Carol Jenkins is President of the Women's Media Center and a Founding Member of its Board of Directors. An Emmy award-winning former news anchor and correspondent who covered presidential politics as well as international issues, Ms. Jenkins leads the Women’s Media Center’s online publication and its advocacy initiatives.

She is a national spokeswoman for women and the media, arguing the case for inclusion of women throughout the media: in ownership positions, at the highest levels of management and creativity, as well as the telling of women's stories in television and film, radio, print, and online.

As president of the Women’s Media Center, Ms. Jenkins has testified before Congress and the FCC, and written about what she calls The Invisible Majority—the 51 percent of the population (women) who occupy only 3 percent of "clout" positions in media.

As a media and political analyst, she has appeared as a guest and in debates at top national outlets. Her commentary, written for www.womensmediacenter.com, has appeared in The Nation.com, The Huffington Post, Television Week, and other print and online sources. A frequently sought speaker and moderator, she also conducts media training seminars and private sessions for women across the country.

Ms. Jenkins enjoyed a 30-year, award-winning tenure with several New York City news departments, including 23 years at WNBC-TV, where she co-anchored the pivotal 6 p.m. newscast. She was most identified with her reporting of national political stories, including from the floor of Democratic and Republican national conventions that yielded Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton. From South Africa she reported on the release of Nelson Mandela after 27 years in prison, and anchored and co-produced an Emmy-nominated prime time special on apartheid. She hosted her own daily talk show, Carol Jenkins Live, on WNYW-TV.

Carol Jenkins is the author, with her daughter Elizabeth Gardner Hines, of Black Titan, A.G. Gaston and the Making of a Black American Millionaire. The life story of Ms Jenkins' uncle, it was selected by the Black Caucus of the American Library Association as one of the best non-fiction books of 2004. She is an executive producer of the PBS documentary, What I Want My Words To Do To You, which won the Freedom of Expression Award at the Sundance Film Festival in 2003.

Among Ms. Jenkins' interests is promoting the cause of the women and children of war ravaged Africa. She serves on the USA board of AMREF, the African Medical and Research Foundation. Founded 50 years ago as The Flying Doctors, AMREF is the largest African health organization working on the continent. Ms Jenkins has visited AMREF projects in South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda, and has written about the former girl soldiers of Uganda.

Ms. Jenkins, a second-generation journalist, is working on her next family memoir, a historical look at women and people of color in the media. She has written articles for More, Ms, and Opportunity Journal and her essay, “Standing By: Women in Broadcast Journalism” appeared in Sisterhood is Forever: The Women's Anthology for a New Millennium. She has served on the boards of the Ms. Foundation for Women and the Feminist Press, among others.

Carol Jenkins has been honored by the Association of Black Journalists/New York Chapter with Lifetime Achievement and International Reporting Awards, UPI, The Feminist Press, The Daily News’ Front Page Award, YWCA, Girl Scouts of America, Save the Children, Single Parents' Association, United Negro College Fund, Hale House, National Mothers Day Committee as Mother of the Year, the Police Athletic League as Woman of the Year, Abbot House as Humanitarian of the Year, and as Distinguished Alumna of New York University, among many others. She holds honorary doctorates from The College of New Rochelle and Marymount Manhattan College.

For the past decade, Glennda Testone has been a leader in the fields of media advocacy and social justice.  Testone joins the Women’s Media Center from the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), where she served as the Senior Director of Media Programs.  During her six years at GLAAD, Testone played a pivotal role in key milestones in gay media activism, most notably leading the team that persuaded the New York Times to make its watershed decision to include same-sex union announcements.  She was also instrumental in securing a commitment from Nielsen Media Research to work to include gay and lesbian viewers in its television rating system

While at GLAAD, Testone managed and led over half the organization’s staff of 45 and was responsible for directing all of the organization’s programmatic activities, including: GLAAD’s media training program; multiple public service announcement (PSA) campaigns; national, regional and people of color media outreach (in English and Spanish); national news and entertainment-based media advocacy, GLAAD’s field operation and its newly created youth media program.   Testone was also responsible for the annual nominations and voting process for the highly coveted GLAAD Media Awards.

Testone has served as a primary spokesperson for GLAAD and for the lgbt movement, appearing on CNN, FOX News, and MSNBC, and in outlets such as The Boston Globe, The New York Post, The Chicago Tribune, Time Out and W magazine.  In 2001, Testone was a member of GLAAD’s program team acknowledged by PR Week with its covered PR Week Award for Non-Profit Team of the Year for its work in heightening awareness of homophobia through its Laura Schlessinger campaign.  In 2005, Testone won Syracuse University’s Foundation Award for Outstanding Alumni and in 2006 she served as an Associate Producer on the Logo & VH1-televised GLAAD Media Awards. 

Originally from Syracuse, New York, Testone has a Bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Journalism and Philosophy from Syracuse University and a Master's degree in Women's Studies from The Ohio State University. Her Master’s thesis focused on feminist representation in mass media, specifically news reports on the "death of feminism." 

Prior to joining GLAAD, Testone worked at Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), a New York City-based media watchdog group that offers criticism of media bias and censorship. Testone worked on its Women’s Desk where she contributed research to several print and broadcast pieces on women’s representation in the media. 

Kathleen Vermazen serves as media director for the Women’s Media Center, bringing experience in both political communications and public relations, with a particular focus on women candidates. 

During the 2006 election cycle, Vermazen served as press secretary and primary spokesperson for the Christine Jennings for Congress campaign in Sarasota, Florida, as well as the subsequent election recount and contest.  Through her work, the Jennings campaign secured extensive, positive editorial support throughout the Florida and national media, as well as ongoing national media attention for the campaign as well as the widespread voting problems that resulted in more than 18,000 lost votes in Sarasota county. 

More recently, Vermazen has served as a member of the national press advance team for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, creating and managing press events across the United States.

In addition to her political work, Vermazen gained extensive experience in public relations while working at Edelman public relations in San Francisco and Miami.  While at Edelman, Vermazen specialized in national media campaigns for both corporate and public affairs clients.  She helped to create communications plans, train spokespeople, and manage ongoing programs while successfully securing media placements in all of the major national news and business publications, as well as internet and broadcast outlets.

Originally from Manchester, Iowa, Vermazen received her Bachelor’s degree with honors in International Relations with a focus in Communications from Stanford University.

Alexus Ranniar Jones served as a spokesperson for American Red Cross during large-scale disasters and as a national spokesperson for Girl Scouts of the USA.  Prior to those positions, Ranniar Jones also worked for several public relations and marketing research firms including Precision Market Research, Eagle Research, Alexander Communications , The William Mills Agency, and Holland McAllister Public Relations.

Her media placements include: Parade, USA Weekend, Associated Press, Business Week, Fortune Small Business, CIO.com, Woman’s World, “Good Morning America”, CNN, Oxygen, and Voice of America.

Jones graduated from Spelman College with a B.A. in Political Science and an M.B.A. in Media Management from Metropolitan College of New York. She also obtained on-camera performance, broadcast writing, interviewing, camera-operation and both linear and non-linear editing skills from Connecticut School of Broadcasting, New York Institute of Technology and her internships with News 12 New Jersey and WRNN-TV.

Maya Iwata brings her passion for actualizing progressive values and her desire to be a part of change across issues to the Women’s Media Center.   This commitment to social justice lead her to a career of  more than 12 years in senior and executive management at grassroots community based organizations in the areas of health, mental health, youth development and social justice.  Some of her past organizational affiliations include Gay Men’s Health Crisis, Brooklyn AIDS Task Force, Heights Hill Mental Health Service Community Advisory Board, and most recently, Sisterhood Mobilized for AIDS/HIV Research and Treatment, Inc.  

From these experiences, Maya realized the interconnections among programming, funding and organizational sustainability.  To ensure organization’s missions, she has a long track record of diversifying funding by type and by number of stakeholders.  For example, she once raised the budget of an organization she worked for by one third within six months. This multi-year funding proved critical when the organization was faced with the possibility of losing its major source of funding, a government contract, due to state budget cuts.

Originally born in Virginia, but raised outside of New York City, Maya received her Bachelor’s degree with honors from Cornell University.  Her undergraduate social psychology thesis was a replication of a study from the 1970’s on the generic masculine.  She returned to New York City to obtain her Masters from Columbia University’s School of Social Work.

As the WMC Communications & Administrative Coordinator, Rebekah Spicuglia has combined her dedication to progressive values with her background in film and television production to create and advocate for inclusive, effective media. In addition to her role as News Brief editor, Rebekah writes for the WMC website and blog, oversees media production, manages interns, and coordinates outreach and program logistics.

After graduating from UC Berkeley with a Bachelor's degree in Mass Communications, Rebekah joined the Media Field Strategy Team at the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), where she contributed to the research and development of GLAAD's Media Essentials guide and worked extensively on the 2006 Announcing Equality project—a national, comprehensive survey of newspaper policy on publishing same-sex wedding announcements—raising awareness about LGBT issues and encouraging people to share their stories in a visible way.  

Rebekah is also a musician, mother, and an active member of the feminist mamasphere -- supporting moms as a powerful political force.