Ann Kirschner

Ann Kirschner works at the intersection of higher education, technology, and media, with particular focus on strategies that transform content, commerce, and learning. Her multidimensional career has covered a lot of territory, from the classroom to the boardroom.  As a University Professor at The City University of New York (CUNY), Dr. Kirschner co-teaches the Macaulay Honors College seminar on The Future of New York City.  She also serves as senior advisor to Ocean Road Advisors and Acting Executive Director of Meyer Family Philanthropies.  An experienced corporate board director, Ann Kirschner serves on the Movado Group (MOV) and Strategic Cyber Ventures boards and is an advisor to ShortTok, the AI video company. At Arizona State University, she is Senior Advisor to the Office of the President, Professor of Practice at Barrett Honors College, and on the Management Committee of EdPlus and Learning Enterprise. She is a member of the Academic Advisory Council of Chegg.  She is a director of the Paul and Daisy Soros Foundation, NYC FIRST, and The Center for Sustainable Media. She is the author of Sala’s Gift  (2006) and Lady at the OK Corral: The True Story of Josephine Marcus Earp (2013), and a frequent speaker and writer on innovation in media, technology, and education, and the future of work. As an entrepreneur and digital strategist, she was a senior executive of five technology start-ups, including NFL.COM and NFL SUNDAY TICKET, and FATHOM, one of the first online learning companies, which she developed at Columbia University in partnership with the London School of Economics, University of Chicago, the British Library, and other leading institutions. At CUNY, she served as interim president of Hunter College, dean of Macaulay Honors College, and strategic advisor to the Chancellor, expanding public-private partnerships and launching CUNY’s partnership with Cornell Tech, Verizon, and other companies in the creation of Women in Technology in New York (WITNY, now known as Break Through Tech). At the CUNY Graduate Center, she developed and taught interdisciplinary courses on the future of higher education and the future of work. A native New Yorker, she graduated from the State University of New York at Buffalo and the University of Virginia. She received her PhD from Princeton University, where she was a Whiting Fellow in the Humanities and was elected to the board of trustees.