Maggie Miller ’97

“It’s hard to imagine that my oldest daughter is now 12, the age I was just before starting Crossroads,” shared Maggie Miller ’97, from her home in Oak Park, CA. “I think it was at Crossroads that I learned that everyone puts their pants on the same way in the morning. Sounds silly, but this has helped calm me down when running a meeting with a former president of a country or a Nobel Peace Prize recipient.” 

Maggie has had these experiences as senior director of the Hilton Humanitarian Prize at the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation. At $2.5 million, it’s the world’s largest annual humanitarian award benefiting nonprofits. “Last year, it went to CAMFED (the Campaign for Female Education),” she said, “an organization that catalyzes the power of the most vulnerable girls and young women to create the future they imagine—for themselves, for their communities and for Africa. My work has taken me all over the world, meeting with incredible humanitarians who have so much to teach our world right now.” 

After graduating from Crossroads, Maggie went to Georgetown University for one semester but quickly transferred to Kenyon College, where she was much happier. She found herself back in Los Angeles in her 20s and spent several years working at the Milken Family Foundation before making her way to the Hilton Foundation. 

“The trips I’ve taken to see nonprofit work in the field have been mind-altering,” she reported. “There is so much suffering, and yet so much incredibly courageous, creative and brilliant work taking place every day to better communities all over the world. Crossroads instilled in me the importance of building a meaningful life and giving back, and I feel very lucky to have found a career that allows me to do both. And that guided imagery in our Life Skills classes—am I the only one who loved those so much? It’s probably why I am such a big fan of the Calm App today. I am also convinced that all the hours in the Crossroads theater made presenting behind a podium at work events a bit easier.”