Jim Purcell is a current member of NCR’s board of directors and a past chair of the group. He spent 16 years at Santa Clara University serving as vice president for university relations and then special assistant to the president. Prior to Santa Clara, Purcell served as the CEO of two large nonprofit social service organizations: Hope Services and Catholic Charities of the Diocese of San Jose, California. He was ordained a priest for the San Francisco Archdiocese in 1965, serving as a parochial vicar for four years and the secretary for the archdiocesan Senate of Priests. He resigned from active ministry in 1972. Purcell has a bachelor's degree from St. Patrick’s College, Menlo Park, a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from the Gregorian University in Rome and a master's in social work from the Catholic University of America. Now retired from full-time employment, he has continued to provide consulting services to nonprofits, Catholic parishes and the San Jose Diocese over the past few years. He and his wife, Bernie, have been married for 47 years. They have two children and four grandsons.
