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Board of Directors

Thère du Pont 
Chairman
Thère is the President of the Foundation where he supports the great work of the entire team. He continues to serve on the grantmaking team and handles a significant portion of grant requests personally.

Previously, Thère was President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at Wawa, and CFO at drugstore.com.

He serves on the Boards of DuPont, WSFS, and Burris Logistics. He is Chair of the Board of the Community Education Building, Pete du Pont Freedom Foundation, and First State Educate. He enjoys spending time with his family, jogging, and playing tennis.
William E. Manning
Secretary
Bill Manning is a partner with Saul Ewing LLC, and as Co-Managing Partner of its Wilmington office, Mr. Manning brings extensive experience in business management. He also serves as Co-Chair of Saul Ewing’s Higher Education Practice Group, and with his partner, Jim Taylor, he provides legal advice to many of Delaware’s charter schools.
He is the former president of the Red Clay Consolidated School District (RCCSD) Board of Education, and has long been a champion for diversity issues relating to quality education, student recruitment, and charter schools. Under his leadership, RCCSD became the first – and remains the only – local school district in Delaware to authorize charter schools.
Margie López Waite
Director
As one of the founders, Margie was instrumental in opening the first dual language (English/Spanish) charter school in Delaware. She has been involved with ASPIRA of Delaware as a volunteer and/or board member since 2004. Margie transitioned into the Head of School role shortly after the school charter was approved in April 2009. With the expansion to high school and a second campus in 2020, Margie took on the role of CEO with a Head of School assigned to each campus. Margie previously was a Spanish teacher in the Appoquinimink School District and also worked at MBNA/Bank of America for sixteen years. Her last position was as a Senior Vice President in the Hispanic Market Sector.

She earned her Master’s Degree in Secondary Education and School Leadership certification from Wilmington University in May 2008. Margie earned a Bachelor’s degree in Marketing from Delaware State University in May 1990, and proudly serves on their Board of Trustees.
Eli Sharp
Director
Eli serves as President and Chief Executive Officer of Eleuthèrian Trust Company, a multi-generational family wealth services firm. Previously, he served as a Sr. Relationship Manager in Wilmington Trust Company’s Managed Wealth Advisory Group. In that role, Mr. Sharp was responsible for managing substantial private client relationships. He is currently also a board member for the Longwood Foundation, Delaware Wild Lands, Inc. and is a Trustee of Christiana Care Health Systems.
Drew Fennell
Director
Drew is the Executive Vice President of Social Contract. Prior to this role, Drew spent five years as a Senior Vice President at  ChristianaCare, where she led communications, marketing, patient experience, and philanthropy. Before joining ChristianaCare, Drew served as Chief of Staff to former Delaware Governor Jack Markell, and as the Executive Director  of the Delaware Criminal Justice Council. She spent several years in private practice as an attorney before becoming the Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Delaware. 
Drew has received numerous accolades and honors over the course of her career, from dozens of organizations and entities in Delaware and in 2019, she was inducted into the Delaware Women’s Hall of Fame.
She has graciously donated her time and expertise to multiple nonprofit organizations, serving on the board for the Delaware Center for Justice, Delaware First Media, and Equality Delaware, to name a few. She currently serves as Chair of the Delaware Community Foundation.