Christine Leahey joined the Center for Caregiver Advancement in 2024 as its first Director of Development, advancing the organization’s mission to build a workforce of highly trained caregivers that many Californians cannot live without. During the five years prior, she served as Brilliant Corners’ first Strategic Partnerships Manager of Fund Development, advancing the organization’s mission to provide supportive housing for people who need it by securing and managing a $136.2 million grant portfolio.
Ms. Leahey previously led institutional giving at Otis College of Art and Design as Director of Strategic Partnerships during a $30 million comprehensive campaign, culminating in the College’s centennial anniversary. She was poised for this leadership role following her fundraising success at the American Film Institute, Library Foundation of Los Angeles, and Santa Monica Museum of Art (now Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles).
A passionate disability justice advocate, Ms. Leahey has taught mild, moderate, severe, and gifted “special” education in public and private schools. She is a subject matter expert on the low-incidence, high-severity condition of blindness and a champion of full economic participation and social inclusion of people with disabilities in the arts—subjects that have preoccupied her since studying for a Bachelor of Arts with High Honors in Art History and Education at Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.