China Jessup has been a member of the ISH Board of Trustees since 1975, serving two years as the board’s president. A Minneapolis native, China graduated from the University of Minnesota with a degree in psychometrics. After graduation, she moved to New York City where Look magazine hired her to work as an editorial researcher and photo editor. A German speaker, China subsequently worked at Heute, a German language magazine circulated in postwar Germany by the U.S. Army Reeducation Program, and then at Amerika Illustrated, a publication of the U.S. Information Service distributed in the Soviet Union.
China and her husband Peter, a Foreign Service officer, were posted to Germany, Switzerland and twice to Israel, where China studied archeology at Tel Aviv University. Each spring China took students from the American International School in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem to assist with excavations in the Old City. During her second posting in Israel, she coached students in English at the Friends School in Ramallah on the West Bank. Returning with her family to Washington, China joined the staff of the newly organized Congressional Caucus for Women’s Issues, a bipartisan group of Congresswomen concerned with legislation about women and families. She was the first administrator of the Congressional Fellowships on Women and Public Policy, a program of the Women’s Research and Education Institute. In addition to her service to ISH, China is on the boards of Jubilee Jobs and Friends International Center Ramallah. She is a member of Bethesda Friends Meeting.
