Federal Bank Governor Lisa Cook has been awarded the Marshall Medal at the 2024 Marshall Forum in Chicago in recognition of her trailblazing work as a distinguished civil servant. 

Accepting her award, Governor Cook said: "It has been wonderful to have the opportunity today to reflect on my time as a Marshall Scholar and to consider how it more fully opened my eyes, allowing me to pursue my career and my passions. I met people from many different parts of the U.K. and the world I had never encountered before and who held views I had never heard articulated before. And that, I think, is the very spirit of the Marshall Scholarship and the Marshall Medal: building respect and understanding and strengthening the enduring friendship between our two countries.”

Presenting the medal, John Raine, Chair of the Marshall Aid Commemoration Committee said: “Governor Cook has shown exemplary leadership within her academic field and the pioneering work that she has undertaken in the critical area of development economics, working tirelessly to bring others into her field. We applaud her for the work that she has done both as a Marshall Scholar and as a servant of her own country. It is with immense pleasure that we recognise these achievements with the Marshall Medal.”

The Marshall Medal is awarded to people of outstanding achievement whose contribution to British-American understanding, distinguished role in public life, or creative energy, reflect the legacy of George C Marshall.  It is awarded on significant anniversaries of the Scholarship or the Marshall Plan, to both former Marshall Scholars and other distinguished recipients.  Past awardees include US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer and former US Secretaries of State Madeleine Albright and Colin Powell, among others.

With the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting, Sarah joins other internationally recognized Marshall Scholar journalists and writers who have been awarded the Pulitzer Prize, including: Anne Applebaum (1986 Marshall Scholar), Sewell Chan (1988 Marshall Scholar), Thomas Friedman (1973 Marshall Scholar), Jeffrey Gettleman (1994 Marshall Scholar), Annalyn Swan (1973 Marshall Scholar), and Dan Yergin (1968 Marshall Scholar). 

This year’s Marshall Medals recognize the 70th anniversary of the Marshall Scholarship programme, which was created by the UK government in gratitude for the Marshall Plan – the United States’ economic aid in the wake of World War II. It honors the architect of the economic recovery programme, US Army General and Secretary of State George C Marshall. The first class of Marshall Scholars arrived in the UK in 1954, 70 years ago.

About the Association of Marshall Scholars

The Association of Marshall Scholars works to strengthen US-UK ties and also the Marshall Scholarship. Historically, the transatlantic alliance has served as a lynchpin for liberal democracy, prosperity and global peace. A valuable thread of this relationship has been the Marshall Scholarship, an educational program strengthening international exchange and advancement in nearly every field of human endeavor.

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