Ellen V. Futter

Ellen V. Futter (born September 21, 1949) is president of the American Museum of Natural History. She previously served as president of Barnard College for 13 years.

Futter was born in New York City and attended high school in Port Washington, New York. She spent two years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison before transferring to Barnard College, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa "magna cum laude" in 1971. She was elected as a student representative to the Barnard's board of trustees in 1971 and was subsequently elected to full membership to complete the term of Arthur Goldberg, former Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Futter earned her J.D. from Columbia Law School in 1974.

Futter began her career as an associate at the Wall Street firm of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy, where she practiced corporate law. In 1980, Futter took a leave of absence from Milbank, Tweed to serve as Barnard's acting president for one year. At the end of that period, she was appointed president of the college and served in that capacity until 1993 when she joined the American Museum of Natural History.

Futter is a director of a number of corporations and not-for-profit organizations. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Advisory Board of the Yale School of Management, the steering committee of the Financial Services Volunteer Corps, on the Advisory Board of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, National Institute of Social Sciences and the Academy of American Poets, as well as of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, New York State Bar Association, and American Bar Association.

She formerly served as chairman of the board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and chairman of the Commission on Women's Health of The Commonwealth Fund. She has received numerous honorary degrees, including from Yale University. She is currently the director of American International Group, director of JPMorgan Chase, director of Consolidated Edison, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and on the board of overseers of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.