Episcopal Press and News
Virginia Executive Gets Church Center Job
Episcopal News Service. October 2, 1986 [86211]
NEW YORK, (DPS, Oct.2) -- Ellen F. Cooke, assistant treasurer of the Diocese of Virginia, has been named Executive for Mission Support and Treasurer of the Episcopal Church Center.
Her appointment, announced here and by Presiding Bishop Edmond L. Browning at the annual House of Bishops meeting in San Antonio, completes the reorganization that Browning instituted in his first year. Cooke becomes one of three mission group executives who, along with Senior Executive Officer George L. McGonigle, will oversee the operations of the Church Center, its staff, Program planning, and Executive Council and General Convention support functions.
Cooke will head the units charged with all administrative support and financial management activities for the Church Center: building management, personnel, administrative services, shipping, management information systems, finance and some communication production functions.
Cooke brings a wide background in Church financial management. She took a bachelor's degree in economics from Georgetown University in 1969 and then served two years as business manager of the National Cathedral School. For six years, after that she served as a financial consultant with schools and religious organizations.
In 1977, she undertook a long-term consultancy with the diocese of Massachusetts in the areas of accounting, audits, personnel and deferred giving programs. From that experience, she was named assistant treasurer of the diocese. In the Massachusetts' structure, the assistant treasurer is the senior staff financial officer, and she was responsible for the management of five diocesan corporate structures and a total of $55 million in budgets.
She moved to Virginia and her present post in February of this year.
Cooke is married to the Rev. Nicholas T. Cooke III, assistant rector at Christ Church, Alexandria, Va. They have three children. She will take up her Church Center duties Nov. 1.