Our Board

Ekaterina Struett was appointed as Chief Executive Officer by College Advising Corps’ Board of Directors on August 1, 2022. She served as Interim CEO from May 2021 through July 2022.

Ekaterina serves as a liaison with strategic partners and is responsible for creating and maintaining collaborative relationships with CAC staff members, the CAC Board of Directors, and external constituents

Ekaterina knows first-hand the transformative impact that college access has on economic mobility. As an adult immigrant to the United States, she completed her college education while working full-time and raising three children. Ekaterina is committed to helping students from all backgrounds and walks of life learn about the post-secondary opportunities available to help them achieve their dreams. She knows that doors to higher education were opened to her because people believed in her and pointed the way. This is the message CAC advisers deliver to young people every day.

Prior to serving as Interim CEO, Ekaterina served CAC as the Chief Operating Officer, Chief of Staff, and Senior Director of People Operations. Her previous experience includes executive roles with Rise Against Hunger and Larson Training Centers, Inc. Ekaterina received her bachelor’s degree in Anthropology from North Carolina State University.

Peter T. Grauer is chairman of Bloomberg, the global financial technology company founded in 1981. He has been a member of the Bloomberg Board of Directors since October 1996 and was named Chairman of the board in March 2001, succeeding Michael R. Bloomberg.

Mr. Grauer joined Bloomberg full-time as chairman, president and CEO in March 2002. Prior to joining Bloomberg, he was a managing director of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette from 1992 to 2000 when DLJ was acquired by Credit Suisse First Boston. Mr. Grauer is a founder of DLJ Merchant Banking Partners and DLJ Investment Partners and also served as a managing director and senior partner of CSFB Private Equity.

Mr. Grauer graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the Harvard University Graduate School of Business, Program for Management Development. He is a member of the McKinsey Advisory Council. He serves on the World Economic Forum’s Media, Entertainment and Information, Financial Services and Gender Parity Board of Governors. Mr. Grauer is founding Chairman of the Community of Chairmen at the World Economic Forum. He is also a member of the British American Business International Advisory Board. 

Mr. Grauer is the President of the Board of Trustees of the Inner City Scholarship Fund in New York City and a member of the Partnership for Inner City Education Board of Directors. He serves as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Wildlife Conservation Society and The WNET Group. Mr. Grauer is the founding Chairman of the U.S. 30% Club. He is a member of the Board of the Prostate Cancer Foundation and is Chairman of College Advising Corps. Mr. Grauer is a trustee of The Economic Club of New York and Rockefeller University. He served as lead director of DaVita, Inc. (NYSE: DVA), a healthcare services company based in Colorado. Mr. Grauer was the Senior Independent Director and Chairman of the Nominations and Audit Committees of Glencore. He is a former Independent Director and member of the Audit Committee of Blackstone (NYSE:BX). Mr. Grauer is a former member of the Business Council, the International Business Council of the World Economic Forum, the Asia Business Council, and Out Leadership’s Global Advisory Board.

Mr. Grauer is Emeritus board member of Room to Read and the Board of the USA Cycling Development Foundation. He is a former member of the Board of Trustees of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and several UNC entities. He is the Chairman Emeritus of the Board of Directors of The Big Apple Circus, former member of Jazz at Lincoln Center and a former President of the Pomfret School Board of Trustees. He is a recipient of the Peterson Business Award, the William Richardson Davie Award, the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Service to the College of Arts and Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the Papal Order of Merit. Mr. Grauer was also inducted into the North Carolina Media and Journalism Hall of Fame. 

André Dua is a senior partner at McKinsey & Company based in Miami. He is a member of the McKinsey Global Institute Council, which advises on MGI’s research on global economic, business, and technology trends.

Mr. Dua co-leads MGI’s Future of Work Initiative and founded and leads McKinsey’s higher-education work, which has served more than 20 public- and private-university systems and campuses around the world, including research, comprehensive, and community colleges. This work has spanned a range of issues, such as strategy, research preeminence, administrative excellence, enrollment, and financial aid, capital productivity, college completion, health-sciences strategy and performance improvement, academic medical-center culture, and university board governance.

Mr. Dua convenes McKinsey’s roundtable of higher education board of trustees and developed McKinsey’s higher-education “Fingerprint,” a granular performance assessment of more than 800 universities in the United States. In addition, Mr. Dua was founder and chair of McKinsey Academy, the firm’s vehicle for transforming the performance of leading institutions by unlocking the potential of people.

Previously, he founded and led McKinsey’s state and local government work; in this role, he worked with dozens of state and local governments, including on economic and workforce development.

Mr. Dua currently serves on the board of the Citizens’ Budget Commission, and on the advisory council for the Oxford University Initiative on AI and the Law. Previously, he served on the boards of the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, and the United Way of New York City, where he was vice-chair.

Prior to joining McKinsey, Mr. Dua was a research fellow at Yale Law School. He holds an LLM in public law from Yale Law School. He also holds an LLB in business law and a Bachelor of Science degree in Econometrics and Economics from the University of Sydney.

 Susan George is a nationally recognized nonprofit leader who is passionate about providing aid and opportunities for individuals in need. She currently serves as Chief Advancement and Stewardship Officer at the Archdiocese of New York, overseeing development initiatives that raise over $50 million annually to support the Church of New York, the Alfred E. Smith Foundation, Catholic education, and underserved communities.

In her previous role, Susan was the Executive Director of the Office of Catholic Education Advancement and Inner-City Scholarship Fund, where she raised over $500 million and launched a capital campaign for a scholarship program that supports 8,000 inner-city children annually.

In addition to her role in education, she has worked closely with the Archbishop of New York and his senior management to plan two Papal visits to the city of New York.

Susan has transformed the board of three organizations through her ability to connect alumni and business leaders with the mission of their colleges and education. Today she manages a board of over 30 individuals including many leaders from Fortune 500 companies.

Prior to joining the archdiocese, Susan was at Teachers College, Columbia University where she was a Director of Major Gifts and initially an Associate Director of Major Gifts and Stewardship. There she managed relationships with trustees and other key volunteers. She was instrumental in recruiting new trustees to the College.

Susan’s first role in philanthropy began at Drew University when she assumed the role of Events Coordinator and then advanced to Associate Director, Leadership Gifts.

She holds a B.A. from the University of Connecticut and a Master of Letters from Drew University where her thesis was “Corporate Philanthropy.”

Susan currently serves or has served on the boards of The Hawthorne Foundation, Inner-City Scholarship Fund, Invest in Education Foundation, and Al Smith.  

Anneliese Olson is the President of HP Inc. Imaging, Printing and Solutions, a global business that delivers services, software, and hardware for home, office, and graphics markets. As head of the global business unit, Anneliese is leading the transformation of HP’s printing business to enhance the printing experience and empower customers to thrive in the future of work.

Since beginning her career at HP as an intern, Anneliese has held a variety of leadership positions across the company, spanning product development, portfolio and product marketing, and go-to-market strategy. Anneliese brings a wealth of international experience, having lived and worked in HP offices in Asia and the U.S. Most recently she served as Senior Vice President and Managing Director, North America Market, where she led go-to-market strategy, sales, execution, and multibillion-dollar P&L for the company’s largest revenue-generating region.

A passionate advocate for sustainability initiatives, Anneliese holds an ESG Certificate from the Berkeley Law Executive Education Program and serves as an Executive Sponsor for HP’s Global Sustainable Impact Steering Committee. She actively mentors emerging talent and is a sought-after speaker on advancement and unlocking human potential. Anneliese also advises several start-ups and holds Board positions with non-profit organizations, including the Board of Regents at Santa Clara University and the Board of Trustees for the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Anneliese earned a Bachelor of Science in Marketing from Santa Clara University and is based in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Marc Noë has 35+ years of management consulting experience across PwC, IBM, and EY.  He has diversified client and industry experiences and has driven large enterprise transformation, from the development of business strategy through implementation for sustained business performance improvement.  Most recently, he has been working with venture capital and start–up firms to launch and optimize business performance for investment returns.  Mr. Noë has a track record of building strong successful teams, identifying and mentoring talent, and leading through collaboration.

At EY, Mr. Noë worked with a large retailer over multiple years to help them drive differentiated customer and employee experiences through innovation in delivery methods, new digital capabilities, intelligent automation, and back-office technology transformation.  Across several power & utilities companies, he helped enhance an overall business strategy to evolve customer relationships from electricity providers to energy management and home services partners, explore digital marketplaces, and develop digital roadmaps for execution.  In his capacity as EY Lead Partner, he worked with CAC leadership to enhance business strategy by evolving into a more blended physical and virtual operating model through the development of digital assets and community that would allow the organization to improve quality, expand to a larger diverse community, and scale impact to underserved students.

While at IBM, Mr. Noë was the Americas Digital Leader who was responsible for operationalizing the Digital Reinvention framework, helping clients to explore new focus, new ways of working, and new expertise areas for improved financial and customer value across their business development opportunities.  He led a large team that drove a global industrial company’s digital strategy and program to transform their customer’s experience and explore construction industry disruption including creating a new digital platform for customer acquisition, service, and retention, building a digital storefront for their franchised brands, and creating a Ventures unit to explore net new business opportunities within the construction industry.

Mr. Noë served as IBM’s North American Customer & Front Office Analytics Leader and was responsible for the development of solutions and business development activity. This new analytics domain grew from early proof-of-concept success into broader programs to meet increasing market demand.  For one of the largest global beverage companies, Mr. Noë led his team to assist in the creation and ongoing support of the largest loyalty program in the industry, developed a digital marketing platform for company brands and marketing agencies, created a consumer persona analytics solution to enhance activities around consumer engagement, and led collaborative sustainability R&D efforts around recycling, filtration, solar, and economic development.

As a PwC Partner, Mr. Noë was one of the North American SAP leaders who drove large transformation programs and had practice responsibility for 300+ consultants in the provision of Program & Change Management and Technical Architecture & Development services.  As part of broader business transformation programs, Mr. Noë led some of the largest most complex multi-year global programs across consumer-packaged goods, industrial, and pharmaceutical companies.  Mr. Noë was instrumental in the identification, recruitment, training, and mentoring of staff in the early days of SAP.

Mr. Noë is a graduate of McGill University where he studied Math & Computer Science and Economics, played soccer collegiately, captained two Canadian National Soccer Championship teams, and was twice awarded All-Canadian honors for Soccer.  He has remained active in the Greater Washington, DC athletic community through participation and gives back through coaching and board membership including multi-year terms as Chairman of the Board for a regional soccer association and Maryland golf club.

Ellen Weiss is an award-winning journalist and leader with more than 40 years experience working in audio, video and digital newsrooms. Most recently, as Washington Bureau Chief and Vice President at The E. W. Scripps Company, she created a multimedia national investigative team and launched podcasting for the company. She received her fourth Peabody Award for the “Under the Radar” investigative series exposing problems when convicted military sex offenders return to civilian life.  In 2020 her team received the RFK’s Journalism Grand Prize Award for the investigative documentary “A Broken Trust,” a project highlighting the lack of justice for survivors of sexual assault tribal lands. 

Weiss joined Scripps from The Center for Public Integrity where she was Executive Editor.  Prior to that she served as Senior Vice President of News at NPR. In that role, she oversaw global expansion of NPR News, the creation of award-winning programs and news coverage, the creation of an investigative unit, podcasts and the digital integration of the newsroom. Under her leadership, NPR experienced significant audience growth and numerous awards for journalistic excellence. 

Weiss joined NPR News in 1982. For 12 years, she was Executive Producer of the daily NPR newsmagazine All Things Considered. From 2001 to 2006, she was Senior Editor of the National Desk, managing 80 reporters, editors and producers covering all national issues. Weiss edited many of NPR News’ investigations including award-winning reports on abuses that led to changes in U.S. government detention center policies and reports on soldiers with PTSD that sparked Senate and Pentagon investigations.  

Weiss is a graduate of Smith College with a B.A. in international relations. She is the co-founder of Rock Creek Sound, an audio production company she launched with her son in 2024. She sits on the board of the Fund for Investigative Journalism and the non-profit news outlet Floodlight. She served as a trustee for the Scripps Howard Foundation for 10 years as is currently an advisor to the foundation and is an advisor to Shomrim, a nonprofit and non-partisan independent investigative news organization in Israel. Weiss is a volunteer for the National Park Service, a trail maintainer for the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club and a mentee for College Bound. She and her family live in Washington, D.C. 

The Honorable Joaquin Castro is a member of the United States House of Representatives from Texas’ 20th congressional district. He serves on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Previously, he served in the Texas House of Representatives where he was Vice Chairman of the Higher Education Committee. He created Trailblazers College Tour, personally raising money to send underprivileged students on college visits. He also created SA READS, San Antonio’s largest literacy campaign and book drive. Mr. Castro serves on the board of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials’ Taskforce on Education. Mr. Castro received his bachelor’s degree from Stanford University and J.D. from Harvard Law School.

Erskine Bowles has had a varied and illustrious career. The former president of the University of North Carolina System, Mr. Bowles also founded and served as Chairman and CEO of the Charlotte-based investment banking firm that became Bowles Hollowell Connor & Co. He is also a founder of Kitty Hawk Capital and Carousel Capital. He was appointed by President Bill Clinton and served as Director of the Small Business Administration, and later as Deputy White House Chief of Staff and White House Chief of Staff. Mr. Bowles has also served as a member of the National Economic Council and National Security Council. He currently serves on the boards of General Motors, Morgan Stanley, Cousins Properties, and NC Mutual Life Insurance Co.

Mr. Bowles helped found Dogwood Equity, chaired the Rural Prosperity Task Force, and served as a trustee of the Golden LEAF Foundation, all of which are designed to bring economic development to rural North Carolina.

Mr. Bowles received his bachelor’s degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his master’s degree from Columbia University’s School of Business. He holds eight honorary doctorates from universities and colleges throughout the United States.

Nicole F. Hurd, Ph.D., 18th president of Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, is the founder of College Advising Corps and formerly the organization’s CEO.

Under Dr. Hurd’s leadership, College Advising Corps has grown into the largest college access program in the country and received many accolades for its innovative work. Some of these honors include selection as one of eight nonprofits highlighted in The University of Pennsylvania’s 2018 annual High Impact Giving Guide, which targets organizations working with society’s most vulnerable, and the 2012 National Service Impact Award from the Corporation for National and Community Service.

College Advising Corps has also been the recipient of major investments including a $20 million gift from the Ballmer Group to launch CAC’s Goal 2025, an initiative to enroll 1 million students in college by 2025; a multimillion-dollar gift in 2015 from Bloomberg Philanthropies to launch CAC’s virtual advising work as part of the CollegePoint Initiative; and two $10 million investments from The John M. Belk Endowment, the first of which was announced at the 2014 White House College Opportunity Summit.

A tireless advocate for students and increasing opportunity, Dr. Hurd was honored as a White House Champion of Change for College Opportunity in September 2016 and was selected as a Featured Innovator by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for leading bold and creative efforts to eliminate disparities in college access and success.

In 2018, Dr. Hurd received an Honorary Degree, Doctor of Humane Letters from Franklin & Marshall College, and was recognized as one of Time Magazine’s 2018 Top 31 People Who Are Changing the South. She was named to Washington Monthly’s 2016 list of the most innovative people in higher education and the Chronicle of Higher Education’s 2014 Influence List.

Prior to launching College Advising Corps, Dr. Hurd served as an Assistant Dean and Director of the Center for Undergraduate Excellence at the University of Virginia. While there, she founded the College Guide Program that was the precursor to College Advising Corps. The College Guide Program received national attention and a $10 million grant from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation to expand into 10 additional states. Because of the growth and success of College Guides, Dr. Hurd was awarded the Governor of Virginia’s Award for Volunteerism and Community Service in 2007.

While at the University of Virginia, Dr. Hurd taught in the Department of Religious Studies, worked with successful Rhodes, Marshall, Mitchell, Fulbright, and Truman Scholar candidates, and led the first university-wide Office of Undergraduate Research.