Penny George

For the past two decades Penny Pilgram George has been a pioneering leader in the integrative health and medicine movement, working to transform society’s consciousness around health and wellbeing on both the local and national level. Galvanized by her personal journey with breast cancer in the mid-1990’s to recognize the importance of caring for people as connected in mind, body, spirit and community, Penny aims to spur change at the institutional level as well as at the community and individual level. Her vision for healthcare is deeply embedded in the idea that we are each the primary agent of our own health and that, where appropriate, self-care needs to be the true primary care. Where illness presents, the key is to get to the root cause and to empower the patient to be a full partner in their care. Through the family foundation she founded with her husband Bill, Penny first created and funded the position of healing coach at the Virginia Piper Cancer Institute in 1996, which eventually led to the creation of the Penny George Institute for Health and Healing, the clinical service line responsible for whole-person health across the Allina Health system. In 2002 Penny co-founded the Bravewell Collaborative, a national alliance of philanthropists who worked together strategically for fifteen years to advance the principles and practice of integrative medicine. The Bravewell Collaborative helped bring the field of integrative medicine into mainstream awareness through strategic initiatives intended to drive systemic change. Bravewell helped grow the Academic Consortium for Integrative Medicine and Health from its original eight institutions to more than 60 members. It was responsible for the award-winning PBS documentary, “The New Medicine,” built the first practice-based research network, and funded more than eighty clinical fellowships at major academic health centers across the country. In 2014 Penny and the George Family Foundation created the Catalyst Initiative, a three-year $3 million initiative to identify and support authentic integrative healing initiatives at the grassroots level. Now part of The Minneapolis Foundation, Catalyst is expanding its reach as it creates an ecosystem of culturally relevant self-care and trauma-focused practices throughout Minnesota. More recently, she and her husband Bill, along with the George Family Foundation, partnered with the YMCA of the Greater Twin Cities to create the George Wellbeing Center. The first of its kind in the country, the center offers extensive holistic services and education to all YMCA members. The center also serves as a platform for developing programming to address the needs of people seeking to prevent or even reverse lifestyle-related chronic illness, thus bridging between clinic-based care and the places where people live, work and play. Most recently, with her husband Bill and the foundation, Penny helped launch the Center for Women’s Health at Mayo Clinic, where women will be empowered to optimize their health regardless of the status of their presenting health condition. Penny received her bachelor’s degree in English, Phi Beta Kappa, from Duke University; her master’s degree in educational psychology from the University of Minnesota and her doctorate in counseling psychology from the University of St. Thomas. She spent almost two decades as a consulting psychologist helping diverse organizations select and develop senior executives and build high-performing teams, expertise and insights she draws upon in her philanthropic work.

I am passionate about progressive politics and preserving essential American values and the democracy too many of us have for too long taken for granted. I am deeply committed to improving the health of individuals and communities and where windows of opportunity appear, to changing how we conceive of and practice healthcare delivery. Through the foundation my husband and I created in 1994, we have given away $76 Million Our mission is to foster wholeness in mind, body, spirit and community by developing authentic leaders and supporting transformative programs serving the common good. As a member of Women Moving Millions, I care deeply that all women and girls have the opportunity to thrive and fulfill their potential. Compassion & Choices, Planned Parenthood, Everytown for Gun Safety and Ranked Choice Voting are other causes that I care about. More about me and about the foundation can be found at www.georgefamilyfoundation.org