Mark Johnson was born in Greenville, CA and grew up on the Central Coast (Nipomo, Valley Center and Orcutt). He earned an AA in Liberal Arts from Allan Hancock College, a BS in Business Administration from Chico State (now California State University, Chico), and an MA in Business Administration from San Francisco State University.
Mark was a District Officer for the Peace Corps in Botswana for two years and served for 21 years as a Foreign Service Officer/Diplomat in Washington DC, Philippines, Peru, South Africa, Namibia, and Indonesia. During that time, he met four US Presidents and seven foreign heads of state. He established a human rights assistance program to Indonesian East Timor, which a year later, after riots and Australian military intervention, became independent Timor-Leste.
In addition to Mark’s foreign service, he spent time in the private sector, working for US Steel in the San Francisco Bay Area and as an executive Advisor for ExxonMobil in Indonesia. During both his international public and private sector work, Mark made significant contributions to the support of:
Physical and financial infrastructure Education, including new MBA programs and university scholarships Multiple human rights programs, including famine and disaster relief, legal aid, and family planning Local governmental and nongovernmental organizations Environmental improvements Mark returned to the Central Coast to retire in SLO in 2013. He enjoys reading books and periodicals on history and current events, watching sports and movies, listening to music (except rap!), playing golf, discovering food and wine, and traveling. He also keeps current on nongovernmental organizations and follows the stock market. He has a daughter, a son, and four granddaughters.