By: Bianca R. Montes
Seven women, including three Preston Hollow locals, will be honored for leadership and service at the upcoming Texas Women’s Foundation award dinner.
The Maura Women Helping Women and Younger Leaders Awardrecognize leaders who have positively impacted the lives of other women and girls. Presented by AT&T, the event takes place May 2 at the Omni Dallas Hotel. The event’s keynote speaker is Sallie Krawcheck, CEO and co-founder of Ellevest, a mission-driven investment platform investing in women-led companies that are building stronger economies.
Krawcheck was named by Fast Company as one of “100 Most Creative People” and she is the author of Own It: The Power of Women at Work.
“We are humbled to pay tribute to these incredible women who are contributing their passion, skill and time to blaze trails for women and girls to follow,” said Roslyn Dawson Thompson, Texas Women’s Foundation president and chief executive officer. “We are also very pleased to welcome Sallie Krawcheck as our keynote speaker. She has made it her mission to help women unleash our financial power so that we can build savings and wealth in order to invest in women to make powerful change in our communities and world.”
For 40 years, the Maura Women Helping Women Award has been presented to courageous individuals who have catalyzed change for women and girls.
Sally Dunning, Ana Hernandez, and Nicole Small, all of the Preston Hollow neighborhood, will be honored.
Dunning has worked tirelessly for equal access to quality healthcare, education, the arts, and adoption to create forever families.
As chair of Greenhill School Board of Trustees, she helped to expand student diversity and instituted scholarship programs to advance gender equality.
She co-chaired Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas with a goal of $12.5 million, which was exceeded to ensure accessible healthcare for all women covered by the affiliate and served on the board of Annie’s List as a strategic plan was created to help elect more women to local, as well as state offices.
As an interior designer, Dunning established The Design Studio and worked for many individuals, clients and companies for more than 50 years.
Hernandez is senior vice president and senior loan officer at PlainsCapital Bank. As a first-generation college graduate born in Mexico, she believes in paying it forward by helping others.
In her field, Hernandez provides financial solutions to businesses on gaining access to capital to help them achieve their business goals.
She is a strong advocate for education and the importance of empowering women with financial literacy and an active mentor to young women attending Dallas-area middle and high schools and young Latina professional women.
Hernandez also volunteers her time equipping women who are victims of financial and physical abuse with the knowledge they need to be economically secure, both in English and in Spanish, at organizations such as The Family Place and Genesis Women’s Shelter.
Small is the chief executive officer of LH Holdings, Inc. and president of Lyda Hill Philanthropies.
From her deep and long-standing involvement at The Hockaday School to her work at Lyda Hill Philanthropies, she has a passion for advancing women and girls.
Most recently, she spearheaded Lyda Hill Philanthropies’ If/Then initiative, a platform aimed to elevate positive and successful female STEM professionals with a focus on funding their work and sharing their stories, developing and supporting programs for middle school girls to learn about STEM opportunities, and engaging media partners to help shift the perception of women in STEM.
Prior to Lyda Hill Philanthropies, Small was CEO of the Perot Museum of Nature & Science where she led the merger of three existing Dallas museums and the development of the new $200 million museum.