People

Geoffrey Cowan is a lawyer, academic administrator, government official, best-selling author, distinguished professor, nonprofit executive, and Emmy Award-winning producer. After serving as the 22nd Director of the Voice of America, Cowan served as dean of USC Annenberg from 1996–2007. When he stepped down, he was named a University Professor, the inaugural holder of the Annenberg Family Chair in Communication Leadership, and director of USC Annenberg’s Center on Communication Leadership and Policy. He is also on the faculty of USC’s Gould School of Law. In 2010, Cowan became the first president of the Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands. As president, he hosted a range of important retreats and three summit meetings with President Barack Obama, including his historic meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping in June 2013. Cowan is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Walter Lippmann fellow of the Academy of Political and Social Science.