Biography

Aida Levitan, Ph.D., APR, has served as a director since August 2013 and is the Immediate Past Chairperson of the Board. Since July 2006, Dr. Levitan has been the President of The Levitan Group, Inc., a firm that provides strategic branding and marketing services. She has also served as President of ArtesMiami, Inc., a nonprofit organization, since it was founded in 1995. As member of the Council on Foreign Relations since 2017, she serves on the boards of FACE (Facts About Cuban Exiles), including as its Chair from January 2019 to December 2019 and the Cultural Center of Spain in Miami, and has served since 2017 as a Trustee Emerita of the Perez Art Museum Miami. Dr. Levitan was Vice Chair of the National Smithsonian Latino Center Board from 2014 to April 2017 and Chair of the UM Cuban Heritage Collection Amigos from 2016 to 2019. She also served from 2010 to 2011 on the National Museum of the American Latino Commission, named by President Obama and the U.S. Congress. From 2006 to 2009, Dr. Levitan was a member of the Miami board of The Art Institutes, and from 2004 to 2005 she was the President of the national Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies (Ahaa). Until January 2005, Dr. Levitan was the Vice Chairperson/President of Bromley Communications, which she helped transform into the number one Hispanic advertising agency in the U.S. (Advertising Age, 2004). In 1986 she co-founded Sanchez & Levitan and sold the agency to Publicis Groupe. Under her leadership as Co-Chairman/CEO between 2001 and 2003, Publicis Sanchez & Levitan became one of the top ten U.S. Hispanic advertising agencies (Advertising Age). Dr. Levitan has directed strategic marketing communications campaigns for major national and global brands. A nationally recognized marketing communications and civic leader, she has been quoted in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Miami Herald, Forbes.com, CNN, Telemundo, Univision, and CNBC business news, and other major media. Dr. Levitan received her Ph.D. degree from Emory University in 1977 and a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Miami in 1969.