Board of Directors

Jon Amsterdam, Program Coordinator, Science Leadership Academy (Co-Chair): Jon currently serves as Program Coordinator at the nationally recognized Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, following a twenty-five year career in youth leadership and citizenship development work.  Jon has founded and directed a number of nationally recognized youth community service programs, assisted in the creation of the Americorps national service program, and developed the design of many popular project based learning initiatives across the country. As a trained lawyer, he has taught high school Civics and other Law-Related Education curricula, as well as instructed Education courses at Temple University. Before joining the design and launch team for Science Leadership Academy in 2006, Jon managed a University of Pennsylvania-sponsored multicultural civic engagement program bringing together students from eighty of Philadelphia's city and suburban high schools for collaborative public problem solving experiences.

Robert W. Cort, Film Producer & Owner, Robert Cort Productions (Co-Chair): Robert W. Cort has achieved a remarkable record of success as a film producer in the entertainment industry. Since 1985 he has produced forty-eight feature films, which have achieved enormous popularity with movie-going audiences, grossing over 2.5 billion dollars in worldwide box office. These include Outrageous Fortune, Three Men and a Baby, Three Men and A Little Lady, The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, Cocktail, Class Action, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, The Cutting Edge, Terminal Velocity, Operation Dumbo Drop, Bird on a Wire, Jumanji, Runaway Bride, Mr. Holland’s Opus and Save the Last Dance. In 2007 Cort went global, producing his first foreign language film in Germany. Cort’s HBO film, Something the Lord Made, became one of the most honored movies in television’s history, winning three Emmys, including the 2004 Outstanding Film Made for Television, the American Film Institute Award, the Director’s and Writer’s Guild Awards, the Christopher, NAACP Image Award and the prestigious Peabody Award. His six other television films have also won multiple honors, including the 1991 Emmy for Best Children’s Programming for A Mother’s Courage: The Mary Thomas Story.

Cort entered the motion picture industry in 1976 as vice president of advertising, publicity and promotion for Columbia Pictures. In 1980, he became executive vice president of marketing for Twentieth Century-Fox. As marketing chief, Cort planned and supervised the campaigns of such films as Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Midnight Express, The China Syndrome, All That Jazz, The Empire Strikes Back, and Nine to Five. He then served as executive vice president of production at Fox, where he oversaw the making of Romancing the Stone, Bachelor Party and Revenge of the Nerds. For the next eleven years, Cort was a partner and president of Interscope Communications, which was sold to Polygram in 1992. From 1996 to 2001, Cort was the managing partner of The Cort/Madden Company, a production unit with close ties to Paramount Pictures. He currently operates Robert Cort Productions, an independent production company.

Prior to the entertainment industry, Cort was a management consultant for McKinsey & Company. He also served a two-year assignment in the Central Intelligence Agency. In 2003 Random House published Cort’s novel, ACTION!, which garnered outstanding critical reviews and became a bestseller. His articles and essays have been published in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and several websites. In 2006 Cort joined the faculty of the American Film Institute as a professor in the production department. He received his BA, magna cum laude, and MA degrees in history from the University of Pennsylvania, where Cort was also elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He later earned an MBA from the Wharton School, graduating at the top of his business school class. Cort and literary manager Rosalie Swedlin, his wife of twenty-four years, live in Beverly Hills.

Russ Finkelstein, Fellow, Portland State University Social Incubator: Russ Finkelstein has developed and supported programs that aid people in locating their purpose and support them in times of transition. He served for fifteen years as the Associate Director of Idealist.org an international nonprofit that helps move individuals from good intentions to action. Russ has developed trainings, programs and resources that seek to inform individuals and those who counsel them about the opportunities available in public service. 

The programs Russ launched included national slates of fairs dedicated to nonprofit careers, global volunteering and public service graduate education. His team released the free online Idealist Guide to Nonprofit Careers for First Time Job Seekers and Idealist Guide to Nonprofit Careers for Sector Switchers. Penguin recently published The Idealist.org Handbook to Building a Better World: How to Turn Your Good Intentions into Actions That Make a Difference. This work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post and Marketplace. Individual programs have been recognized by the National Association of Careers and Employers (NACE) and the National Association of Graduate Admissions Professionals (NAGAP) for their innovation and service to the field.

Russ recently launched a new social venture, All Your Possibilities, to counter the hopelessness felt by many LGBT young people (13-24) about their future by providing them with the inspiration, tools and individual support to discover and achieve career and life goals. Russ has a Masters in Public Administration (MPA) in Education and Nonprofit Management from Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs and his B.A. is from Connecticut College. He previously served as program director for the Higher Achievement Program, an educational and social enrichment program for inner city children in Washington, DC. Russ also serves on the boards of Next Generation Leadership Forum and Talent Initiative. In 2007 he was named a Selah Fellow. 

Bethany Rubin Henderson, Founder & Executive Director, City Hall Fellows:  A visionary activist and developer of civic leaders, Bethany believes that one talented, passionate individual working inside government can change an agency, and that many working together can change a community. 

In 2007, Bethany launched City Hall Fellows to get the talent snowball rolling. As the first and only non-partisan national service corps for city governments, City Hall Fellows empowers top young talent to help their own cities run better and cheaper. City Hall Fellows prides itself on its proven ability to secure the best young talent, and its highly-regarded, one-of-a-kind, purpose-driven, 300+ hour leadership training program – which prepares Fellows to drive social change through effective local policy innovations and empowers them to be lifelong public leaders.

In just over four years, Bethany has grown City Hall Fellows from a one-page sketch to an impactful venture, raising over $3,000,000 from public and private sources. 7 cohorts of Fellows (working in San Francisco, Houston and Baton Rouge) have saved city agencies over $10 million, piloted ground-breaking anti-obesity and renewable energy programs, project managed water conservation, civil service reform and financial system modernization efforts, and much much more.  Over half of alumni remain in city government post-Fellowship; others take on leadership roles at local nonprofits or attend graduate programs at Oxford, Harvard, Georgetown and the like.

To cultivate City Hall Fellows, Bethany opted to leave a successful legal career at Quinn Emanuel, the country’s largest business litigation-only law firm. Her inspiration: spending the year after college on the 5-person team that guided New York City’s transition into the Internet era. As part of a citywide cohort of young policy wonks, Bethany experienced both city government’s far-reaching impact and the enormous social change young people can create working inside city government.

Bethany is widely recognized as a leader and innovator.  She is an Echoing Green Fellow (2009); a Next American City emerging urban leader (2010); and a former NYC Urban Fellow (1998-99).  Most recently, she was named one of the 40 under 40 progressive political entrepreneurs of 2011 by the New Leaders Council and babble.com's 2011 Mom Changing Your World (Politics). Bethany has her J.D. from Harvard Law School, both a B.A. and M.A. in Political Science (summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa) from the University of Pennsylvania, and has authored or co-authored eight academic and industry journal articles.

When not traveling, Bethany lives near Washington, DC with her husband of nine years, their two delightful young daughters and a very spunky dog.

National Advisory Board

National Academic Advisory Board

Houston Friends of Fellows

Mini Timmaraju

San Francisco Friends of Fellows

Nancy Kirshner Rodriguez
Director of Government Affairs, Mayor's Office, City and County of San Francisco

Robert Selna

Economic Development & Governance Policy Director, SPUR

Advisory Members

Baton Rouge Friends of Fellows