Candidate Manager
Director of Residence Life 1998-2010
Director, Guide Team 2009-2010
Global Village for Future Leaders of Business and Industry®
Iacocca Institute
1-610-758-6887 (office)  1-610-392-2389 (mobile)
mfs2@lehigh.edu

Mary Frances Schurtz-Leon has served as Candidate Manager of the Global Village for over ten years.  As a licensed attorney, veteran teacher, and international connoisseur, Mary Frances is a source of leadership and passion at the Iacocca Institute.  Since assuming her position as head of enrollment for the Global Village, Mary Frances has also taken on the role of International Student Candidate Manager for the Pennsylvania School for Global Entrepreneurship, Director of Residence Life, Manager of the Global Village Guide Team and has also recruited for the Global Village in Latin and South America, and adopted the responsibility of Global Village Alumni Relations. 

Mary Frances has been actively involved in women’s groups and immigration rights.  She has conducted seminars and workshops, across the nation and internationally, in Conflict Management and Negotiation, Assertiveness Training, Legal Counseling Techniques, Public Speaking, Effective Listening, Citizenship Preparation, Occupational Spanish, and English as a Second Language. 

Mary Frances graduated summa cum laude from Loyola College in Baltimore, Maryland in 1973, in only three years.  During her time at Loyola, Mary Frances embraced travel opportunities with stays in Puerto Rico, New Orleans, and Guadalajara, Mexico.  Once receiving her Bachelor of Arts in modern languages with a focus in Spanish, Mary Frances moved to El Paso, Texas to work for VISTA, (Volunteers in Service to America).  After a year with VISTA, a natural aptitude and familial persuasion brought Mary Frances back to New York, where she began legal training at St. John’s University School of Law.  Prior to graduation, a former professor offered Mary Frances a position at the Brooklyn Diocese Catholic Migration Office, where she began working in 1977 upon receiving her Juris Doctor degree.  After a year as supervisor of four satellite immigration offices, Mary Frances married and moved to California.  Despite success with both civil and criminal litigation as a general partner in a Santa Monica law firm, Mary Frances left California and moved to Saudi Arabia in 1980. 

In Saudi Arabia, Mary Frances worked in hospital administration at a major oil company, and produced a system-wide Self-Assessment Program.  Moreover, Mary Frances achieved cultural progress by breaching traditional gender roles.  Not only did she serve as a well-respected supervisor to over two dozen Saudi men, but she also taught an Assertiveness Training class for women on the English TV station, and was involved in several women’s groups.  Mary Frances moved back to the Poconos as Gulf Wars proceeded, and set out to find a new career that could leave her time with her children, but also allow her to leave her mark.   She enrolled in a class at Northampton Community College, where she was first introduced to the Global Village program.   Mary Frances got her start with the Global Village that summer, and was hired as a consultant.  A few months later in October, 1998, she joined the Lehigh University staff full-time, and has been an integral part of the Iacocca Institute ever since. 

Mary Frances’s career spans a wide variety of positions and places, but the common thread is a focus on the value of connecting with people.   She has found her calling at the Global Village as a mentor to the young people that will change the world.