Former head of Florida Humanities Council to direct Graham Center

June 4, 2009

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The president of a Florida foundation and former foreign service officer has been named the first director of the Graham Center for Public Service at the University of Florida. Ann Henderson will take the reins from interim Director Tony Rosenbaum on July 1.

Henderson has worked in nonprofit management in Florida for 20 years. She served as the executive director of the Florida Humanities Council, which creates and supports public policy and educational programs through the state. As the funding director of the Abacoa Partnership for Community, she secured $4 million in donations for a New Urbanist community in northern Palm Beach County.

She also served as the cultural affairs and press officer for the American Embassy in Honduras where she supervised the activities of the only two public libraries at that time in Honduras. She received a meritorious honor award from the U.S. Department of State.

Most recently she created and served as the founding president of the Rodel Charitable Foundation, which supports programs critical to civic life, including affordable housing, environmental issues and education. She has just completed two terms as chairwoman of the Donors Forum of South Florida, an association of 140 private and public foundations, government agencies and corporations from Palm Beach to Key West.

Henderson received a bachelor’s degree from Vassar College and a master’s in the arts of teaching from University of New Hampshire. She completed her doctorate in American civilization at George Washington University. She was an Eisenhower Fellow and a Smithsonian Fellow. She was also a Fulbright-Hays Scholar and studied at Jadavapur University in Calcutta, India.

The Graham Center for Public Service provides students with opportunities to train for future leadership positions, meet policymakers and take courses in critical thinking, language learning and studies of world cultures.