

She held the retitled position of assistant to the president for intergovernmental affairs and public engagement, managed the White House Office of Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs, and Office of Urban Affairs she also chaired the White House Council on Women and Girls and the White House Office of Olympic, Paralympic, and Youth Sport. Jarrett was one of three senior advisors to President Obama. On November 14, 2008, President-elect Barack Obama selected Jarrett to serve as a senior advisor to the president and assistant to the president for intergovernmental relations and public liaison. What she does share with these counterparts is a fierce sense of loyalty and a refusal to publicly say anything that may reflect poorly on the candidate-or steal his thunder. Jarrett isn't a confidante with a particular portfolio. Unlike Bert Lance, who arrived from Georgia with President Carter and became his budget director, or Karen Hughes, who was President Bush's communications manager, Ms. Jarrett was one of President Obama's longest serving advisors and confidantes and was "widely tipped for a high-profile position in an Obama administration." Jarrett serves on the board of directors of USG Corporation, a Chicago-based building materials corporation.īarack Obama and Valerie Jarrett converse in the Blue Room, White House, 2010 She also served as vice chairwoman of the board of trustees of the University of Chicago and a trustee of the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. Jarrett was a member of the board of trustees of the University of Chicago Medical Center from 1996 to 2009, becoming vice chairwoman in 2002 and chairwoman in 2006.

Jarrett was a member of the board of Chicago Stock Exchange (2000–2007, as chairman, 2004–2007). Levin is the chairman of Habitat, which was formed in 1971. She was replaced by Mark Segal, an attorney who joined the company in 2002, as CEO. Until joining the Obama administration, Jarrett was the CEO of the Habitat Company, a real estate development and management company, which she joined in 1995. Jarrett served as commissioner of the department of planning and development from 1992 through 1995, and she was chairwoman of the Chicago Transit Authority from 1995 to 2003. She was deputy chief of staff for Mayor Richard Daley, during which time (1991) she hired Michelle Robinson, then engaged to Barack Obama, away from a private law firm. Jarrett continued to work in the mayor's office in the 1990s. Jarrett got her start in Chicago politics in 1987 working for Mayor Harold Washington as deputy corporation counsel for finance and development.

On May 21, 2016, she received the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws from Colby College in Waterville, Maine. in psychology from Stanford University in 1978 and a Juris Doctor (J.D.) from the University of Michigan Law School in 1981. Jarrett graduated from Northfield Mount Hermon School in 1974, and earned a B.A. The institute was established to provide collective knowledge in child development for teachers and other professionals working with young children. In 1966, her mother was one of four child advocates who created the Erikson Institute. Īs a child, Jarrett spoke Persian, French, and English. Her maternal grandfather, Robert Rochon Taylor, was chairman of the Chicago Housing Authority in the 1940s. Jarrett's father once told her that her great-grandfather was Jewish. One of her maternal great-grandfathers, Robert Robinson Taylor, was the first accredited African-American architect, and the first African-American student enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Among her European roots, she was found to have French and Scottish ancestry.
#WAS VALERIE JARRETT READING A PROMPTER SERIES#
On the television series Finding Your Roots, DNA testing indicated that Jarrett is of 49% European, 46% African, and 5% Native American descent. Her parents are of African-American and European descent. When she was five years old, the family moved to London for a year, later moving to Chicago in 1963. Her father, a pathologist and geneticist, worked at a hospital in Shiraz in 1956. Jarrett was born in Shiraz, Iran, during the Shah's rule, to American parents James E.
