An Alumnae Awardee Check-In Young Alumna Award winners fulfill their early promise

by Merri Rosenberg ’78

What do actor and activist Cynthia Nixon ’88, author and scholar Jhumpa Lahiri ’89, and Olympic fencing medalist Erinn Smart ’01 all have in common, besides being Barnard graduates? All were Young Alumna Award winners, recognized early on for their extraordinary achievements.

For more than two decades, the Alumnae Association of Barnard College (AABC) has bestowed this award on alums who’ve graduated within the past 15 years. And their track record ain’t bad. The roster of high-achieving alums also includes Jamie Babbit ’93, P’26, who received the Young Alumna Award in 2008 and is this year’s winner of the Woman of Achievement Award, confirming her staying power as a TV and film director and producer. The 2023 Young Alumna Award winner, Aditi Somani ’18, is the special assistant to the first-ever counselor for racial equity at the United States Department of the Treasury.

The list also includes three impressive alums from the early aughts who would go on to succeed and evolve well beyond what they were initially recognized for. Barnard Magazine caught up with those past winners to see how prescient the College’s crystal ball turned out to be.

JIEH GREENEY ’03

Jieh Greeney was already a rising star in the financial world when she won the AABC’s Young Alumna Award in 2013. Her citation noted her entrepreneurial spirit even as an undergrad — Greeney had started an event planning company, Gotham Events, as a junior — as well as her corporate success at IBM and McKinsey & Company.

“I was surprised to get it,” Greeney admits. “I was just launching who I’m going to be in my life. It was definitely a vote of confidence. It was a little scary — ‘We think great things will come.’ I better make Barnard proud.”

Greeney, who majored in art history and studio art as an undergrad, went on to earn an MBA from Harvard Business School and worked for Lululemon Athletica before rejoining McKinsey.

Currently, Greeney is leading the U.S. launch later this year for a European farm-to-table food tech startup and has provided her strategic expertise in sales, marketing, innovation, and customer experience to companies like Tiffany and Food52.

As a scholarship recipient at Barnard, Greeney feels strongly that she wanted to encourage students to consider finance, technology, and consulting opportunities: “How can I enhance the resources beginning at Barnard?”

A dedicated fundraiser for the College, Greeney says, “The award strengthened my loyalty and affiliation. I’ve always been really ambitious. [The award] was a motivation to continue being a role model for Barnard students.”

If anything, Barnard’s recognition of her accomplishments provided even more incentive for Greeney to stretch and succeed. “I always keep moving forward,” she says.

JOYA BANERJEE ’04

Receiving the Young Alumna Award five years after graduating helped Joya Banerjee assuage her family’s doubts about her professional path. The accolade in 2009 “was so unexpected and a huge honor,” says Banerjee. At the time, she was in grad school after having just stepped down from helping run a youth global health NGO. “This [award] was giving legitimacy to this type of work. My family was questioning what I was doing.”

The citation recognized Banerjee’s early interest and advocacy for “health care as a human right” as well as her work as a co-founder of the Global Youth Coalition on HIV/AIDS — a network of over 8,000 young leaders in 164 countries that sought to empower young people to battle the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

As a major in human rights and political science, she says, her seminal experiences at Barnard included starting Columbia Global Justice, a chapter of the national Student Global AIDS Campaign, participating in Take Back the Night, and helping to shape the new major in human rights.

Banerjee was earning a Master of Science in global health and population from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health when she received the Young Alumna Award.

Pursuing public health has remained Banerjee’s mission. In her current role at CARE — an international humanitarian and development nonprofit that focuses on ending poverty and achieving social justice, centering women and girls — Banerjee is the global director for gender-based violence. Her professional pursuits continue her focus on transforming health for women around the world.

Barnard’s recognition has “drawn me closer” to the College, says Banerjee, who is also grateful that Barnard provided funding for her to attend an Oxfam conference shortly after she graduated. The only stipulation was that she make a “commitment to come back,” which she has done.

“I’ve given a talk and mentored students, in person or remotely, for nine of the past 14 years,” she says. “I talk to Barnard students every year, and I’ve connected them to other opportunities. Barnard is so near and dear to my heart.”

MERCEDES MONTAGNES ’05

When Mercedes Montagnes received the Young Alumna Award in 2015, it validated her gutsy career choice. “I had taken a big risk when I moved to New Orleans,” she says. “At the time, [the award] felt like a real professional vote of confidence from this Barnard community that had done so much for me.”

She was especially touched that all her best friends came to their class’s 10th Reunion to celebrate her award.

The citation recognized her pursuit of criminal justice reform, most notably with the organization she co-founded, the Promise of Justice Initiative (PJI), a New Orleans-based nonprofit that works toward the abolition of the death penalty in Louisiana as well as improved conditions for those imprisoned.

The urban studies major, who was born and raised in Toronto before moving to New York to attend Barnard in September 2001, credits the College with fostering and encouraging her ambitions.

At Harvard Law School, Montagnes was president of the Harvard Law and Policy Review and worked with the Massachusetts Prisoners’ Legal Services and the Criminal Justice Initiative, as well as the Hurricane Katrina Legislative Tracking Project.

After her law school graduation, Montagnes held two clerkships, one in New Orleans’ district court and the other in the federal court of appeals in Richmond, Virginia. She served for 11 years, until this past April, as the PJI’s leader, and she currently heads her own firm as a legal consultant and strategist.

The Barnard award, Montagnes says, reinforced her willingness to stand “up in leadership,” even if it was “pretty scary.” As the executive director of the PJI, Montagnes was especially mindful to “really examine my own mentorship of people who were younger and people who came to work in New Orleans. Their growth was something important to me.”

Through projects and personal and professional relationships, Montagnes remains closely connected to the Barnard community.

“It’s always those connection points,” says Montagnes. “I reminded my core cohort how much we were all made in that place. Barnard made me.” B