Heather Wilson

Her grandfather, George Gordon "Scotty" Wilson, flew for the Royal Air Force in World War I and emigrated to America in 1922 where he was a barnstormer and airport operator in the 1920s and 1930s.

He served as a courier pilot during World War II and started the New Hampshire Civil Air Patrol where he was a Wing Commander.

Her father started flying at age 13 and enlisted in the United States Air Force after high school.

The United States Air Force Academy began admitting women during Wilson's junior year at Keene High School (Keene, New Hampshire).

She applied and was appointed to the Academy.

At the Academy, she was the first woman to command basic training and the first woman Vice Wing Commander.

Heather Ann Wilson (born December 30, 1960) is the 11th President of the University of Texas at El Paso.

Wilson was born on December 30, 1960, in Keene, New Hampshire, the daughter of Martha Lou, nurse, and George Douglas "Doug" Wilson, a commercial pilot and member of the Experimental Aircraft Association.

Wilson grew up around aviation and hoped to become a pilot like her father and grandfather before her.

Her paternal grandparents were born in Scotland.

She graduated in 1982 as a Distinguished Graduate (magna cum laude equivalent).

Wilson earned a Rhodes Scholarship to study at the University of Oxford and continued her education at Jesus College, earning an M.Phil. and D.Phil. in international relations by 1985.

Wilson served in the United States Air Force until 1989 when she was chosen to serve as director for European Defense Policy and Arms Control on the National Security Council staff, "the President's principal forum for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and cabinet officials. [. . .] The Council also serves as the President's principal arm for coordinating these policies among various government agencies."

She worked for Republican president George H. W. Bush.

Her principal responsibilities included guiding the U.S. position on the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) negotiations and NATO affairs during the period of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Warsaw Pact.

In 1990, Oxford University Press published her book, International Law and the Use of Force by National Liberation Movements, which won the 1988 Paul Reuter Prize of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

The Paul Reuter Prize is awarded for a major work in the sphere of international humanitarian law.

Wilson won the second Reuter prize ever awarded.

An Air Force officer for seven years, Wilson was a negotiator and political adviser to the U.S. Air Force in the United Kingdom, and a defense planning officer for NATO in Belgium, where her work included arms control negotiations.

After leaving government in 1991, Wilson founded Keystone International, Inc. in Albuquerque, New Mexico to promote business development in the United States and Russia.

In 1995, Governor Gary Johnson appointed Wilson to be Cabinet Secretary of the New Mexico Children, Youth, and Families Department, a state-level agency with 2,000 employees and $200 million budget.

During her tenure, Wilson lead efforts to reform child welfare laws, modernize the juvenile justice system, and improve early childhood education.

This position led her to take an intense interest in Medicare and Medicaid and the ways in which the system can be improved to ensure the health of the American people and the American healthcare industry.

Under her leadership, the department opened a juvenile work camp and a secure facility for young, non-violent offenders.

She was a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives for New Mexico's 1st congressional district from 1998 to 2009.

While Secretary of the Air Force, Wilson focused on restoring the readiness of the force which had declined after years of combat and budget constraints.

She proposed and supported three straight years of double-digit budget increases for military space capability and publicly acknowledged that space is likely to be contested in any future conflict.

Wilson also guided implementation of acquisition reform to reduce the time to get military capability to the warfighter and increase competition by making it easier for innovative companies to supply the Air Force.

Wilson was honored by the Air Force, Army, Navy, and Department of Defense for her superior service upon her retirement.

While in the U.S. House of Representatives, Wilson focused on national security issues, serving on the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the United States House Committee on Armed Services.

She also focused on health care, energy, manufacturing and trade, and telecommunications, serving on the United States House Committee on Energy and Commerce.

She opted not to run for re-election in 2008 and sought the U.S. Senate seat of retiring senator Pete Domenici but finished second in the Republican primary to Congressman Steve Pearce, who then lost the general election to Democrat Tom Udall.

On March 7, 2011, she announced another run for Senate in 2012 to replace retiring senator Jeff Bingaman, but lost the general election to Democrat Martin Heinrich, her successor in the House of Representatives.

Wilson was the 12th president of the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in Rapid City from 2013 to 2017, and she was the first female military veteran elected to a full term in Congress.

In April 2013 she was selected to be president of the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology by the South Dakota Board of Regents.

She was the eighteenth president, and first female president, of SD Mines.

She previously served as the 24th Secretary of the United States Air Force from 2017 through 2019.

Upon the recommendation of Secretary of Defense James Mattis, on January 23, 2017, President Donald Trump announced that he would nominate Wilson as Secretary of the Air Force.

The U.S. Senate confirmed her nomination on May 8, 2017, and Mattis described her as “a leader for all seasons.” On March 8, 2019, Wilson said that she would resign as Secretary, effective May 31, 2019, in order to assume the office of President of the University of Texas at El Paso.

On March 2, 2020, President Trump appointed Wilson to be a member of the National Science Board.