Firm’s communications, including the McKinsey Quarterly. He served for a decade on the McKinsey Shareholder Council (its Board of Directors). He retired from McKinsey in 2014.
He was formerly the Chair of New America and Children Now, co-Chair of California Forward, and co-founder and Chair of Fusecorps. He was the Vice-Chair of Common Cause. He is the Chair Emeritus of the Bay Area Council and their Economic Institute, and was vice-chair of the Stanford GSB Advisory Council. He was a trustee at the Committee for Economic Development. He served on the boards of Fidelity Charitable, Western Governors University, UC Merced, The Educational Results Partnership, The College Futures Foundation, California Competes, The Opportunity Institute, Commonwealth Club, National Association of NonPartisan Reformers, and The Guardian.org. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He served on the Board of Trustees for Junior Statesmen of America, and the Advisory Boards of Y Analytics, QB3, the Haas Center at Stanford, Third Sector Capital, The CA Community College Chancellor’s Office, Measures for Justice, and the Public Policy Institute of California.
He received his MBA and certificate in public management from Stanford. He holds an AB, magna cum laude, in economics from Harvard.
He lives on the Half Moon Bay coast with his wife, Christine. They raised their two daughters, Allie and Rebecca, there and are the founders and owners of the Half Moon Bay Brewing Company, The Inn at Mavericks and the Pacific Standard Taproom. He is also Chair and primary owner of the Coastside News Group (Half Moon Bay Review).
Mr. Mendonça joined the Board in 2015.
Eloy Ortiz Oakley joined the Foundation as President & CEO in August 2022. As president and CEO he works in partnership with organizations and leaders around the state to ensure that more students who reflect California’s diversity can complete their postsecondary journeys, access the opportunity for a better life, and participate in an inclusive and robust economy. Eloy is known as a leading voice on improving equity in higher education and for positioning institutions for global shifts in the workforce and the future of learning.
In 2016, Eloy became Chancellor for the California Community Colleges, the nation’s largest higher education system, serving mostly students of color, many of whom are low-income and the first in their families to attend college. There he has been instrumental in the development and adoption of the Vision for Success, a guiding set of goals and commitments designed to significantly improve the system’s student outcomes.
Previously, Eloy was superintendent and president of the Long Beach Community College District (LBCCD), where he helped launch the Long Beach College Promise Program, a compact that outlined clear pathways from high school to Long Beach Community College and Cal State Long Beach. He also previously worked as LBCCD’s executive vice president of administrative services as well as vice president of college services at Oxnard College.
A forward-looking thought leader on higher education and its connection to the economy, he has served on many boards and committees, including the California Governor’s Council for Post-secondary Education, the California Forward Leadership Council, the PPIC Higher Education Advisory Council, the California Chamber of Commerce, the California Economic Summit, and the American Association of Community Colleges 21st Century Commission on the Future of Community Colleges. He joined the College Futures Foundation board of directors in 2013.
After serving in the U.S. Army from 1984-1988, he began his postsecondary education at Golden West College, then transferred and earned his bachelor’s degree and his MBA from the University of California, Irvine.
Linda Oubré is President Emeritus of Whittier College, in Whittier, California.
Dr. Oubré led Whittier College from 2018-2023 and was the school’s first president of color. With a student body that is 70 percent students of color, Whittier is one of the most diverse liberal arts colleges in the nation. Previously, Oubré was the dean of the College of Business at San Francisco State University for six years, where she increased funding by more than 300 percent, including support for student career and leadership development, and launched innovative programs including a graduate curriculum review and a new executive M.B.A. program.
At UC Davis, Dr. Oubré oversaw a new corporate relations and business development plan for the Graduate School of Management and led the development and implementation of an enrollment growth, marketing, and visibility strategy for the Bay Area M.B.A. program.
Before working in higher education, Dr. Oubré held top corporate positions. She was president and chief executive officer of LSO Ventures, a venture investment and consulting firm, and helped found BriteSmile, where as president, she took the company public on NASDAQ.
Dr. Oubré earned a doctorate in higher education management from the University of Pennsylvania, an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School, and a B.A. in economics from UCLA.
Dr. Oubré was elected to the Board in October 2019.
Willa Seldon is a partner at The Bridgespan Group, a global social impact consulting firm and advisor that works with leaders, philanthropists and impact investors to address society’s most important challenges and opportunities. Her clients include Low Income Investment Fund, Mercy Housing, The Rockefeller Foundation, Silicon Valley Community Foundation, and StriveTogether. She has helped launch initiatives, including Black Ambition and OneTen and has supported mobilization efforts such as the White House Council for Community Solutions.
Before Bridgespan, Seldon served as CEO of the Glide Foundation, a San Francisco-based center for social justice, and executive director of the Tides Center, a fiscal sponsor and accelerator for social ventures. Her private sector experience includes co-founding a venture capital firm and serving as a senior executive at wireless communications company AirTouch.
Willa is on the board of directors of JFF, Pew Charitable Trusts and Sutter Health. She received a JD from Yale University, a MBA from the Harvard Business School, and an AB in economics from Bryn Mawr College, where she is an emeritus trustee.
Ms. Seldon joined the Board in 2015.
Karen Skelton has advised U.S. Presidents, Vice Presidents, U.S. Cabinet Secretaries, Governors, First Ladies, Fortune 100 corporations, philanthropies, Boards of Directors for 35 years.
Most recently, Skelton served as a Senior Policy Advisor to both Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm and the President’s top Climate Diplomat, John Podesta. During this time, Skelton played a key role in managing political, policy, and communication strategies to accelerate the nation’s industrial policy transition to a clean energy economy. Skelton collaborated with private sector stakeholders to gain access to hundreds of billions of dollars in grants, tax credits, loans, and other investments that address the climate crisis, rebuild American manufacturing, and lower costs for consumers and businesses.
Skelton’s work included co-leading the establishment of the Interagency Working Group on Coal & Power Plant Communities & Economic Revitalization (See www.Energycommunities.gov), now responsible for delivering over $170 billion in federal resources to help revitalize America’s energy communities; organizing private and public sector engagement in key states as Congress considered support for the Inflation Reduction Act; managing a White House effort to build a coalition of philanthropies which have contributed so far over $3 Billion in pooled funds and aligned tables to implement the President’s climate package; heading the inaugural launch of the DOE’s Foundation of Energy Security and Innovation.
Karen Skelton joined the Biden-Harris Administration from California, where she spent two decades running and selling two companies. Skelton spent a decade as the founder of Skelton Strategies, a policy and political consulting firm working on energy, climate, technology, economic justice, and women’s health. Skelton served as Governor Jerry Brown's Director of Strategic Partnerships at the Global Climate Action Summit, where she drove high-level corporate commitments designed to combat climate change. With Maria Shriver, Skelton founded and managed a series of groundbreaking reports on the transformational role of women in American life, including an Emmy-nominated documentary. Clients included Governor Schwarzenegger’s Women’s Conference, HBO, Bloom Energy, Segway, the National Basketball Association, UCLA’s Baseball team, T-Mobile, Google, YouTube, Amazon, John Doerr and Mayor Willie Brown.
Previously, Skelton served in the Clinton-Gore Administration as Vice President Al Gore’s first Political Director and Deputy Political Director to the President, in the U.S. Departments of Justice as a prosecutor, and at the United States Department of Transportation as Chief Counsel of the Federal Highway Administration.
Skelton earned her B.A. in English with Honors from UCLA, a Master’s degree from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a J.D. from the UC Berkeley Law School.
Skelton and her husband, a life-long public defender, live in Sacramento and have two grown daughters and one lively Brittany spaniel.
Ashley Swearengin is president and CEO of the Central Valley Community Foundation, a charitable foundation serving the six counties of Central California and providing over $100 million in funding to over 650 community benefit organizations over the last decade. Prior to joining the Foundation, she served as mayor of Fresno from 2009 through 2016.
As mayor, she implemented substantial changes to improve the delivery of city services, revitalize the downtown and urban core, promote business and job growth, address chronic homelessness, and stabilize the city’s financial position.
Before becoming mayor, Ms. Swearengin led a number of economic development initiatives in the Fresno region, including the Central Valley Business Incubator, Fresno State’s Office of Community and Economic Development, and the Regional Jobs Initiative. She holds MBA and BS degrees from California State University, Fresno.
Ms. Swearengin joined the Board in 2017.
Richard Whitmore most recently served as Superintendent of the Lafayette School District in Lafayette, California.
Previously, Mr. Whitmore was Chief Administrative Officer at WestEd, a nonprofit, public research, development, and service agency that works in education and communities to improve learning for children, youth, and adults. From 2003-2006, Mr. Whitmore served as WestEd’s Chief Financial Officer, and prior to rejoining WestEd in 2011, he served as the Superintendent for the Los Gatos Union School District.
Mr. Whitmore was Chief Deputy Superintendent to California State Superintendent of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin, and also served during her two terms as the Chief Policy Advisor and as Deputy Superintendent for Finance, Technology, and Planning. He represented the California Department of Education (CDE) in the development of the state’s first accountability system, helped create state budgets for K-12 education, developed state policies to identify and intervene in low-performing schools, and was responsible for the day-to-day management of CDE.
Mr. Whitmore graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University and received his MBA from Harvard University.
He has most recently served on the boards of the College Preparatory School in Oakland, ConnectEd: the National Center for College and Career (including six years as chair), and on the advisory council for the Lawrence Hall of Science. Currently, he served as an elected Governing Board member of the Acalanes Union High School District in Lafayette, CA for fifteen years , and is active in other local community affairs, having served as the President and Fundraising Chair of the Lafayette Arts and Science Foundation, the President of the Lafayette Girls Lacrosse Association, and many other roles in the academic and athletic communities.
Mr. Whitmore joined the Board in 2013.
Tim Yamauchi is principal for Inside the Mountain Consulting, a management consulting practice focused on assisting growth companies and organizations that are catalyzing change and innovation in their industries.
Mr. Yamauchi has more than 30 years of experience in strategy development, business innovation initiatives and capital sourcing. He has taken a lead role in several successful startups and early-stage, high-growth companies and organizations across the country. Notably, he has served as executive vice president for PRIDE Industries, one of the nation’s largest employers of people with disabilities, and as a member of the founding board of the California Asian Pacific Chamber of Commerce.
Mr. Yamauchi is a senior fellow of the Mountain Valley Chapter of the American Leadership Forum and was named CFO of the Year by the Sacramento Business Journal in 2009. He is also a certified public accountant with previous experience at a “Big Four” accounting firm, now PricewaterhouseCoopers.
An ardent higher education advocate, Mr. Yamauchi has served on the advisory boards for California State University, Sacramento, San Francisco State University, and Drexel University. Originally from Whittier, California, Mr. Yamauchi also served as a trustee for Whittier College.
Mr. Yamauchi holds an MBA from Harvard University and is a graduate of California State University, Los Angeles.
Mr. Yamauchi was elected to the board in December 2023.
Betty T. Yee is a former California State Controller with over three decades of experience in public service, especially in state and local finance.
She was elected Controller in November 2014, following two terms of service on the California Board of Equalization. As chief fiscal officer of the world’s then-fifth largest economy, she chaired the Franchise Tax Board and served as a member of the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) boards. As chair of the State Lands Commission, she provided stewardship of public trust lands, waterways, and marine resources through economic development, protection, preservation, and restoration consistent with the state’s environmental needs.
Prior to serving in elected office, Ms. Yee served as chief deputy director for budget with the California Department of Finance, where she led the development of the governor’s budget, negotiations with the legislature and key budget stakeholders, and fiscal analyses of legislation. She also served in senior staff positions for several fiscal and policy committees in both houses of the California State Legislature.
Yee currently serves on the boards of directors of Golden Gate University, the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies, and Ceres, a global nonprofit organization that mobilizes climate action investors.
Ms. Yee earned an M.P.A. from Golden Gate University in San Francisco and a B.A. in sociology from the University of California, Berkeley.
She joined the College Futures Foundation board in 2023.
*Currently on leave from the board.
