Board of Directors

Changing The Present is operated by ImportantGifts, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.

The following are the members of the Board of Directors. See our Board of Advisors, too.

Steven J. Spiegel

Chairman of the Board of Directors

Steven Spiegel is an attorney and strategist active in social entrepreneurship projects. He was formally educated at Brown University (B.A. ’82), where he received the school’s award for best honors history thesis, and at Columbia University School of Law (J.D. ‘85), where he was named a Harlan Fiske Stone scholar for academic distinction in each of his three years of law school. Mr. Spiegel’s early career was focused on major Wall Street corporate and real estate transactions, primarily at Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom, where he spent over five years, in their New York and Los Angeles offices. In 1991, he founded his own firm, where he concentrates on entrepreneurial projects. In 1999, Apple Computer profiled Mr. Spiegel as “the lawyer who takes ‘Think Different’ to a whole new level.

Alton Parks

Director

Alton Parks currently heads Chrysalis Projects, a consulting firm to non-profit research and higher education institutions for which he serves as project representative and advisor to clients such as James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy, National Fund for the US Botanic Garden, St. Paul's School, and Howard Hughes Medical Institute at institutions such as Rice University, Yale University, Rockefeller University, Children's Hospital Boston, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard University, Mass General Hospital, MIT, UCLA, and UCSD. Currently Mr. Parks is serving as owner's representative for a new $36,000,000 Experimental Sciences Building at Texas Tech University. The total value of these projects exceeds $300,000,000. A licensed architect for thirty years, Mr. Parks practiced architecture and urban design in Houston prior to making the transition to representing non-profit owners and donors. Concurrently with professional practice, Mr. Parks was a member of the architecture faculty at Rice University for eight years.

James Huysman, Psy. D., LCSW

Director

Jamie Huysman is the Executive Director of the Leeza Gibbons Memory Foundation. He is a board-certified licensed clinical social worker and certified addictions professional. He is the founder of TV Aftercare, a program that has assisted and secured treatment for over 700 guests of talk, court, and reality shows. He has worked on 10 syndicated national shows while appearing on-camera in over 100 different episodes. He has a group practice, The Centers for Psychological Growth.

 

Board of Advisors

See our world-class Board of Advisors.