Celebrating Women Philanthropy

Meet lawyer, history maker, and philanthropist - Judith Batty

At my core, I am a girl scout. I spoke publicly for the first time at Girl Scout Sunday. I learned perseverance by completing all the many tasks related to earning badges. I am convinced that my early years of selling cookies were a precursor to my career in fundraising. Hands down, Girl Scouts is one of the leading producers of women leaders. And Judith Batty agrees.

Serving as the first African American woman CEO of Girl Scouts of the United States, Batty credits her experience as a girl scout to cultivating her giving spirit and commitment to ensuring underserved populations, especially African American youth, have access to every opportunity to be successful. She sees Girl Scouts as being an example of an organization that meets that need having described it in one interview as a "premier organization in this country for creating women leaders!"

If you needed any further proof of this, a look at Batty's life provides all you need. Batty started as a Brownie with a girl scout troop in New York. She continued with the scouts all through high school and into her adult life serving as a troop leader and a member of the national board. For years, she worked in corporate law for ExxonMobile Corporation. Her areas of expertise were corporate deal-making and corporate strategy.

Batty's philanthropy is focused on organizations that build strong girls, celebrate the arts, and intentionally engage African Americans. In the early years of her career, she gave more time than money. When she retired for the first time, she gave herself fully to board service and opened her wallet to give more.

She focused her efforts on three nonprofits - Girl Scouts USA, Arena Stage, and the Levine School of Music. Girl Scouts because of its research-based approach to developing girls to be leaders in their community; Arena Stage because of its stellar theatre program that serves a significant minority population and Levine because of its financially accessible program that helps serious and novice musicians alike develop musically with some going on to pursue a degree in music at some of the most prestigious music programs in the country.

For some time, this was her life. Then the Girl Scouts of the United States called upon her to step in as interim CEO when Sylvia Acedio stepped down in 2020. She served in that role until Sofia Chang was hired in 2022 as the new CEO.

Done with her short-term assignment she continues using her time, talent, and treasurer to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in every sector, business, private, public, and independent. Her vision, as shared in one interview with Angela Dorn of #Blackher asking her what a miracle for black women would look like, was "Black women are fully present and fully powerful."

And through philanthropy, we can be.

Reference: Giving Compass August 2019, Girl Scouts, HistoryMakers August 2018, Forbes August 2020, BlackHer December 2018