download a high resolution photo click here. NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Ronald D. Ford has been elected president of the Vanderbilt University Alumni Association Board of Directors for 2003-04.
A native of Lenoir City, Tenn., Ford received his Master’s in Business Administration through the Executive MBA Program at the Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt in 1992 and was a member of the Beta Gamma Sigma honorary society. While a student at Owen, Ford was elected to the Owen Alumni Board of Directors and served 11 years, culminating with his presidency of the group. He has been a member of the Vanderbilt Alumni Association Board for the past several years and assumed the presidency July 1.
Ford has a degree in accounting from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville and holds a doctorate in executive management from Case Western Reserve University. Until recently he was chief executive officer of the publicly traded Media Arts Group, Inc., the nation’s largest producer and distributor of art reproduction and related gift items. The company is perhaps best known as the publisher and distributor of the inspirational works of Thomas Kinkade.
Ford and his wife, Kim, make their home in Atlanta. They have one son, Colin, age six. An active member of the Atlanta community, Ford is a past president of Atlanta’s American Cancer Society Board and is involved in the Young President’s Organization, Leadership Atlanta, the Holy Innocents Episcopal Schools Board of Trustees and the Atlanta Downtown Rotary.
“Ron Ford’s deep civic engagement with his own community has perfectly prepared him to lead and to guide an Alumni Association that is ever more increasingly involved in Vanderbilt’s present life,” said Vanderbilt Chancellor Gordon Gee.
For more information on the Vanderbilt Alumni Association, visit www.vanderbilt.edu/alumni.
Media contact: Kara Furlong, (615)322-NEWS kara.c.furlong@vanderbilt.edu