Board of Directors

Sean has launched and grown several Life Science businesses, one of which went public, developed several divisions, and served worldwide markets. His business experience includes C level roles in marketing, sales, operations, and product/service development. He has a classic science background but his real passion is for education and helping young people. Sean has been a classroom teacher, started a highly successful Charter school, and has served on boards of organizations focused on changing lives through education. Sean has coached cross country and soccer. Sean moved from a board position at LYTE (a Delaware Education nonprofit) to become the development and finance director where he assures LYTE has appropriate management systems, clear financials, and sustainable revenue strategies.

Evan was born and raised in Delaware and graduated from the University of Delaware with a Bachelor’s degree in Accounting. While in high school, he initially rowed for St. Marks before moving over to WYRA. Additionally, Evan also coached at various WYRA summer camps. Currently, Evan works at Santora CPA Group as a Senior Accountant providing tax and consulting services to numerous clients. Evan has chosen to follow his earlier passion for rowing and became a part of WYRA as a board member in November 2020. 

Karen Ions is head of JPMorgan’s industry-leading Commercial Card business which offers a broad range of international solutions to corporate clients to help them to drive organizational efficiency and unlock cash through smarter payments. This is facilitated by a highly competitive product-set which encompasses both virtual and physical cards combined with versatile spend controls, online functionality and data integration, making it the #1 Visa/Mastercard commercial card issuer in North America. Karen has been with JPMorgan Chase since 2011, when she joined the Consumer & Community Bank Legal function in the London office. She moved from London to Chicago in 2014 and has held various leadership positions within CCB Legal, the last being the General Counsel for CCB Digital and the Strategic Transactions team. In 2018 Karen moved roles to become the Head of JPMorgan’s Payment Network Office which marked Karen’s first non-lawyer role. In January 2022, Karen moved to the Commercial Card business as Head of Product and then took on the expanded leadership role across the Commercial Card business in October, giving Karen full end to end executive responsibility for the running of the business and ownership of its P&L. Karen lives in Wilmington, Delaware with her husband, Gareth, and son, Sam. On the weekends Karen likes to cook for her family and friends and spend as much time outdoors as possible – biking and forever learning to play golf in the summer, and skiing in the winter.

Martha Manning has been involved with WYRA for over 15 years. She is the mother of four children – now grown – one of whom rowed at WYRA for 6 years. Two other children rowed in high school and/or college. A graduate of the University of Delaware, Martha is a former teacher who went on to found the Delaware Charter Schools Network, a non-profit organization where she served as Executive Director until her retirement in 2006. A long-time volunteer at Cab Calloway School of the Arts, Martha served on their Board for 11 years. She has a good deal of grant-writing experience and is well known in the Wilmington community.

Mark is a partner at Herdeg, du Pont & Dalle Pazze, LLP. He is a trusts and estates attorney who focuses in the areas of estate and business planning, wealth transfer, estate and trust litigation, estate administration, and tax law. He earned his law degree and LLM in taxation from the Villanova University School of Law where he attended on an academic scholarship.

Before attending law school, Mark graduated magna cum laude from the Honors Program at the University of Delaware where he attended on a full academic scholarship.

Mark is a WYRA alum (2001-2005). He and his wife, Shannon, are the parents of two young children, Luke and Anna.

Dr. Jack Perry works as an educational consultant at TNTP, a national nonprofit committed to providing excellent teachers and leaders to the students who need them most by advancing policies and practices that ensure effective teaching and leading in schools. At TNTP Jack supports leadership development and school improvement work, external and internal diversity, equity, and inclusion work, and TNTP’s teacher pipeline, diversity, and retention work both locally and nationally.

Prior to joining TNTP, Jack served as Deputy Chief of Academic Enrichment for the School District of Philadelphia, where he oversaw the Arts, Physical Education, Athletics, Gifted and Black Male Initiatives. Jack was also a charter school leader and founder in Wilmington, DE for several years.

Jack holds a B.S. in Sociology from Southern Connecticut State University and a Master of Social Work from the University of Connecticut. He earned a Doctorate in Educational Leadership from Southern Connecticut State University. He and his wife are the parents of a son, Jackson.

Andrew Pizor is an attorney at the National Consumer Law Center. A Wilmington native, Andrew learned to row and cox at the Wilmington Rowing Club while a student at the Tatnall School, before WYRA was founded. He has coxed for WRC, Georgetown University and the University of Glasgow. A graduate of Georgetown University (B.A.) and Fordham University School of Law (J.D.), he is a contributing author of several books on consumer protection law and a dockmaster at WYRA’s Head of the Christina Regatta.

Lou joined the Wilmington Youth Rowing Association in the fall of 2018 after working for a non-profit specializing in the education of youth-at-risk. His work in the nonprofit sector followed over 25 years’ experience as a Marketing Director in the for-profit sector. This set of skills from the business and non-profit worlds enables him to help lead WYRA in the fulfillment of its mission to serve middle and high school youth. In addition to his experience in the business world, he has been a high school coach in Lacrosse and Cross Country for over 16 years.