Susan Ferris Wyderko, Director of the Office of Investor Education and Assistance, to Leave Commission

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
2006-88

Washington, D.C., June 6, 2006 - The Securities and Exchange Commission announced today that Susan Ferris Wyderko, Director of the Office of Investor Education and Assistance, will leave the Commission in June. She will become the Executive Director of the Independent Mutual Fund Directors Forum, a non-profit organization dedicated to improving mutual fund governance.

Chairman Cox said, "America's investors have been well and truly served by Ms. Wyderko. She has been a forceful advocate for better disclosure in every position that she has held within the agency. She has evidenced a total commitment to the mission of the SEC, and has done her work with great enthusiasm and uncompromising principles."

Ms. Wyderko said, "I am very proud to have been part of the staff of the Commission and to have worked with such a dedicated and talented group of individuals. It has been an honor to work in support of the Commission's unwavering commitment to investor protection. It has also been an honor to work with Chairman Cox and the Commissioners and their predecessors on behalf of individual investors."

Ms. Wyderko has been the Director of the Office of Investor Education and Assistance since 2000. She has held other senior jobs within the Commission, most recently as the Commission's Acting Director of the Division of Investment Management from January to May of this year. She has also served as the Director of the Office of Legislative Affairs, the Acting Director of the Office of Public Affairs, and Counsel to Chairman Arthur Levitt. She joined the Commission's staff in 1985 as a staff attorney in the Office of the General Counsel, and has also worked in the Trial Unit of the Division of Enforcement.

Ms. Wyderko has appeared frequently in television and radio, delivering the Commission's investor education messages. She has testified before Congress on behalf of the Commission and has worked with many other Government agencies and public-private partnerships to ensure widespread distribution of neutral and unbiased educational information. During her tenure in the Office of Investor Education and Assistance, Ms. Wyderko launched a number of inventive investor education initiatives, including

• podcasting of SEC educational information;
   
• creation of an innovative series of fake scam websites to educate potential victims of financial fraud;
   
• development of targeted information for uniquely vulnerable populations, including seniors, teachers, and military families; and
   
• an investor education outreach program to public librarians throughout the country.

Ms. Wyderko received the Commission's Distinguished Service Award in 2005 for her exceptionally creative approach to investor education. She is also a recipient of the Commission's Stanley Sporkin Award, which recognizes those who have made "exceptionally tenacious and insightful contributions" to the enforcement of the federal securities laws, and the Federal Bar Association's Manuel F. Cohen Younger Lawyer Award in recognition of her "maturity of judgment, tenacity and creativity in resolving complex legal matters." She has received the Commission's Law and Policy Award on three separate occasions. She began her legal career as an Associate at the law firm of Miller & Chevalier, Chartered, and is a graduate of Wellesley College and Cornell Law School.

http://www.sec.gov/news/press/2006/2006-88.htm