Nancy Hirsch Rubin

Nancy Hirsch Rubin

Vice Chair, Board of Directors

Nancy Rubin is a public servant and a global champion for human rights, women’s rights, mental health, and social justice. She served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights during the Clinton Administration and was a Presidential appointee on the Council for Community Solutions to advance changes for cities’ most urgent needs. She was also a Senior Advisor to the State Department for the UN Human Rights Council in the Obama White House, and worked in the Carter Administration.

To expand opportunities for development, democracy and political participation, she serves on the Board of Directors for the National Democratic Institute, was on the Strategy Committee for Harvard University’s Project on Justice in Times of Transition and is a national leader in the effort to pass the Convention to End Discrimination Against Women. She is also a Commissioner of the Women’s Refugee Commission.

Viewing access to mental health care as a human right, Nancy was the first chair of the National Mental Health Awareness Campaign. She founded Community Outreach in 1977 to help fund Didi Hirsch Mental Health Services, which was named after her mother. She is a former Board member and received an Erasing the Stigma Leadership Award in 2000.

Other organizations where she has made important contributions include the Coalition for Women in International Development, the United Nation’s Foundation Strategy Council, the Women’s Leadership Board at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, The Washington Center, and the White House Corporation for National and Community Service, which created AmeriCorps.