2012 Inspiring Women

Seattle Storm Inspiring Women

2012 Inspiring Women Honorees

The Seattle Storm is proud to announce our 2012 Inspiring Women.
As part of our commitment to the community and to inspiring women, four exceptional leaders with
remarkable stories and achievements, have been selected to be honored at the Storm game on
Aug. 30, 2012. This year's winners are:

Paula Boggs, former lead counsel of Starbucks | Bobbe Bridge, former State Supreme Court judge
Kate Starbird, former Storm player; currently a Ph.D candidate at University of Colorado
Patty Stonesifer, former CEO of Gates Foundation

2012 Seattle Storm Women of Inspiration

Paula Boggs | former lead counsel of Starbucks
Paula Boggs has served in numerous professional and community leadership roles for the past 25 years. From 2002 to the spring of 2012, Boggs served as Starbucks' executive vice president, general counsel and secretary in the Law & Corporate Affairs department, advising Starbucks partners and employees on legal and business issues. In 2010, President Barack Obama named Boggs to the 26-member White House Council for Community Solutions.

Boggs' legal career began as a United States Army officer assigned to the Pentagon in 1984 where she also worked as a staff attorney for the White House before leaving the service in 1988. From 1988 to 1994, Boggs served as the assistant United States attorney in the western district of Washington State.

Boggs was a partner from 1995-1997 at Preston Gates & Ellis in Seattle, a premier, full-service law firm. Before joining Starbucks, Boggs served as Dell Computer Corporation's Vice President, Legal for Products, Operations and Information Technology Systems from 1997-2002.

Boggs graduated with a bachelor's degree in International Studies from The Johns Hopkins University in 1981 and then received her juris doctor from the University of California - Berkeley School of Law.

2012 Seattle Storm Women of Inspiration

Bobbe Bridge | former State Supreme Court judge
Bobbe Bridge is the 2012 Ginger Ackerley Community Service Award winner, an honor presented each year to an individual who has had a measurable impact on improving the quality of life in Puget Sound through a significant and sustained record of volunteer service to the area's youth.

As a champion for disadvantaged youth, Bridge is the founding president and CEO of the Center for Children & Youth Justice, a nonprofit organization she created in 2006 to reform Washington State's child welfare and juvenile justice systems. Her work aims to improve Washington's foster care and juvenile justice systems in order to make a difference for troubled children and youth.

From 1999 to 2007, Bridge served on the State Supreme Court after serving on the King County Superior Court for 10 years, having the title of Chief Juvenile Court Judge for three of those years. Currently, Bridge chairs the Washington State Supreme Court Commission on Children in Foster Care and is a board member for many nonprofit organizations including YouthCare and the YWCA.

Before joining the bench, Bridge was recognized as the first female partner at the Seattle law firm of Garvey Schubert Barer where she specialized in administrative law, litigation, government relations and domestic relations.

Recognized statewide and nationally as a leading advocate for foster care reform, domestic violence victims, truancy prevention, juvenile justice reform and a host of other issues, Bridge also serves the community as a dedicated volunteer and philanthropist.

2012 Seattle Storm Women of Inspiration

Kate Starbird | former Storm player; currently a Ph.D candidate at University of Colorado
After a long and successful professional basketball career, Kate Starbird shifted her focus and passion to the world of academia, working as a Ph.D student at the University of Colorado at Boulder to improve disaster relief using social media. Currently, Starbird is finishing her degree and transitioning back to her home state for an assistant professor position with the University of Washington's Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering, starting this Fall Semester.

Starbird co-created the "Tweak the Tweet" concept, an idea for leveraging Twitter as a crisis-data reporting platform in 2009. The concept has been deployed in many different situations and has proven to be successful and necessary technology. She also developed a software system for the qualitative analysis of large, computer-mediated communication data sets, utilized for several research efforts.

In 2010, Starbird and her research partners developed social media technology that aided workers and volunteers in Haiti in getting help where it was needed the most following the disaster.

Following a successful college career at Stanford, Starbird spent nine years playing basketball professionally for the ABL's Seattle Reign and the WNBA's Seattle Storm, helping the Storm to the franchise's first playoff appearance in 2002.

2012 Seattle Storm Women of Inspiration

Patty Stonesifer | former CEO of Gates Foundation
As the former CEO of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Patty Stonesifer has spent years working to improve access to advances in global health and learning working with the Foundation's endowment fund that distributes over a billion dollars a year. From 2009 to 2012, she served as chair of the Smithsonian Institution. Currently, Stonesifer advises business, nonprofit and government leaders on strategies for reducing inequity.

Along with her various board memberships, Stonesifer also served as a member of the US delegation to the United Nations General Assembly Special Sessions on AIDS.

In 2010, President Barack Obama appointed Stonesifer as the Chair of the White House Council on Community Solutions. In July of 1996, Stonesifer was recognized as one of the 25 Most Influential People in America by Time Magazine.