P’ville Native’s Path Takes Her to Highest Levels of Government
Bernadette Meehan always dreamed of traveling the globe, but never imagined she would find a career that would allow her to do that alongside some of the most important leaders of the free world.
Growing up in Pleasantville, she remembers her father, a banker, telling stories about his trips to Asia and Africa and sending home postcards from what seemed to her to be exotic places.
In 1992, during the summer between her junior and senior year of high school, Meehan traveled to Argentina through the Pleasantville International Association exchange student program, which further sparked her interest in travel.
At Boston College, Meehan was still undecided about her career path, but became interested in social justice issues and public service.
“I always sort of had this vision of growing up and traveling around the world, but not really having an idea of how that translates into real life,” said Meehan, who attended Bedford Road School and Pleasantville Middle School before going on to Kennedy Catholic High School in Somers.
After her college graduation, Meehan moved to New York City to work in the financial industry as an adviser for J.P. Morgan for six years and for Lehman Brothers for a year after that. Although she appreciates that time in her life, Meehan knew she wasn’t going to find long-term happiness on Wall Street.
“I always felt like something was missing, like I couldn’t really think about waking up for the next 50 years and feeling like this was the passion,” she said.
It wasn’t until she read the profile of a Boston College alumnus who worked for the State Department that she found her calling. Meehan signed up to join its Foreign Service branch, and 11 years ago received top secret clearance. She moved to Washington, D.C., and spent most of the next few years visiting countries around the world.
“It’s been the most rewarding, unexpected, something-new-every-day career beyond what I ever could have conceived of when I was back growing up in Westchester and sort of had these ideas about what I thought I wanted to do when I grew up,” Meehan said.
The work can be dangerous. During her first overseas trip to Bogota, Columbia, Meehan survived a kidnapping and assault. Although it took awhile for her to come to terms with that experience, it never caused her to reconsider her career choice.
In 2006, she signed up to go to Baghdad for a year. Meehan said she was worried about going there during the height of the Iraq War, but decided it was something she wanted to see for herself.
“I felt like that was one of the defining foreign policy issues of my generation and that I wanted to be there and see it firsthand and experience what that was,” Meehan said.
Following her return from Bagdad, Meehan spent a year studying Arabic full time before heading off to Dubai. She then returned to Washington to learn about policymaking. She soon found herself helping with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s briefing papers and arranging Clinton’s travel plans.
Before Clinton was scheduled to travel, Meehan would visit the country to work out logistical issues, ranging from whether there would be a motorcade to finding the nearest restrooms.
The work, she said, led her to develop a strong relationship with Clinton, leading Meehan to ultimately become one of two special assistants to the secretary of state, a job she held for 15 months. During her time as a special assistant, Meehan became acquainted with White House staff. She was asked by Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes to remain at the White House and do press work instead of going overseas again after her time as a special assistant to Clinton ended.
Meehan expected that assignment to last for a year, but she has remained at the White House now for three years as the National Security Council spokesperson and special assistant to the president for national security affairs.
Meehan will soon be taking a sabbatical to teach at Georgetown University and hopes to encourage high school and college students to consider government work.
She advises students to take time to learn a language, which will give them a leg up in nearly any career. Meehan herself is fluent in Spanish and is conversational in Arabic.
Meehan also urges youngsters to be curious and seek out mentors. Students should look toward a career that excites them, but to avoid creating an ironclad plan, noting they may have more success if they’re willing to keep their options open.
“You should always have a vision for where you want to go in your life or your career; you should have an idea of what excites you, what makes you happy, what challenges you, but one of the biggest mistakes people make is trying to game out every step or every move,” she said.
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