Marlene Hess
RECIPIENT OF THE HONORARY DEGREE
Marlene Hess is an independent philanthropic consultant and the former Managing Director of Global Philanthropic Services at JP Morgan Private Bank (J.P. Morgan Chase). She has advised clients from the United States, Latin America, Europe, and Asia, and has helped create innovative programs and nonprofit organizations. Prior to her work at JP Morgan, she was Director of Not-for-Profit Relations at Chase Manhattan Bank. She played a key role in enhancing the bank’s philanthropic activities and created campaigns to raise public awareness, including an award-winning child vaccination program.
Ms. Hess serves on the boards of the Museum of Modern Art, where she is a Vice Chair; Lincoln Center Theater, where she is a past Vice Chair; the American Museum of Natural History; The Metropolitan Opera; New York-Presbyterian Hospital; and The WNET Group. She is an active member of the Council on Foreign Relations and has served on several of its task forces.
Ms. Hess is also a past trustee of New York City Ballet, the International Women’s Health Coalition, and Sesame Street Workshop. She was a trustee of NYC-focused organizations including the Episcopal School, St. Bernard’s School, the Trinity School, and Women In Need, a non-profit organization serving homeless women and their children. She was a member of Harvard University’s David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies, and of its Overseers’ Committee to Visit the College. From 2012 to 2014, she served on the Capital Commitment Task Force of the NYC Partnership’s 9/11 Financial Recovery Fund to aid in the rebuilding of lower Manhattan.
The International Women’s Health Coalition gave her its Visionary Leadership Award in 2019. In 2022, the New York Landmarks Conservancy honored Ms. Hess as a Living Landmark for her contributions to New York City. In 2023, she was honored by MoMA. In 2024, Ms. Hess received Rockefeller’s Enlightened Philanthropy Award in recognition of her significant contributions to advancing the university’s mission of science for the benefit of humanity.
Ms. Hess joined Rockefeller’s Board of Trustees in 2002 and, in 2017, she was elected Vice Chair. From 2013 to 2024, she served as Chair of the Educational Affairs Committee. She was elected a Life Trustee of the university in 2024. Her many significant commitments to Rockefeller include endowing the Leon Hess Professorship held by Sohail Tavazoie, launching the cross-disciplinary Marlene Hess Center for Research on Women’s Health and Biomedicine in 2022, and creating the Hess Academic Center at Rockefeller, housing both the president’s and dean’s offices, in memory of her father.