Ellen Foley

Ellen Foley is a University of Wisconsin-Madison alumna, an award-winning journalist, an accomplished digital media advisor and a strategic communications corporate executive. She is president of Ellen Foley Ink, a communications consulting company specializing in strategic marketing. Foley worked as Senior Vice President of Corporate Communications at WPS Health Solutions until 2017. She wove an interest in journalism and strategic communications ethics throughout her 33-year career as a daily journalist, a stint leading an election campaign and in her job in the health insurance industry. Foley specializes in complex and community-focused strategic work. Her efforts as editor-in-chief at the Wisconsin State Journal earned the journalists there many awards for online and print projects, including a Pulitzer Prize finalist honor in 2008. In 1988, Foley founded the Violence Against Women Coalition in Minneapolis-St. Paul after the tragic murder of her sister, Mary. The coalition successfully advocated for legislative change of the penalties for sexual predators. In Madison, Foley volunteers as a marketing advisor at Reach Dane, one of the area’s highly regarded providers of early education teaching, including Head Start. She earned a master’s in journalism and a bachelor’s degree in political science, both at UW-Madison.