UUSC President Steps Down to Accept Major
Human Rights Position at Harvard University
Charlie Clements, UUSC president for the past six-and-a-half years, will be stepping down from his role as the organization’s chief executive officer to accept a new position as head of a major human rights research and teaching institution at Harvard University.
Clements will continue to lead UUSC through a transition period before assuming full responsibilities in February as executive director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
UUSC Board of Trustees Chair Rev. John Gibbons said that while he is disappointed that Clements is leaving, it is completely understandable why the Carr Center would want him in its primary executive leadership position.
“Charlie has transformed UUSC so positively,” said Gibbons. “By attracting a world-class staff, smartly strategizing and by passionately engaging our membership, Charlie has made UUSC a hotbed of human rights activism. He has put UUSC at the go-to center of local, national, and international justice-making.”
Gibbons said that because of the work that Clements has done to grow and strengthen UUSC, he is confident the organization will continue to attract robust leadership. He said the board is already working to ensure that during the transition process, UUSC stays strong and effective in our commitment to program partners and our mission.
Clements said he does not consider his move as an end to his formal relationship with UUSC, but rather as a transition that will open exciting new opportunities for both the Service Committee and the Carr Center to advance our mutually supportive missions.
“I was not seeking another position and had thought I would be here until I retired. However, when Harvard came recruiting there were several matters of great excitement,” said Clements. “These include the convening power of Harvard; the intellectual crossroads of the world that the JFK School of Government seems to be; and the hope to create collaborations between UUSC and Harvard as well as between the Carr Center and some of our partners around the world.”
During Clements’s tenure as UUSC’s president, the organization doubled its membership, moved to much larger headquarters in Cambridge, Mass., and gained widespread respect for its expertise in the four major program focus areas of environmental justice, economic justice, civil liberties, and rights in humanitarian crises.
Clements, a widely respected human rights activist and public health physician, has served as president of UUSC since August 2003.
For more information, visit UUSC President Steps Down.
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