Our History

Impact100 Nashville was established in the fall of 2014 when Founding President Jolene Skinner shared her prior experiences in the Impact100 Austin chapter with the women who would become the founders of Impact100 Nashville: Mollie Lacher (past-president), Michele Herlein (past-president), Meghan Breinig, Trish Holliday, and Leah Willingham. The founders of Impact100 Nashville built the infrastructure and enlisted the assistance of other amazing women in the community to make the dream of Impact100 Nashville a reality. Since its inception, Impact100 Nashville has empowered a diverse local group of women of all ages, stages in life, income levels, and backgrounds to come together to fund transformational grants of $100,000 in the Greater Nashville region comprised of the 10 counties including and surrounding Nashville (Cheatham, Davidson, Dickson, Maury, Montgomery, Robertson, Rutherford, Sumner, Williamson, Wilson). Through 2023, Impact100 Nashville has given $1,051,000 in grant funds to deserving non-profits.

Our mission is to inspire women to collectively invest in social transformation in Greater Nashville. Our vision is to grow a large, vibrant community of philanthropic women.

For more information about how Impact100 started, see the Global council story.

 

The Impact100 Model

The Impact100 model is readily available to all communities who wish to implement it. The model is designed to empower women to see themselves as philanthropists and overcome the barriers women have historically faced in this arena. The model is designed for transformational grant-making within local communities, with a minimum grant size of $100,000.

At Least 100 Women
Come Together

Each Woman
Donates $1,000

$100,000
is donated to a
Local Charity

Focus Area

Impact100 Nashville recognizes non-profit organizations that seek to end the cycle of any debilitating condition, including but not limited to homelessness, poverty, addiction, hunger, illiteracy, human trafficking, recidivism, etc. We are seeking to award these grants to non-profit organizations that offer creative and innovative services to their populations and can show how the results of their services end the cycle for the communities they serve.

How it Works

The annual $1,000 donations of Impact100 Nashville members are pooled into a grant fund to be given away to nonprofit organizations serving the Greater Nashville area. The number and size of grants awarded are dependent on our membership, but our goal is to give incremental grants of $100,000 each year. Grant categories and amounts are announced in the Spring at “The Big Reveal” event, commencing our grants cycle. Nonprofit finalists are chosen by grant committees through a competitive application process, and grants are awarded based on a membership vote at our annual meeting. Every woman who gives $1,000 or more has one vote.

Joanne Sowell
President
Joanne Sowell
President

Joanne is an attorney, community activist and philanthropist in Nashville, and is passionate about making Tennessee a welcoming and inclusive place to live. Besides practicing law, she has worked at social service agencies, owned a social enterprise and been an active volunteer on political campaigns and in numerous community projects.

Contact Joanne:
president@nashville.impact100council.org

Janet Walls
Immediate Past President
Janet Walls
Immediate Past President

Janet is president and founder of Delta Blvd, a management consulting and executive coaching company she founded in 2007. Prior to starting Delta Blvd, Janet spent 27 years in the corporate world including roles as Chief Financial officer and VP of Operations. She also serves as a board member of OCLC, a global technology company and as adjunct professor at Vanderbilt University. Janet joined Impact100 Nashville in 2017.

info@nashville.impact100council.org

Jill Pepper
Membership Retention and Engagement
Jill Pepper
Membership Retention and Engagement

Jill moved to the Nashville area in 1993 and is a Director at a Fortune 100 Healthcare company. She’s also a Certified Project Manager and is excited to utilize those skills while serving on the Impact100 Nashville board to further the objectives of the organization. Jill was drawn into Impact100 Nashville because it offers a unique, welcoming environment and is a perfect combination for women wanting philanthropy, networking and comradery on their own terms.

Contact Jill:
membership@nashville.impact100council.org

 

Tara Waters
Board Secretary
Tara Waters
Board Secretary

Tara is an Attorney, specializing in advocating for disabled individuals. Tara also serves in other capacities making a difference; as a member of the Orphan, Foster, Adoption Ministry team at Brentwood United Methodist Church, serving as a volunteer Attorney for the Legal Aid Society, and as a Member Relations Committee member for the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce. Tara has served on the Advisory Board/Committee and Grants Committee during her tenure and looks forward to the collaborative continuation of working together with other women making a positive and transformative IMPACT in our community.

secretary@nashville.impact100council.org

 

Tina Percy
Treasurer
Tina Percy
Treasurer

Tina is originally from St. George, Utah and has been a Tennessee resident since 2010. Tina works as an Accounts Receivable Manager in the Revenue Cycle department at a local health care company. She got involved with Impact100 Nashville through a friend.  She is excited to be part of a growing organization that both inspires and empowers women who want to make a significant difference in their community.  She is inspired by being involved in a group effort that makes an impact on the Nashville non-profit community.

Contact Tina:
finance@nashville.impact100council.org

 

Tracey Power
Corporate Sponsorship Chair
Tracey Power
Corporate Sponsorship Chair

Tracey is a Human Resources Executive with 15+ years experience designing HR strategies to meet corporate goals. She joined Impact100 Nashville because of the powerful mission of women coming together to influence the communities where we live and work. Tracey loves the camaraderie, the connection, and the care the organization and its members and sponsors provide to other organizations in our city.

Contact Tracey:
sponsorship@nashville.impact100council.org

Michele Herlein
Legacy Chair
Michele Herlein
Legacy Chair

Michele co-founded Impact100 Nashville in 2015. She was President from 2018 to 2021, doubling our membership to over 200 members. She continues to be dedicated to Impact100 Nashville because she loves combining philanthropic and financial power to create social change in our community. She is an Executive Vice President, Chief Administrative Officer for Barge Design Solutions and lives in Mt. Juliet with her husband Doug. She loves paddle boarding, yoga, and being with her children and grandchildren.

Contact Michelle:
info@nashville.impact100council.org

 

Rahwa Mahari
Community Liason
Beth Johnson
Grants Co-Chair
Beth Johnson
Grants Co-Chair

Beth is a Senior Investment Consultant at Mercer. She currently services endowment, foundation and family office clients with over $9 billion in aggregate assets under advisement. For these clients, Beth focuses on projects relating to asset allocation, investment manager selection, performance evaluation, fund operations, and governance.

Beth’s prior professional experience includes work as an Investment Director for Vanderbilt University’s endowment, where she was responsible for investments across traditional equities and bonds, marketable alternatives, oil and gas and private equity. She started her investment career as an Investment Analyst at Duke Management Company, managing investment projects across all asset classes for Duke University’s endowment office.

Throughout her career, Beth has remained active in her community, sitting on several not-for-profit boards of directors, previously serving as the Investment Committee Chair and then Chair of the Board for the Missouri Foundation for Health, a $1 billion healthcare foundation in St. Louis. She is also a previous recipient of the Foundation and Endowment Money Management’s Non-Profit Consultant of the Year Award.

grants@nashville.impact100council.org

Kristen Phillips
Grants Co-Chair
Kristen Phillips
Grants Co-Chair

Kristen Phillips, a Nashvillian since 2009, works in healthcare administration and has been a member of Impact Nashville since 2020. She immediately fell in love with the work of the grants committee for both the ability to support the amazing work by nonprofits in the Nashville community she loves, as well as the opportunity to meet and work with the supportive and driven women of Impact100 Nashville.

Contact Kristen:
grants@nashville.impact100council.org

 

Melissa Russell
Data Analytics
Melissa Russell
Data Analytics

Melissa is a technology leader who specializes in Data Analytics. She manages a team of developers and analysts at a local healthcare company. Melissa became involved in Impact100 Nashville to be a part of the solution for middle Tennesseans in need. She’s been with Impact100 Nashville for four years and served on the grants committee for three of those years.

Contact Melissa:
dataanalytics@nashville.impact100council.org

 

 

Katherine Terrell
Marketing Chair
Katherine Terrell
Marketing Chair

Katherine is a seasoned creative professional with 25+ years building brands and designing products in the entertainment, healthtech, and fintech industries. She was thrilled to join Impact100 Nashville in 2022 after hearing its model of gathering 100 women donating $1,000 each to give incremental grants of $100,000 each year to local non-profits. Katherine looks forward to growing the Impact100 brand and awareness.

marketing@nashville.impact100council.org