SKILLMAN, NJ – John Bridgeland, alumnus of the Harvard University Class of 1982 and the University of Virginia School of Law Class of 1987, will receive the highest honor bestowed by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association when he is presented with the 2015 ITA Achievement Award on Saturday, Sept. 12, at the International Tennis Hall of Fame’s Board of Directors Meeting at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York. The ceremony will be hosted by the ITHF and presented by Rolex Watch, U.S.A.
Stan Smith, President of the ITHF, will present the award along with David A Benjamin, ITA Chairman of the Board, Timothy Russell, ITA Chief Executive Officer, and Mounia Mechbal, Vice President of Communications of Rolex Watch U.S.A., who will present a distinctive, personally engraved, Rolex timepiece to Bridgeland. In addition to this special gift, Bridgeland and a guest will be invited to watch a session of the 2015 U.S. Open from the President’s Box, courtesy of the USTA, and will also be recognized during the ITHF’s Legends Ball on Friday evening. The Harvard University men’s tennis program will also receive a $1,000 donation from the ITA in Bridgeland’s honor.
Now in its 22nd year, the ITA Achievement Award pays tribute each year to past participants in the world of varsity tennis who have achieved excellence in their cho¬sen careers. The spirit of the award honors both professional success and contributions to society made either as a direct result of a career or through humanitarian efforts.
Bridgeland is the CEO of Civic Enterprises, a public policy firm, and Co-Chair of the Franklin Project at the Aspen Institute, an initiative to create a voluntary, civilian national service counterpart to military service in the U.S. Previously he was the Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, where he coordinated policy on international, national, community and faith-based service in the aftermath of 9/11, and the first Director of the USA Freedom Corps under George W. Bush. He was later appointed to the White House Council for Community Solutions by President Obama.
Picking up tennis at the age of five, Bridgeland credits the sport for giving him confidence and courage, and later inspiration through the camaraderie of his teammates at Harvard. He graduated from Harvard with honors in government, and after receiving his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law began his career at a firm with offices in New York and Paris before serving as Chief of Staff and Counsel for former U.S. Congressman Rob Portman. In 2000, he served on George W. Bush’s Presidential campaign and then his Transition Team. He continued to serve in the White House afterward, where among other things, he co-led the White House Summit on Malaria, launching Malaria No More, a program that has saved more than four million lives. Bridgeland was the first CEO and is the current Vice Chairman of Malaria No More.
Bridgeland helped organize the ServiceNation Summit in 2008, which showcased a 10-point plan to increase community, national and international service opportunities. The plan became part of the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, earning Bridgeland and the other organizers of the ServiceNation Summit the honor of the 2008 NonProfit Times Executives of the Year. He has also been working with Results for America, which launched in 2012, to promote bipartisan evidence-based policymaking.
He published a report, The Silent Epidemic, on the high school dropout crisis, helping bring national attention to the issue and resulting in him leading the National Summit on America’s Silent Epidemic. Bridgeland also co-organized the GradNation Summit and co-authored the report Building a Grad Nation, which launched a “Civic Marshall Plan” to boost the high school graduation rate to 90 percent by the Class of 2020. For the first time in history, the nation has a graduation rate of over 80 percent.
A senior policy advisor for Oceanographer Sylvia Earle and Mission Blue, Bridgeland has also worked with the National Parks Conservation Association along with serving on the National Park System’s Advisory Board and the Executive Committee of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Recovery Team for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. He is also currently on the Public Service Advisory Committee at the University of Virginia School of Law.
Bridgeland is the author of Heart of a Nation: Volunteering and America’s Civic Spirit, along with being an experienced public speaker, appearing on PBS NewsHour, CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Fox News, Cavuto Fox Business, BBC, among others. In February he was the recipient of the 2015 Champion Partner Award at the annual Corps Network Capitol Hill Awards ceremony.
Bridgeland and wife Maureen have three children, Caily, Fallon, and Regis.
