Jo Ann Jenkins

Jo Ann Jenkins (born February 8, 1958) is the former CEO of AARP. She was appointed on September 1, 2014, having previously served as chief operating officer from 2013 to 2014. She retired from the role at the end of 2024. Between 1994 and 2010, she was a senior adviser, chief of staff, and chief operating officer of the Library of Congress. She spent three years in the private sector as a partner for quality management services from 1987 to 1990. an annual intergenerational event that promotes reading and literacy by bringing in authors, illustrators and poets for presentations, talks and book signings. The festival grew to become a large-scale event, with more than 200,000 people attending in 2016. In 2008 she developed the Library of Congress Experience, which digitized important written works including the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, and the Constitution of the United States. This allowed people visiting the library to compare the rough drafts of these founding documents with their final versions, showing edits, corrections and margin notes made by key authors including Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams.

AARP Jenkins joined AARP in 2010 as president of AARP Foundation, the organization's affiliated charity. In this role, she focused the foundation on four areas of work affecting Americans age 50 and up: income insecurity, housing, isolation and hunger. She created a program with NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon called Drive to End Hunger, which drew attention to the issue of food insecurity among older Americans by donating 36 million meals and providing funding to more than 100 organizations fighting hunger in the U.S.

Following one year as chief operating officer, Jenkins was appointed CEO in 2014. According to The Washington Post, Jenkins "fundamentally recast the organization’s mission" Under Jenkins' tenure close to half of AARP's 38 million members are still working full- or part-time, and continued the organization's involvement in advancing legislation to strengthen federal age discrimination laws.

In March 2024, Jenkins announced she would retire as CEO at the end of the year. She was succeeded in November 2024 by Myechia Minter-Jordan.