To mark 150 years of educating women alongside men, Northwestern University is celebrating distinguished individuals who’ve been part of the Northwestern community and gone on to take risks, contribute to others, inspire change, and chart new paths.
Among them is Ann Drake, a 1984 graduate of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern. Drake is the former chairman and CEO of DSC Logistics, a third-party logistics provider and supply chain consultant.
A lifelong advocate for women in business and leadership, Drake is the founder of AWESOME (Achieving Women’s Excellence in Supply Chain Operations, Management and Education), which is the preeminent community for senior women in the supply chain field. In 2019, Drake also founded Lincoln Road Enterprises (LRE). Lincoln Road Enterprises is dedicated to further impacting the future of women’s leadership in business, supply chain, technology, engineering and space by supporting new talent, improving systems, initiating creative partnerships, investing capital, and encouraging bold ideas.
“It gave me the tools and the mindset and network to call upon and be called upon to make things happen.”
Drake’s profile is featured on the “150 Years of Women” website that Northwestern has launched as part of its yearlong celebration of coeducation. The website invites visitors to “[b]e inspired by Northwestern women, womxn and gender-diverse individuals who led the struggle to open doors, creating greater access and opportunity for all who followed.” Honorees include athletes, educators, artists, and advocates, among others.
Drake is lauded as an innovator who “transformed supply chain management into a critical business strategy based on collaborative partnerships. Drake was the first woman to be recognized as a top leader in this industry.” You can view her profile here.
Drake has described her time at Kellogg as “transformational” because it taught her how to think about herself, her world, and her ability to lead and influence others in new ways.
“It gave me the tools and the mindset and network to call upon and be called upon to make things happen,” she said in a 2017 interview with the Kellogg Alumni Network.
In addition to founding two organizations that support women’s leadership, Drake established the Drake Scholars Fund at Kellogg in 2017. The fund gives financial support to female students who are working toward their MBA at Kellogg, either in the Executive MBA program or the Evening & Weekend MBA program.
Northwestern University was an innovator itself in education when it began admitting women as undergraduate students in 1869. Coeducation was generally considered a novel idea at the time. Ivy League schools that were far better established than Northwestern would take (in some cases) another 100 years to enroll women as students alongside men.
The “150 Years of Women at Northwestern” marks the 2019–20 academic year.