The Rev. Shavon Arline-Bradley became president and chief executive officer for National Council of Negro Women in 2023 — the first in the organization’s 90-year history, following a change in its governance structure. To this new role at the head of the NCNW — an “organization of organizations,” comprised of 330 campus and community-based sections and 32 national women’s organizations — Arline-Bradley brought 21 years of experience in healthcare; diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI); government affairs; and executive leadership.
Now, she brings that expertise to Chautauqua as well, when she speaks at 3:30 p.m. today in the Hall of Philosophy for the Week Seven African American Heritage House Lecture.
Founded in 1935 by Mary McLeod Bethune, the NCNW is the only Black women-led organization based on Pennsylvania Avenue. In a June interview with the Chicago Defender, Arline-Bradley described how her work wasn’t just honoring the NCNW’s legacy, but pushing it forward by fighting the forces trying to erase Black voices, while organizing to meet Black women’s everyday needs.
“That legacy is in my bones,” she said in her interview.
The NCNW’s mission is to lead, advocate for, and empower women of African descent, their families and communities. In 2025, that work means promoting education with a special focus on: science, technology, engineering, and math (STEAM); encouraging entrepreneurship, financial literacy, and economic stability; educating women about good health and HIV/AIDS, and promoting civic engagement and advocating for sound public policy and social justice.
“Our relevance has been connected to the needs of the people,” she said in a June interview with Word in Black. “When people needed to be fed, when families needed to be fed, when housing challenges were in place, when we needed a piece of legislation passed — NCNW has always been at the forefront of those conversations.”
Arline-Bradley is also the founding principal and CEO of R.E.A.C.H. Beyond Solutions, a public health, advocacy, and executive leadership firm.
Prior to starting R.E.A.C.H., Arline-Bradley served as senior adviser and director of external engagement during the Obama Administration in the Department of Health & Human Services for the 19th U.S. Surgeon General, Vivek H. Murthy. Prior to that, she served as executive vice president of strategic planning and partnerships, as well as former chief of staff, at the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. In 2024, Arline-Bradley became the youngest person ever to keynote the Martin Luther King, Jr. Beloved Community Commemorative Service, the annual celebration of King’s birthday organized by the King Center.
Arline-Bradley earned her undergraduate degree in exercise science and master’s in public health from Tulane University and graduated from the Samuel Dewitt Proctor School of Theology at Virginia Union University with a Master of Divinity, where she too became an ordained minister.
