Scott McVay, a charter member of the board of trustees of the Knowles Science Teaching Foundation, organized the national search for Mr. and Mrs. Knowles who chose Angelo Collins as the first Executive Director. McVay's life reflects a conviction that great teaching and continuing education are the soul of a healthy and secure society.
For three decades, McVay has been engaged in organized philanthropy as founding executive director of both the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation (1972-75) and the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation (1976-98). He served three years as the 16th president of the Chautauqua Institution in western New York.
Among his initiatives are: creating a program of Chinese language instruction in high schools nationwide, backing superb teachers, encouraging able students nationwide to become teachers, supporting public school principals to become active learners and encouraging the Principals' Center for the Garden State, giving top veterinary students in North America the chance to work at the frontiers of veterinary research, and stimulating writing, reading, and poetry through biennial poetry festivals, poet-teachers in the schools and through 26 hours of PBS programming, mostly with Bill Moyers.
McVay worked previously for Princeton University for 11 years as Recording Secretary and Assistant to the President (Robert F. Goheen). A graduate of Princeton University in English literature, he served in the U. S. Army in Berlin, Germany (1956-58) as a special agent with the Counter Intelligence Corps.
He has an avocational interest in whales, dolphins, and porpoises and is the author of papers in Scientific American (1966), Science (Songs of Humpback Whales with Roger Payne, 1971), Natural History, The New York Times, Mind in the Waters (Scribners), among others. McVay led two expeditions to the Alaskan Arctic to study, record and film the rare Bowhead whale, resulting in a lead paper in American Scientist (1973) and a film documentary by the National Film Board of Canada (1974).
McVay has served on the boards of the World Wildlife Fund (1973-1998), Smithsonian Institution, W. Alton Jones Foundation, National Park Foundation, World Resources Institute and on the U. S. delegation to the International Whaling Commission. In addition to the Knowles Foundation, he currently serves on the boards of the New Jersey Network for public television and radio, Bat Conservation International, Center for Talented Youth at Johns Hopkins University, Princeton (University) Environmental Institute and Storm King Art Center.
He and his wife Hella, a mathematician and teacher, have traveled widely on behalf of science, conservation, population, women's issues, Chinese language instruction and the well being of animals. McVay has written chapters in books on whales, biophilia, the humane treatment of all life, and philanthropy. The newly published book, JUST MONEY: A Critique of Contemporary American Philanthropy (2004) contains his essay, "The Philanthropic Tipping Point."
McVay's honors include receipt of the Albert Schweitzer Award from the Animal Welfare Institute, the Princeton Class of 1955 Award, President's recognition award from A Better Chance, the Joseph Wood Krutch Medal from the Humane Society of the United States, the Lyndon Baines Johnson award from the White House Commission on Presidential Scholars, New Jersey Council on Humanities Citizen of the Year, Rutgers University Zimmerli Art Museum Zammi award (with George Segal), and an honorary doctorate from Middlebury College.
His wife, Hella, their two daughters Catherine and Cynthia, and their children, Philip, Tess, and Matthew, are the center of his life. To reach Mr. Mcvay email scottandhella@aol.com