Education Pioneer To Be Honored By UC

Since December 1998, Chad Wick has been the president and CEO of KnowledgeWorks Foundation. As the first president and CEO of KnowledgeWorks Foundation, Wick led the development of a strategic plan that has positioned the foundation to play a national leadership role in the areas of college access and school facilities planning. Under Wick’s leadership, the Foundation was asked by the Ohio Board of Regents to help create the Ohio College Access Network and was invited by the U.S. Secretary of Education to be a founding member of the National Pathways to College Network. The foundation is also partnering with the U.S. Department of Education to inform local school districts in Ohio about the impact of school facilities on learning outcomes, and to encourage school districts to work with communities during the planning and design process.

Wick is highly respected for the work he has done on behalf of Ohio’s children. His involvement in early childhood education earned him an appointment to the National Advisory Council of the Education Commission of the State. Before coming to the foundation, he co-founded RISE Learning Solutions, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the training of those that work with infants, children and youth. Ohio’s Governor Bob Taft has congratulated Wick “for his superb leadership in founding RISE,” and has called RISE “critical to accomplishing our number one priority for Ohio, enabling every child to succeed.”  RISE Learning Solutions has also received the Ohio’s BEST award for early childhood practices in the state.

Wick has been a leader in the nonprofit world for many years. Among his many involvements, he created and was the first chairman of the annual campaign for the YWCA of Cincinnati. When he was chairman of the Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) in Cincinnati, Wick started the dialogue that ultimately resulted in a decision to build a major new facility – the first art museum in the country to be designed by a female architect (Zaha Hadid). Wick was also a key Ohio leader in fund-raising for the renovation of the Statue of Liberty.

Throughout his career, Wick has demonstrated his commitment to equal opportunities for all people. He co-chaired the successful effort to amend Ohio’s constitution, making housing a public purpose. He was the first Cincinnati bank president to recruit an African-American to his board of directors and to have an African-American woman as a senior bank officer. He also advocated support of minority-owned businesses and work to eliminate “red-lining” (a practice that prevented those living in low-income areas from receiving mortgage loans).  In addition, he was appointed by the governor to the State of Ohio Banking Board and the Governor’s Housing Commission.

Wick earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration from the University of Cincinnati and his master’s degree with distinction in international management from Thunderbird, the American Graduate School of International Management. Wick is also a veteran of the U.S. Air Force. He and his wife Gail (married in 1964) have two grown daughters.