Carrie Besnette Hauser is a senior fellow for the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. She has also served the Foundation as President and CEO of Kauffman Scholars, Inc. Her career has included a variety of leadership roles in private foundations, higher education institutions, and the public policy arena. She has focused primarily on access and equity issues for underrepresented populations.
In other roles, Hauser was vice president for advancement and external relations at Metropolitan State University of Denver and executive director of its foundation. She also served as vice president and an original senior officer of the Daniels Fund. While at Daniels, she was a loaned executive advising Denver's mayor on a city-wide college scholarship program and assisting the Metro Denver Sports Commission on an initiative to attract top-tier international sporting events, including the Olympic Games.
Her background includes teaching assignments at UCLA, the University of Denver, and in Colorado State University’s executive MBA program. She has held research and legislative staff roles as well as positions with the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education and the University of Arizona, her undergraduate alma mater. She earned her master’s and Ph.D. degrees from UCLA and is a graduate of the Advanced Management Program at The Wharton School of Business.
Hauser has served on boards and commissions including the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce and its Foundation (chair), the Metro Denver Sports Commission (co-chair, 2012 Women’s Final Four), Visit Denver, and the American Red Cross Mile High Chapter. She received gubernatorial appointments to Colorado’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Health Care Reform and the Colorado Commission on Higher Education. Denver’s mayor appointed her to his Justice Center Taskforce. At the national level, she is past president of the National Scholarship Providers Association, has served on the Pathways to College Network executive committee, and is an Educational Policy Institute board member. In 2008, she was named the 9News Leader of the Year by Denver’s NBC affiliate and the Colorado Leadership Alliance.
