HWS PSS Winter 2016

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HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES 300 Pulteney Street Geneva, New York 14456

Dominic Facciponte ’16

• Professor of Medicine; Chief, Section of Hematologic Malignancies; Assoc. Dir. for Clinical Research, Division of Hematologic Malignancies and Cellular Therapy, Duke Cancer Institute • Founder of the Thomas J. Glover Endowed Summer Research Fund in the Natural Sciences • At HWS, Majored in Biology, Member of Soccer Team, Phi Beta Kappa

• Major in Biochemistry; Minors in Public Policy and Health Care; Pre-Med Program • Former member of the Hobart Lacrosse Team and Orange Key Society; Biology Teaching Fellow • Internships with Geneva General Hospital and Family Practice Associates PLLC

1. What three things do you need to be successful in health care? Work ethic, empathy, intelligence

1. What three things do you need to be successful in health care? Work ethic, ability to collaborate, compassion 2. What do you think is the most pressing issue in medicine today? Lack of medical/research funding

3. Rank intelligence, compassion, and integrity in the order of importance to you. Integrity, Compassion, Intelligence

3. Rank intelligence, compassion, and integrity in the order of importance to you. Integrity, Compassion, Intelligence

4. Which of your college courses interested you the most? Behavioral Ecology

4. Which of your college courses interested you the most? Developmental Biology

5. What do you do for your personal wellness? Crossfit at least five days per week and read most every night (body and mind!).

5. What do you do for your personal wellness? Go to the gym, listen to and play music, be around my friends, and call my parents regularly.

6. What’s the most interesting thing about you that we wouldn’t learn from your resume? I enjoy learning about and collecting (in a very small way) art. 8. As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? A doctor 9. Which HWS professor had the most influence on you? Dr. Tom Glover, hands down, was the most intimidating though best professor I’ve ever known in undergraduate or graduate studies. 10. What’s your proudest achievement? Trying to build a strong relationship with my children and ensure they are well prepared ‘for a life of consequence.’ 11. What are your specific goals in medicine? As a clinician I start the day with the expectation to help improve the quality of life and hopefully cure every new patient I see. All other goals revolve around that. 12. What gets you out of bed in the morning? I enjoy building things. I’m in a position to have helped build a program from the ground up, having a role in expanding research, patient care and junior faculty career development. It’s very rewarding.

6. What’s the most interesting thing about you that we wouldn’t learn from your resume? I have been a musician since I was seven years old. 7. What quality do you value most in your friends? Honesty 8. As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? A paleontologist or archeologist 9. Which HWS professor had the most influence on you? Associate Professor of Biology Kristy Kenyon pushed me to challenge myself, making me a better scholar and a more critical thinker. 10. What’s your proudest achievement? Walking on to the DI Hobart Lacrosse team as a first-year. Being a part of that program taught me hard work, dedication, personal achievement, teamwork and sacrifice. 11. What are your specific goals in medicine? I aspire to be a physician who impacts the lives of those around me and their families in a positive way. I want to be someone others can turn to for help. 12. What gets you out of bed in the morning? I have a sincere desire to continue my education and to learn more today than yesterday.

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7. What quality do you value most in your friends? Loyalty

PARALLELS PARALLELS

2. What do you think is the most pressing issue in medicine today? Controlling expectations and costs of care

THE SALISBURY

Dr. David Rizzieri ’87

The Pulteney Street Survey

The inside text pages of this publication were printed using recycled paper which enables the environmental savings equivalent to the following: • 204 trees preserved for the future • 20,094 lbs waterborne waste not created • 196,407 gallons wastewater flow saved • 65,913 lbs CO2 not emmited • 169,000,000 BTUs energy not consumed • 85 lbs NOx gases prevented

WINTER 2016

ALUM’S VISION

THE SALISBURY

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INTERNSHIPS

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LIVES CHANGED


Moonrise over Seneca Lake and the Bozzuto Boathouse. Photo by Kevin Colton


Pulteney Street Survey | Winter 2016 Catherine Williams EDITOR, VICE PRESIDENT FOR COMMUNICATIONS Peggy Kowalik ART DIRECTOR/DESIGNER

Contents

Jessica Evangelista Balduzzi ’05 ASSISTANT EDITOR Jessica Evangelista Balduzzi ’05, Steven Bodnar, Kristyna Bronner ’14, Ken DeBolt, Ronny Frishman P’00, Stephanie Kenific ’17, Mary K. LeClair, Paige Mullin, Margaret Popper, Avery Share ’15, Andrew Wickenden ’09 and Catherine Williams CONTRIBUTING WRITERS/EDITORS

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Bill Sawalich-Barlow Productions, Kevin Colton, Santiago Galvis, Andrew Markham ’10, Michael Paras, Mehak Qureshi, Chris Reed, Gregory Searles ’13, Jared Weeden ’91 CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS/ ILLUSTRATORS Jessica Evangelista Balduzzi ’05, Rebecca Frank, Mary K. LeClair, Betty Merkle, Kathy Killius Regan ’82, P’13, Jared Weeden ’91, Chrissy Bennett West ’94 CLASSNOTES EDITORS

Maureen Collins Zupan ’72, P’09 CHAIR OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES Thomas Bozzuto ’68 VICE CHAIR AND CHAIR ELECT OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES Andrew G. McMaster Jr. ’74, P’09 VICE CHAIR OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES Robert B. O’Connor VICE PRESIDENT FOR ADVANCEMENT Kathy Killius Regan ’82, P’13 ASSISTANT VICE PRESIDENT, ALUMNAE RELATIONS AND NATIONAL REGIONAL NETWORK Jared Weeden ’91 ASSISTANT VICE PRESIDENT, ALUMNI RELATIONS William Smith Alumnae Association Officers: Aloysee Heredia Jarmoszuk ’98, President; Jane Erickson ’07, Vice President; Chris Bennett-West ’94, Immediate Past President; Kate Strouse Canada ’98, Historian Hobart Alumni Association Officers: Dr. Jeremy Cushman ’96, President; Frank Aloise ’87, Vice President; James B. Robinson ’96, Immediate Past President; Rafael A. Rodriguez ’07, Historian VOLUME XLI|I, NUMBER ONE THE PULTENEY STREET SURVEY is published by the Office of Communications, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, 300 Pulteney Street, Geneva, New York 14456-3397, (315) 7813700. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Pulteney Street Survey, c/o Alumni House Records, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, 300 Pulteney St., Geneva, New York 14456-3397.   Hobart and William Smith Colleges are committed to providing a non-discriminatory and harassmentfree educational, living, and working environment for all members of the HWS community, including students, faculty, staff, volunteers, and visitors. HWS prohibits discrimination and harassment in their programs and activities on the basis of age, color, disability, domestic violence, victim status, gender, gender expression, gender identity, genetic information, national origin, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, veteran status, or any other status protected under the law. Discrimination on the basis of sex includes sexual harassment, sexual violence, sexual assault, other forms of sexual misconduct including stalking and intimate partner violence, and gender-based harassment that does not involve conduct of a sexual nature.

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8 On Campus: Fall Speakers 12 HWS in Space 18 Bishop Michael B. Curry ’75 26 Aliceann Wilber Hits 500 Wins 30 Feature: The Salisbury International Internship Award 54 Classnotes 98 24 Hours With Thomas Odelfelt ’93 104 Bookshelf

For questions and comments about the magazine or to submit a story idea, please e-mail Catherine Williams at cwilliams@hws.edu.

TO

Mark D. Gearan PRESIDENT

Inside text pages printed on 100% post-consumer fiber paper. Gas resulting from the decomposition of landfill waste used in place of fossil fuels to produce inside text paper.

HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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Lakeviews

Dear Friends,

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was privileged to represent Hobart and William Smith at the Installation of the Most Reverend Michael Bruce Curry ’75 as the 27th Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church. A liturgy marking the beginning of Bishop Curry’s ministry was celebrated on the Feast of All Saints at Washington National Cathedral, and it was an honor to attend on behalf of our alumni and alumnae. Bishop Curry graduated from Hobart with a degree in religious studies and went on to earn his master of divinity degree from Yale University Divinity School. Ordained a deacon in 1978, Curry was the 11th bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina, serving as a member of the Hobart and William Smith Board of Trustees from 1988 until 1992. When he took office as Presiding Bishop on November 1, he became the first African-American to do so. The headline of the Washington Post story detailing the Installation noted that Curry “is expected to bring Pope Francis-like energy to the job.” As you would imagine, the Installation ceremony was a remarkable celebration, one made more poignant by the selection of music, which included two pieces by the late Lindsay Arthur Lafford, HWS professor emeritus of music, who taught Bishop Curry as an undergraduate. To honor this association, Bishop Curry asked that Benjamin Straley, organist and associate director of music at Washington National Cathedral, play Lafford’s “Ostinato from ‘Suite for Organ,’” and “Dithyramb on ‘Paderborn.’” It was a fitting tribute to Lafford and to the Colleges, as well as a powerful reminder of the strong bonds of mentorship that, once forged on campus, span a lifetime. You can read more about Bishop Curry on page 18.

This issue of The Pulteney Street Survey also highlights the Salisbury Center for Career, Professional and Experiential Education, which relies on the good will and generosity of alumni, alumnae and parents to thrive. Offering a myriad of services to students – from helping to identify values and career goals, to assisting with resume preparation and interview techniques – the Center is particularly adept at facilitating mentoring relationships between students and a broad network of alums and parents. These are individuals who take the time and effort to speak with students about their future plans, who offer internships and first jobs, and who ensure that the strong education students receive in Geneva translates into a rewarding career or graduate school opportunity. The Salisbury Center would not be possible without its namesake founder, Honorary Trustee and former Chair of the Board Charles H. Salisbury Jr. ’63, P’94, L.H.D.’08. It was Charlie’s vision to invest in the Center which is today a defining component of every HWS student’s experience, offering one-on-one guidance and a guaranteed internship program. It was Charlie’s idea to create and fund the International Internship program that has profoundly changed the lives of 30 students who have spread out across the globe for internships in a myriad of careers including finance, medicine, law, real estate and advertising (see page 30). Charlie’s confidence in the power of a Hobart and William Smith education has never wavered. I am grateful to him for his leadership and service, and to the many alums and parents who mentor our students, helping them to find their footing post-graduation. As we begin the spring 2016 semester, I send my very best wishes from Geneva. Sincerely,

President Mark D. Gearan introduces Honorary Trustee and former Chair of the Board of Trustees Charles H. Salisbury Jr. ’63, P’84, L.H.D.’08 (sitting) at the ribbon cutting for the Salisbury Center at Trinity Hall in 2004.

Mark D. Gearan President

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Downtown | ca.1948

WAVELENGTHS

Seneca Street, Geneva, N.Y. Looking west on Seneca Street, an historic view of downtown Geneva in 1948 captures a winter night in the city. In January 1948, the Geneva Daily Times reported record-breaking cold, blasts of snow and fuel shortages that limited heat usage for residents and businesses in Geneva and across the Finger Lakes.

Classes of 2019

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Fall Speakers

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HWS Par tners with NASA

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New Leaders

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Michael B. Cur r y ’75

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HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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TOP Daily Update Stories

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HONORING FACULTY

Members of the HWS faculty recently acknowledged their peers by awarding faculty prizes to: Associate Professor of Spanish and Hispanic Studies Edgar Paiewonsky-Conde, who received the prize for teaching; Associate Professor of English Laurence Erussard, who was awarded the prize for community service; and Professor of Art and Architecture Nick Ruth, who was honored for research.

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KAENZIG NAMED CHAIR OF PLEN BOARD

Lisa Kaenzig, associate dean of William Smith, was recently nominated and named Chair of the Board of Directors of the Public Leadership Education Network, the only national organization with the sole focus of preparing college women for leadership in the public policy arena. Kaenzig has more than 25 years of administrative and academic experience, including several years working in politics in Washington, D.C.

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BARILE WINS LGBT RESEARCH AWARD

Director of Residential Education Brandon Barile won the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators Gay, Lesbian, Bi-Sexual and Transgender Knowledge Community award for his doctoral research. Earning his Ed.D. from Northeastern University, Barile’s thesis “LGBTQ Chief Student Affairs Officers: How Lived Experiences Affect Professional Identity and Progression in Higher Education” uses queer theory to investigate the experiences of LGBT administrators.

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GENEVA NAMED ALL-AMERICA CITY

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COLLEGES EARN 4TH FULBRIGHTHAYS IN RUSSIAN STUDIES

For its inclusive, innovative and ongoing efforts to influence positive, community-wide change, Geneva was named a 2015 All-America City, a highly-selective honor awarded annually by the National Civic League to only 10 cities. Geneva earned the designation following the All-America City Competition held in Denver, Colo., where a group representing the City, the Colleges, the Geneva City School District and youth residents delivered a dynamic presentation.

For the fourth time in the past decade, HWS has been awarded a FulbrightHays Group Projects Abroad grant from the U.S. Department of Education to fund an immersive educational excursion to Siberia. The $95,000 grant will enable seven upper-level HWS students, seven regional K-12 teachers, and the HWS project director, Associate Professor of Russian Area Studies Kristen Welsh, to explore the language, culture and issues of Western Siberia.

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MOLINA HONORED WITH KINGHORN

HWS DEBATE TOURS CHINA

Director of Intercultural Affairs Alejandra Molina has been named the 2015-16 recipient of John Readie & Florence B. Kinghorn Global Fellowship. Established in 1970, the fellowship honors outstanding faculty at HWS who have exemplified global citizenship on a continued basis. Molina’s work ceters on immigration issues and farmworker women.

Members of the HWS Debate Team, Danny Schonning ’15, Emily Saeli ’16, Chris Doak ’18, and Emma Herbst ’18 and alum Buzz Klinger ’12 recently took a three-week trip across China, offering training workshops, serving as adjudicators and competing in the China Open debate tournament. The trip was organized by Associate Professor of Philosophy Eric Barnes as part of a three-year grant to promote debate in China.

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RICHARD S. PERKIN OBSERVATORY

Through grants from The Perkin Fund, the Colleges are in the final stages of completing the Richard S. Perkin Observatory, a teaching and outreach facility that will provide students with opportunities to observe and photograph objects located trillions of miles from Earth. The facility is located adjacent to the Katherine D. Elliott Studio Arts Center.

HWS AMONG SIERRA’S GREENEST SCHOOLS

HWS has again been named to Sierra magazine’s annual list of the greenest colleges and universities, moving ahead 63 spots since first appearing on the list in 2009. This year, the Colleges ranked No. 53 on Sierra’s “Cool Schools” list, earning the highest possible rating in the categories for co-curricular sustainability programs and 1.75” x 2” initiatives, as well as innovation in sustainability. 3.5” x 4”

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Overheard “I

n the spring of 2011, I took a seminar titled ‘Taliban’ with Associate Professor of Political Science Vikash Yadav. What I learned in this class was invaluable to understanding the decision I made and further fueled my desire to become a part of the special operations community.”

WAVELENGTHS

“Hard to resist the urge to get in the car and drive north.” Tweet from Damian Herrick ’97, of Cary, N.C., in response to a photo of Seneca Lake.

“Not a day goes by that I don’t think of my mother.… It is my hope that by gathering together we are able to not only move on, but use the experience to make each other stronger.” Rebecca Czajkowski ’18, who organized a campus remembrance of those lost during the 2001 terrorist attacks, reflects on her mother Traci Tack-Czajkowski P’18, a detective with the New York City Police Department who responded to the attack and recently passed away after a three-year battle with lung cancer.

Will Schweitzer ’11 has deployed multiple times to Afghanistan as a U.S. Army infantryman serving with the 75th Ranger Regiment, 2nd Battalion.

“When I looked out across the field at Raymond James Stadium, I saw linemen who were as big or bigger than Ali, linemen who were as strong or stronger than Ali, but I didn’t see any linemen who were nearly as athletic. He really stood out.” Mike Cragg P’12, head coach of the Hobart football team, reflecting on the first time he saw Ali Marpet ’15 play professional football. Marpet made history when he was drafted by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in May, making him the highest Division III student ever drafted in the NFL.

“To me, Koshare means inclusion.” Bridget Nishimura ’17, co-president of the student-run Koshare Dance Collective, on this year’s showcase which featured more than 130 dancers in pieces choreographed by 24 HWS students.

“Couldn’t be more excited to attend Hobart and William Smith Colleges!” Tweet from Sarah Sveen ’20, one of the first students accepted into the HWS Classes of 2020.

“Inextricable from a culture of respect is respect for our environment, for the ecologies in which our actions have material effects which may not be immediately apparent.” Professor of Political Science and Director of the Fisher Center Jodi Dean on this year’s Fisher Center speaker series, “Gender, Climate and the Anthropocene.”

HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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Introducing the Classes of 2019 From community service projects that spanned all 11 neighborhoods in the City of Geneva, to a tour of downtown and a “LOVE Geneva” lunch hosted on campus, first-year and transfer students were welcomed and immersed in both the HWS and Geneva communities through Orientation 2015. The 635 new Statesmen and Herons in the Classes of 2019 hail from 35 states and 18 countries as far away as Thailand, Lithuania, Rwanda, the Czech Republic and China. Approximately 45 percent of the Classes enrolled through Early Decision, with 40 percent receiving scholar awards. The incoming Classes have the highest average high school grade point average of any classes at the Colleges (3.49) and represent 445 high schools. A culturally diverse group (about 20 percent are multicultural), the Classes of 2019 include 118 incoming “legacies,” one of the largest numbers of students in recent years who have a parent, sibling, aunt or uncle who is an alum or current student.

Convocation Kicks Off Academic Year Celebrated on the first day of classes, Convocation marked the beginning of the 2015-2016 academic year and included a keynote address by HWS Board Chair Maureen Collins Zupan ’72, P’09, as well as remarks from: Professor of Art and Architecture Nicholas Ruth, recipient of the 2014-2015 Faculty Prize for Scholarship; Title IX Coordinator Susan Lee; HWS Chaplain Maurice Charles; and Student Trustees Max Gorton ’16 and Nicole O’Connell ’16.

To read the transcripts of all Convocation speeches, go to www.hws.edu/news/ transcripts

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WAVELENGTHS

In her keynote Convocation address, HWS Board Chair Maureen Collins Zupan ’72, P’09 urged students to expand their horizons at HWS. “My challenge to you is to do so by being uncomfortable,” she said. “You are going to do it by taking some courses you think you couldn’t possibly like or benefit from. You are going to do it by joining a club or activity that you have never tried before. You are going to spend time getting to really know at least one of your professors every term.”

Professor of Art and Architecture Nicholas Ruth asked students to “challenge the assumptions you have been raised with.” He noted that there are two good reasons to do so: “… one, by recognizing how what you take for granted makes you a person of privilege, you will become a more compassionate person; and, two, relying less on all the mental categories that tell you how something should work puts you and your senses back in charge, so you with a sense of discovery and wonder - can figure out how it does work....”

“At the time of its passage Title IX challenged our culture and caused an uproar, mainly about athletics,” Title IX Coordinator Susan Lee said. “Then we thought that Title IX protected women. Now we know Title IX protects the rights of men, women and people of all genders, of all gender expressions and gender identities, and people of all sexual orientations.”

“Hobart and William Smith and Geneva as a whole are communities built on small gestures that matter,” HWS Chaplain Maurice Charles said. “We invite you to create your own gestures of hospitality, to help us widen the circle of friendship, and yes, even to challenge us on those unfortunate occasions when we fail to live up to our highest values.”

HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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on campus: fall speakers

Tony Shelton, professor of entomology at Cornell University, and Neil Morrison, scientist at Oxitec Ltd, discussed their research on genetically modified diamondback moths. Dr. Charlie Carter from the UNC-Chapel Hill Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, spoke on “Structural Biology and Life’s Choreography.”

DON MITCHELL

Distinguished Professor of Geography in the Maxwell School at Syracuse University Don Mitchell gave the annual Leo Srole Urban Studies Lecture. Titled “Mean Streets,” the talk explored the criminalization of homelessness. Carol George, who taught in the history department at HWS from 1973 until her retirement in 2001, gave the Robert Huff Lecture on her new book: One Mississippi, Two Mississippi: Methodists, Murder, and the Struggle for Racial Justice in Neshoba County. Eric Weaver, an activist and former Rochester Police Department sergeant, returned to HWS to speak about mental illness and hope for recovery.

Trustee Bill Whitaker ’73, L.H.D. ’97, an Emmy award-winning veteran of CBS News and a correspondent for 60 Minutes, joined Homecoming and Family Weekend as the special guest of the President’s Forum Series. He was joined by HWS Presidential Fellow and the Mayor of Ithaca, N.Y., Svante L. Myrick.

Nationally acclaimed golf and travel writer Andy Reistetter joined the Colleges as this year’s John Henry Hobart Fellow in Residence. The 2011-2012 Trias Writer in Residence, Tom Piazza returned to read from his new novel Free State. Claudrena Harold, associate professor of history and African American studies at the University of Virginia, discussed her film Sugarcoated Arsenic.

CLAUDRENA HAROLD

Justice of the Residual Special Court for Sierra Leone, The Hon. Shireen Avis Fisher ’70, recent recipient of the William Smith Alumna Achievement Award, opened the 2015-2016 President’s Forum Series with a talk, “International Criminal Courts and the Battle Against Impunity: Are We Fighting a Losing War?”

Stephanie Davidson and Georg Rafailidis presented on “generous architecture,” a lecture made possible by the Termuhlen P’09-Rauck ’09 Family Endowed Lecture Fund in Architecture, established in honor of Professor of Architecture A senior fellow at Stan Mathews and the Arts and Design Collective. the Brookings Institute and Associate Professor of Economics at Universidade Federal do Rio de Peter Colon ’01, associate director at DC Moore Janeiro, Rogério Studart spoke on finance for Gallery, returned to campus to speak with development. students interested in careers in the arts. 8 Pulteney Street Survey | Winter 2016

TANAKA LECTURE SERIES Director of the World Wildlife Fund’s China Program, Tao Hu delivered a talk on China’s environmental policies. TAO HU

DR. TEMPLE GRANDIN An advocate for the humane treatment of animals and one of the most widely-recognized professionals with autism in the country, world-renowned animal behavior expert Temple Grandin delivered a lecture, “My Life with Autism and the Humane Treatment of Animals.” Included on Time magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people in the world, she is the author of many books, including Animals in Translation, Animals Make Us Human and The Autistic Brain.

Dr. Morris Rossabi, one of the world’s foremost experts on Mongolia and the Mongols, spoke on “Genghis Khan and Kublai Khan: Conquest and Rule.” PROFESSIONALS IN RESIDENCE The Professionals in Residence series brings alumni, alumnae and parents to campus to speak with students about career options. • Amy Bard ’94, Vice President and Private Banking Team Leader at M&T Bank • Rich Barlette ’01, Senior Manager at New York Independent System Operator • Kelly Biggs ’11, Membership Services and Planned Giving Manager, Emily’s List • Calvin “Chip” Carver Jr. ’81, COO of Markit • Zach Day ’15, Client Services Manager, EdgeRock Technology Partners • George Fries ’15, Deployment Analyst at EZE Software • Dave Gibbons ’94, Vice President of Securities at M&T Bank


TRIAS READING SERIES Poet and essayist Mary Ruefle joined HWS as the 2015-16 Trias Writer-in-Residence, leading workshops and mentoring the Colleges’ most accomplished student writers. As curator of the fall Trias-in-Residency Reading Series, Ruefle selected other noteworthy writers and poets to read on campus, including: • Michael Burkard ’68, a poet, 2008 Guggenheim Fellow, alumnus of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, and associate professor of English at Syracuse University, read from his work inspired by his time as a student at Hobart. • David Hinton read from his collection of essays. He teaches at Columbia University’s Creative Writing Program. • Poet, translator and hybrid-forms artist Jody Gladding read and showed images from her work which explores language and landscape. ●

FISHER CENTER This year’s Fisher Center speaker series titled “Gender, Climate and the Anthropocene” explores the connections between human planetary impact and the systems through which societies reproduce themselves. Lecturers included: • Elizabeth A. Povinelli, The Franz Boas Professor of Anthropology and Gender Studies at Gender, Columbia University, Climate and the delivered a talk “Before Biopower and Anthropocene After: Geontopower” • The arts-collective “Not An Alternative” presented its project, The Natural History Museum, a work of socially engaged art.

• A doctoral candidate at the University of Leicester, UK, Nicholas Beuret focused on the political and aquatic aspects of climate change. • Visiting Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies, Elizabeth Johnson presented “Our Futures with Jellyfish: Dreams of Ecological Apocalypse and Everlasting Life.”

PATRICK DESBOIS

AMY BARD ’94

• James Herman ’79, Director of the Stress Neurobiology Lab and the University of Cincinnati Neurobiology Center • Jessie L’Heureux ’15, Sales Consultant at Unum Insurance • Tom McGarrity P’18, Founder of Center of Bullseye Consulting, LLC Keegan Prue ’09, Manager of Schooling at Success Academy Charter Schools • Jenna Raleigh ’15, Client Manager at Unum Insurance • Michael Richardson P’17, Executive Vice President of REIS • Jennie Seidewand ’09, Assistant to the Heads, EXPLO at Yale University • Garrett Thelander P’16, Executive Managing Director at Cushman & Wakefield • Heather V. ’95, Intelligence Officer, CIA

HUMAN RIGHTS AND GENOCIDE SYMPOSIUM As part of the Max and Marian Farash Community Lecture series and the Colleges’ annual Human Rights and Genocide Symposium, internationally renowned Holocaust researcher and human rights activist Father Patrick Desbois discussed his experiences documenting long-hidden Nazi atrocities in his lecture, “Holocaust by Bullets.” Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Women’s Studies at St. Louis University, Judith Gibbons spoke on the social, psychological, legal and moral dimensions of inter-country adoption. ●

LEADER IN RESIDENCE

Goldman ’74 Leader in Residence Bringing a wealth of knowledge and nearly four decades of experience in strategic planning, marketing, sales and operations, Lisa Miller Goldman ’74 returned to campus as the Centennial Center for Leadership’s (CCL) Leader in Residence in October. An international management consultant, author and educator, Goldman is a partner in the global consulting firm Management Associates. “I was so excited to be the Leader in Residence,” says Goldman. “This allowed me the unique opportunity to contribute to students at my alma mater, and to perhaps have an impact on guiding their choices for the future. The educational environment is fertile ground to explore and absorb the skills that will allow students to experience a new kind of success when they leave school. The Centennial Center for Leadership has crafted a program that highlights some of the most critical skills for success.” Goldman worked with HWS leadership groups and classes from a wide range of disciplines on effective communication strategies and how to make a successful pitch. She also offered a discussion on careers in the technology industry that was broadcast on WEOS. “Her work with a number of entrepreneurial organizations is exactly what we wanted our students to gain experience with,” says Susan Pliner, associate dean for teaching, learning and assessment and director of CCL. “We’re thrilled that she had the opportunity to meet with several different classes and share her advice.” Goldman is co-authoring a book due out in 2016, The Moonshot Effect: Breaking Through the Gravitational Pull of Business-as-Usual and is a guest lecturer at Stanford University Graduate School of Business. “The world is increasingly shifting to a call for more entrepreneurial thinking and innovation within large and small businesses,” says Goldman. “The era when people were guaranteed ‘jobs for life’ or even ‘jobs’ has come and gone. It is incumbent upon professionals to forge an identity in the workplace that builds on their unique skills and on a passion for contribution. The skills that are learned in programs like the Pitch and IdeaLab are in that sweet spot.” Goldman received a B.A. in Asian studies from William Smith and an M.B.A. from the University of Oregon. She has been an active alumna, serving as a West Coast Region volunteer for Career Services and as a mentor for the HWS Stu Lieblien ’90 Pitch Contest. ● HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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The Global Identity of HWS German Studies by Andrew Wickenden ’09

language learning with historical, social, literary, economic and political contexts – has taken a variety of forms, from academic and social events on campus, to experiential learning opportunities for students and alums, to an expanding GAS abroad presence. These new facets are helping “integrate German culture into the fabric of the campus community,” Klaus says.

backbone of much of what we’re doing now,” Klaus explains. “Our initiatives in international opportunities and in bringing culture to campus reflect this credo of lifechanging experiences.” “Without the Blocker Fellowship I never would have decided to move to a German-speaking country,” says Mizzoni, who spent the spring of 2012 studying in

GAS Abroad Klaus notes the success of recent graduates who have pursued their love of German language and culture beyond HWS, like Silene Binkerd-Dale ’12, who earned a Fulbright Award to Tübingen; Luke Connolly ’15, who is interning at the American Embassy in Berlin; Stephen Enos ’15, who began a graduate program in physics in Dresden this fall; Lizzy Kniffin ’15, an au pair Eric Klaus, associate professor and chair of the GAS program advising Emily Nugent ’13, Blocker Fellow. for a German family in n an era of globalization, programs like Frankfurt, where she’s German Area Studies (GAS) become honing her language skills as she weighs increasingly important, but as a result, Berlin, immersing herself in the language graduate school and career they must also constantly and the culture. “The experiences I had options; and Devan Mizzoni evolve. “We’re forced to in my semester abroad almost completely ’13, a graduate student at the ask, ‘what defines German determined my decision to move here after University of Vienna. Area Studies?’ and ‘how graduation. It was a really big leap of faith Each of these graduates do we as a department coming here – I’m ambitious and a planner, spent time abroad in Germany make ourselves known and so moving to a country where I knew no one as students through the relevant?’” says Ashwin was a huge risk, but it has paid off in more Blocker Fellowship, which, Manthripragada, visiting ways than I could’ve imagined.” thanks to the generosity of assistant professor of GAS. For Connolly, who majored in political the late Julius G. Blocker ’53, To address these science with a double minor in economics provides support to HWS questions head-on, and international relations, “The Blocker students who participate in Manthripragada and Eric Fellowship was essential to both my Ashwin Manthripragada one of the Colleges’ study Klaus, associate professor academic career and future career plans. It abroad programs in Germany. and chair of the GAS program, have focused provided me with the financial assistance “Julius Blocker went on a Fulbright to the program’s curriculum around the nature I needed in order to study abroad – an Germany, which was, in his own words, of German identity in the 21st century. experience which directly influenced my a ‘life-changing experience.’ That’s the This development – which melds German career plans by creating a desire to return to

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WAVELENGTHS

Kate Boeding ’16 presents her experience to classmates, faculty and staff at The Blocker Showcase.

Germany or work with the country in some capacity.” The Blocker Showcase, in which returning Blocker Fellows present their experiences to their classmates, highlights for current students “the fantastic opportunities to study abroad in Germany,” says Kniffin, an international relations major and German minor who spent a full year abroad as a Blocker Fellow. “Those 11 months in Bremen, and one in Berlin, not only exposed me to a global world, but also set me on a specific path.”

A Growing Community When Kniffin and Kathryn Gallagher ’15 returned to HWS after studying in Bremen, they helped to found the German Club. “Once that happened there’s been a more ongoing presence of German culture,” Manthripragada says. “It’s part of the backbone of making ourselves more present. There’s a sense of community.” To capitalize on this vitality, the GAS Devan Mizzoni ’13 program has developed other opportunities, like the German Area Symposium, to promote intellectual collaboration between HWS and other GAS programs in the area. With a focus on identity in the 21st

century, the first Symposium took place on campus in April and brought together scholars and students from the New York Six Liberal Arts Consortium – which includes HWS, Colgate, Hamilton, St. Lawrence, Union and Skidmore, sharing resources and ideas as they delve into topical issues regarding the sustainable success of higher education institutions.

Looking Forward In the summer of 2015, with the support of the Blocker Fund, the HWS GAS program was able for the first time to send students to University of Leipzig’s Summer Immersion Program, which allows HWS students to earn course credit. Taught by language instructors at the university’s Herder Institute, the program “is marvelous,” Klaus says. “I’m very excited about it. When they came back to campus, their German was stronger, they were better ambassadors for the Blocker Fellowship, and my hope is that they will inspire students to take more German.” Noting her cohort of recent graduates, who “have all been fully inspired by their time spent in Germany,” Kniffin recalls her time in the HWS GAS program as not only “an academic experience, but a social one filled with friendships and personal growth.” For Connolly as well, the GAS program “provided me with so many opportunities to engage with German culture.” And after his experience abroad, he says, “I realized that I wanted to return to Germany and have a career path which incorporated my interest in the country with my studies of international relations and politics.”

Connolly’s internship at the U.S. Embassy in Berlin is based in the Public Affairs section, which “promotes an understanding of U.S. political, economic and social issues, explaining to German audiences both the current Administration’s foreign policy agenda and the complexities of U.S. society and culture.” Mizzoni hopes to remain in Austria after she graduates from the program in Vienna, “where I could use my English and German to work with an international NGO or one of the many development related agencies in the city,” Luke Connolly ’15 she says. “This city is really a hub for development cooperation, so it would be a great experience working here.” Kniffin, who began work as an au pair in Frankfurt this summer, says the job will help her “evaluate and home in on” where German fits in her long-term goals. “I’m interested in intercultural communication, ethics and the non-profit sector,” she says. “I’ll soon be taking a right or left on the same path that began with the Blocker Fellowship, depending on what I am exposed to during this upcoming year and whether I begin a masters or start out in the professional world.” As the GAS program develops under the leadership of Klaus and Manthripragada and the close-knit community of current students, Kniffin is confident in the “wonderful underclassmen who saw the excitement we had and added something special. I know they will continue to pave the way.” ●

HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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HWS Team Partners with NASA on Launch by Avery Share ’15

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fter spending more than a year grappling with the complex physics and engineering concepts it takes to design and construct a sounding rocket payload capable of withstanding a 71.4 mile launch into the Earth’s atmosphere at nearly 2,886 miles per hour, it was a remarkably simple, two-word text message – ROCKET RECOVERED – that notified a team of HWS physics students and faculty that their yearlong endeavor had ended successfully. “As soon as we got the text, we all ran toward the building where we could retrieve the data,” Assistant Professor of Physics Ileana Dumitriu remembers. “It was a relief to know that the rocket got all the way up and came all the way back down and actually had data on it.” Dumitriu and Physics Lab Technician Peter Spacher Ph.D. mentored six HWS 12 Pulteney Street Survey | Winter 2016

students through the highly technical process of researching, designing and building a sounding rocket payload – in this case an experiment to investigate subatomic particles in the atmosphere – to be launched at The Colorado Space Grant Consortium (COSGC) RockSat-C Program out of NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility this past June. The group – which represented one of the only liberal arts schools in the competition and the first group of HWS students to ever successfully launch anything into space – was chosen as one of only 10 teams nationwide to participate in the program, and one of just two out of the 10 to be given full space on the rocket for their payload. Fewer than 100 rockets from across the globe are launched into space per year, making the opportunity one that few experience in their lifetime, let alone as an undergraduate student.

Christopher Demas ’17, Lisa Ditchek ’15 and Jeff Rizza ’16 designed and built the payload and spent a week at the flight facility in Wallops Island, Va., with Spacher and Dumitriu. Joe Carrock ’17, Duncan Lilley ’17 and Matt Sanders ’17, who were not at the flight facility, were also instrumental throughout design and construction. The group received funding from the President’s Office, Hobart student government, K-Tech Corporation and the New York State Space Grant. The HWS group was the only one representing a school without an engineering major. Being chosen for the program, therefore, is a testament to the merits and quality of the group’s payload design as well as their ability to integrate a diverse set of skills into a collaborative team able to quickly learn electrical and engineering skills that other teams had mastered for years. “Coming from a liberal arts institution, we knew from the start we would be different from other teams,” says Rizza, a physics and environmental studies double major. “Virtually every other team was composed of students at larger institutions that were more technically focused than any liberal arts college would be. Quite honestly, this only motivated us more.” The project began in the spring of 2014 when the group attended the COSGC RockOn! Workshop. There, they built a payload using one of NASA’s designs, and then launched the experiment into sub-orbit – meaning it followed the path of a parabolic arch, reaching the fringes of the atmosphere and crossing the boundary into outer space before returning back to Earth’s surface. “The students liked RockOn! so much and wanted to do the next step, which was RockSat-C,” Spacher explains. “For RockSat-C, we had to come up with our own idea of what we were going to measure with our payload, so last summer we started brainstorming and eventually narrowed down something that would be feasible.” The group decided to investigate cosmic ray muons, elementary subatomic particles generated through cosmic radiation from deep space that are similar to an electron but 207 times as massive. With special attention paid to those muons near the fringes of Earth’s atmosphere, collected data would allow the group to explore important questions like what pollutants are in the atmosphere and how far up they range, the Doppler shift, and the rotation


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of the space craft and how that changes the energy spectrum. “The research provides important insight into an area of particle research that has only been theoretically predicted,” explains Demas. After deciding on an idea and intended results, an “Intent to Fly” form, which included a formal proposal and blueprint of their design, was submitted to COSGC. Vying for space on the rocket was just the start of the arduous process that required near constant contact with COSGC – including bi-weekly teleconferences – to ensure that design and construction progressed as expected. While their collective background in physics was essential to compiling data for their monthly reports, it was actually their liberal arts background that the group believes gave them a true advantage. “They know how to talk and interact, and they know how to present their work,” Jeffrey Rizza ’16, Lisa Ditchek ’15 and Christopher Demas ’17, along with Assistant Professor of Physics says Dumitriu. “Having an interdisciplinary Ileana Dumitriu and Physics Lab Technician Peter Spacher Ph.D. pose for a photo with their payload before it team meant that each student had his or her was launched into sub-orbit. own strengths in different areas, but they were all able to bring it together and work out the electric current or an improperly soldered from their muon detectors to work through, challenges.” component could throw off the entire launch, the group is continuing with this research Once the group arrived at the NASA causing the payload to return with no data,” while helping a new group of students facility, the value of having a team that ranged Dumitriu explains. design another muon detection payload for from geoscience majors next year’s launch.   While standing on the to pre-med students Launchpad at 5 a.m. with “The research we’re doing is real world and women’s studies the payload hooked up research,” Spacher says. “There are real minors quickly became and ready for take off, questions here that we are trying to answer, evident. Rizza says the group didn’t know and the results will have broad impacts the other competitors if the experiment would and continue to be expanded with further tended to be “very survive the launch. research.” compartmentalized,” Regardless of the results, The group left their mark on the with each team member seeing a year’s worth complex world of physics research and all specializing in one aspect of work, frustrations six students agree that the launch left an of the payload design. and eventually “ah-ha” equally lasting impact on them. Demas adds that with moments put into action, “I am in many ways a new person limited electronics and provided an unforgettable from this experience. I no longer engineering backgrounds, moment. question whether I can do something but the group simply had to   “The rocket launch rather ask the question of how do we get “be more creative” than some problem answered,” says Demas, signified the culmination other teams, relying on who intends to go to medical school. “Most of a project that has every team member to previously seemed just importantly, I gained further experience have a full understanding The HWS payload was launched into subimpossible. The launch in how to lead a positive and constructive of every design aspect. orbit using an Orion Sounding Rocket at the Colorado Space Grant Consortium RockSat-C was breathtaking, and it’s group effort that will surely be useful as I Much of this program. a moment I will always pursue a career medicine.” ● creativity came in the remember,” says Ditchek. week leading up to the   The successful launch still ingrained in their launch, when the group was making near memories, the group has begun the process round-the-clock repairs to the payload on the of analyzing the data collected. With 18,000 floor of their hotel room, hoping to ensure that spectra to analyze, and another 20,000 points everything went off without a flaw. “One stray HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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Three New Leaders Join HWS by Avery Share ’15 and Steve Bodnar

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obart and William Smith began the fall semester welcoming three individuals to leadership positions at the Colleges: The Rev. D. Maurice Charles, Chaplain of the Colleges; Susan Lee, Title IX Coordinator; and Carolee White, Vice President for Finance and Chief Financial Officer. “We welcome these new colleagues to the Colleges with excitement and enthusiasm,” says President Mark D. Gearan. “As they begin their roles with us, I am inspired by the legacies of their predecessors and by the strong visions that Rev. Charles, Susan Lee and Carolee White bring to campus. With substantial expertise and knowledge, they have already added significantly to our community.”

MAKING SPACE Initially drawn to Hobart and William Smith for its commitment to community service and civic engagement, Rev. D. Maurice Charles has many years of ministry experience in Episcopal and American Baptist churches in San Francisco and the Midwest. He previously

Rev. D. Maurice Charles, Chaplain.

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served six years as Associate Dean for Religious Life at Stanford University. A scholar as well as a pastor, Charles has a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago and has taught graduate and undergraduate courses at Stanford, the University of Chicago, Northwestern University and Case Western Reserve University. “I have been moved by the dedication and passion of members of the Hobart and William Smith community. I believe I have found a new home among some of the most committed, intelligent, hardworking people I have met in an institution of higher learning,” Charles says. “I look forward to partnering with this community that so clearly embodies the highest values, where social, academic and community space is used to enhance discussions on many of the topics I hold dear race, class, gender, sexuality and religion.” Following the retirement of The Rev. Lesley Adams HON’12, HON’15, D.D.’15 at the end of the spring semester, Charles began his appointment in July, arriving to the Chaplain’s home on South Main Street with pasta dishes in hand (he has maintained Adams’ popular Pasta Night tradition). “I’m concentrating on making space, not only for people to have one-on-one conversations about change and crisis, but also challenging conversations about difference, whether that be religious difference, gender difference or racial difference,” he explains. His track record in this work is noteworthy. For the impact he made on both the individuals he mentored and the community as a whole at Stanford University, Charles was recognized with the Black Community Service Center Mentor Award and the Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Community Center Service Award. Colleges and universities, Charles believes, are places where

“dissent is valued and where the clash of ideas can happen,” as students are given the opportunity to fully express their perspectives both in the classroom and within the campus community. Inspired by his readings of the founding and history of the Colleges, Charles worked with students, faculty and staff prior to the start of the academic year to change the name of the Office of Religious Life to the Office of Spiritual Engagement. “The diversity of attitudes toward religion and spirituality is embodied in the founders, both of whom had a unique orientation toward organized religion,” Charles says.

SPEAKING UP “Speak up. Be a leader. Create a future where the thought of sexual violence and relationship violence occurring anywhere would be absurd. Create a future where the thought of racist, misogynist and homophobic cultures would be absurd.” During her address at Convocation, Susan Lee, the new Title IX Coordinator, asked students to consider how they might contribute to the enhancement of a culture of respect. She challenged them to become change agents and to keep in mind the impact that Title IX has had on women’s rights. She asked them to contemplate the significance of the bystander intervention training they had just completed during Orientation, and how it focused on empowering students to take a stand against sexual violence. Lee’s remarks at Convocation introduced the campus to her role with the Office of Title IX Programs and Compliance and served as a moment to share her background and vision. Succeeding Interim Title IX Coordinator Dr. Stacey Pierce who has returned to the Division of Student Affairs, Lee joined HWS last summer, overseeing Title IX compliance, education and prevention initiatives for sexual violence and gender-based misconduct. Lee has since met with hundreds of students, faculty, staff and parents to address concerns


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CHALLENGING PERSPECTIVES

Susan Lee, Title IX Coordinator.

and facilitate education and prevention efforts. She works to ensure that policies and practices meet compliance and best practices standards while cultivating a respectful, compassionate and gender-equitable environment. “As a community, we have the opportunity to work together to advance a culture of respect through the support of Title IX programs, education and outreach, campus wide initiatives and resources,” Lee says. “We have the chance to build upon the work that’s taken place across campus, address challenges and continue the meaningful engagement happening at Hobart and William Smith.” Informed by more than two decades of experience – including working in city government for fair housing, lobbying for the League of Women Voters and most recently serving as Director of Affirmative Action and Campus Diversity at Indiana University, South Bend – Lee brings to the Colleges a passion for advocacy and significant expertise in Title IX. Previously, she served at the University of Denver as director of the Office of Diversity and Equal Opportunity and the University of Arizona as assistant director of the Affirmative Action Office and ADA Coordinator. A graduate of the Indiana University School of Law, the Indiana University School of Public and Environmental Affairs and the Purdue University School of Nursing, Lee brings a strong background of investigative, legal and interpersonal skills.

After serving Colgate University in nearly every financial and business capacity imaginable over the past 20 years, Carolee White has developed what she calls “a liberal arts approach” to managing the widely varying and complex responsibilities of a vice president for finance and chief financial officer. “A liberal arts education teaches you the very important skill of being able to appreciate someone else’s perspective but also to think critically and be comfortable challenging perspectives,” says White. “That’s a lot of what I do in my position.” White is responsible for all financial operations including the business office, annual operating budget and capital project financing. She works closely with the Colleges’ Investment Committee to execute and monitor the endowment investment portfolio. She’s also responsible for the Colleges’ external contract with Sodexo for buildings, grounds, and dining services, the College Store, Conferences and Events, and the William Scandling research vessel. “I feel a deep responsibility to ensure that we are doing everything possible to give students rewarding academic experiences as we also balance the cost of that kind of high touch education with the financial pressures that students and their families face,” she explains. “It’s my job to ensure we are farsighted stewards of the Colleges’ finances and that we are spending funds today in ways that make sense and align with our mission.” A certified public accountant, White earned her B.S. in accounting from Syracuse University and worked at the accounting firm Coopers and Lybrand. At Colgate, White was associate vice president for finance

and assistant treasurer, and served for six months as interim vice president for finance. Responsible for buying and selling real estate and issuing bonds, she also worked closely with advancement on stewarding gifts for the endowment and with attorneys on compliance related issues. She succeeds Peter Polinak who retired in June. “Students, alums and families have to have confidence in the Colleges,” White says. “If alums are confident in the president, the senior staff, the faculty and the institution as a whole, they’re going to want to stay connected and help other students have the same or better experience than they had. It starts from the day a prospective student visits campus. We have to do everything in our power to give our students the best four years possible. I

Carolee White, Vice President for Finance and Chief Financial Officer.

hope that all students feel they benefited from their time at the Colleges, so much so that they want to make sure HWS continues to be a vibrant place for students to be educated for years to come.” ●

HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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2015

HOMECOMING & FAMILYWEEKEND

Highlights More than 3,000 alums, parents and families celebrated all things HWS during Homecoming and Family Weekend 2015. A memorable gathering, HWS spirit was felt campus-wide with victories from Hobart football and William Smith soccer teams, the dethroning of the reigning three-time Fall National winners and a standing-room-only President’s Forum Series talk by “60 Minutes” correspondent and HWS Trustee Bill Whitaker ’73, L.H.D. ’97 and HWS Presidential Fellow and Ithaca Mayor Svante L. Myrick.

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1) Friends gather at the Office of Intercultural Affairs. 2) Keshihito Murphy ’17 speaks with members of the HWS community about her project titled “Spectroscopic and Computational Study of Thiophene” during the Senior Research Symposium. 3) The Global Perspectives theme house gears up for Homecoming and Family Weekend with HWS and internationally themed decorations. 4) Fall Nationals tradition continues. This year’s winner was the team from Theta Delta Chi. 5) ’Bart has fun at the Tailgate party during the Sigma Chi fraternity “Pie a Sigma Chi” fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. 6-8) Friday night Quad-a-Palooza activities. 9) HWS Presidential Fellow and Ithaca Mayor Svante L. Myrick (left) and President Mark D. Gearan (right) discuss social media’s impact on the news with “60 Minutes” correspondent and HWS Trustee Bill Whitaker ’73, L.H.D. ’97, the guest of the President’s Forum Series. 10) Homecoming spirit! 11) Members of the William Smith Athletics Department, William Smith soccer team, alums and President Mark D. Gearan gather for a photo with William Smith College Head Soccer Coach Aliceann Wilber P’12 following a presentation celebrating Wilber’s and the Herons’ 500th win. 12) Hobart football vs. Worcester Polytechnic Institute. 13) Quad-a-Palooza. 14) Rowers race down the Cayuga-Seneca Canal during the Hobart Rowing Alumni and Family Weekend. 15) Associate Professor Emeritus of Art and Architecture Mark Jones ’72, P’14 presents his show titled “A Retrospective Exhibition, Paintings, Drawings and Photographs 1969 to the Present” in the Davis Gallery at Houghton House. HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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Living the Dream Michael B. Curry ’75, the newly installed Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church, and the first African American to hold the position, shares his vision for the dream the world can be. by Andrew Wickenden ’09

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hen he marched this summer across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., the site of 1965’s “Bloody Sunday,” where hundreds of civil rights marchers were beaten and tear-gassed by local and state police, the Most Reverend Michael B. Curry ’75 was struck in particular by the metaphorical significance of the bridge itself. The bridge, he says, is where the division

PHOTO COURTESY OF EPISCOPAL NEWS SERVICE

MICHAEL B. CURRY ’75

A liturgy marking the beginning of Curry’s ministry as presiding bishop and primate was celebrated Nov. 1, 2015, at Washington National Cathedral.

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between the protesters and the rights they sought – between black and white – was manifest, but it also “linked the two sides once separated. In the same way, the church must be a bridge, as all religious traditions must ultimately do if they’re authentic.” Born in Chicago, Ill., Curry recalls growing up in Buffalo, N.Y., “around a Christian clergy passionate about living out their teachings in society.” Curry’s father, the late Rev. Kenneth S. Curry, served as rector of St. Philip’s Episcopal Church in Buffalo, and while studying religion at the Colleges, the younger Curry was already “committed to doing something with my life that would have a positive effect on our society,” he says. That active, dynamic sense of service, he adds, “was formed in me early on, but at the Colleges I got the chance to reflect on that.” It was while studying the theological writings of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., that “it became clear to me that becoming an ordained minister of the Gospel would be a way that I could participate in the transformation of unjust social structures and be an instrument of change,” Curry explains. “Dr. King brought together a clear passion for


Curry “is expected to bring Pope Francis-like energy to the job.” —The Washington Post

the teachings and life of Jesus of Nazareth, living that life and teachings, embodying it, and then helping individuals in social order to be more aligned to those teachings and the foundational principle of love.” Curry went on to earn his Master of Divinity degree in 1978 from Yale University Divinity School and was ordained as a deacon in 1978 at St. Paul’s Cathedral in Buffalo, and as a priest later that year at St. Stephen’s Church, in Winston-Salem, N.C. After serving as rector in Ohio and Maryland, in 2000 he was elected as the 11th bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina. From 1988 to 1992, he served as a member of the HWS Board of Trustees. On June 27, 2015, the Episcopal House of Bishops elected Curry to a nine-year term as the 27th Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church, and the House of Deputies confirmed the election. When he took office on Nov. 1, Curry became the first African American in the church’s top leadership office. With his “high-energy, evangelical” style of ministry, as the Washington Post noted upon his installation, Curry “is expected to bring a Pope Francis-like energy to the job.” As Curry assumes his new responsibilities leading one of the largest Christian communities in the world, “the most challenging and most hopeful aspects are wrapped up into one,” he says. “One of the greatest challenges before the church is before us as a global human community. Specifically, it goes back to something Dr. King said: we must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools. What that means is that the critical issue for us to figure out is how to move beyond mere coexistence and learn together as a human community.” As the Washington Post reported in October, Curry is a “progressive on social issues and was one of the first bishops to allow same-sex marriages to be performed in North Carolina churches,” which Curry himself sees as part of the church’s mission “to reconcile ourselves with each other and with God.” Curry envisions “a country and culture that welcomes the stranger, where equal justice and equal opportunity for everyone is the norm, where each and every man, woman and

child is a child of God with rights that cannot be taken away.” This vision for the future reflects the interrelated priorities identified by the General Convention, the church’s governing body. These priorities – “an inclusive, authentic way of evangelism and a commitment to racial reconciliation in our culture and our world,” as Curry explains – have “practical implications of what our churches look like and that they need to look like the world in which we live.” “Bishop Michael is one of the best embodiments of the Episcopal Church’s enthusiasm for spreading the gospel of hope and reconciliation,” says the Rt. Rev. Bishop Prince G. Singh, the Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Rochester and a member of the HWS Board of Trustees. “His election in the Church is historic. It was the first time a presiding bishop was elected at the first ballot — when someone gets elected that early and that overwhelmingly, that’s a pretty significant marker. There is an insatiable joy about him. He’s respected, well regarded, and the kind of leader that we need for the Church.” “I really believe that Jesus came not to establish an institution but to begin a movement,” Curry says. “It was and is a movement whose purpose is to change the world from the nightmare it often can be into the dream that God intends. That’s what the teachings of Jesus are about, and what this religious enterprise is about. The church today must reclaim and recapture that spirit, because institutional realities follow the movement – not the other way around.” In leading The Episcopal Church and making concrete the church’s goals of evangelism and reconciliation, Curry hopes to create a “profoundly welcoming, profoundly inclusive, profoundly transformative vision not just of church but of the world, a world where there’s plenty good room for all God’s children. “We can only do that,” he says, “through a movement grounded in a real and radical love that seeks the good and welfare for the other before the self. That kind of love can change the world, has done it before, and can do it again.”●

Crazy Christians “We need some Christians who are as crazy as the Lord,” Curry said in his 2012 address to the General Convention of The Episcopal Church in Indianapolis. “Crazy enough to love like Jesus, to give like Jesus, to forgive like Jesus, to do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with God – like Jesus.” Curry’s 2013 book, Crazy Christians: A Call to Follow Jesus, is a theological piece that expands on his signature wisdom to the church. In it, Curry argues that Christians must strive to be different in their thinking and actions, be confident and willing to do the impossible and prove the world wrong with immense faith and God’s assurance of omnipresence. He calls for the brand of “craziness” embodied by Mary Magdalene, Harriet Beecher Stowe and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. “Sane, sanitized Christianity is killing us,” he writes. “Comfortable, demure Christianity may have worked once upon a time, but it won’t carry the gospel anymore.” The way forward, Curry says, is to embrace “what Jesus was pointing us to, and what religious traditions at their best have done: pointing us toward life.” ●

Michael B. Curry ’75, Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church, succeeds outgoing Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, the first woman to lead The Episcopal Church and 39th recipient of Hobart and William Smith Colleges’ Elizabeth Blackwell Award. Curry served as a member of the Hobart and William Smith Board of Trustees from 1988 until 1992. He and his wife, Sharon, have two daughters, Rachel and Elizabeth. HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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Catching Up with Professors Emeritus and Emerita by Kristyna Bronner ’14 and Steven Bodnar

Professor Emeritus of Sociology Jim Spates P’00, P’11 retired in 2014 after more than

Professor Emeritus of Geoscience Donald L. Woodrow P’83, GP’15 came to the Colleges

Associate Professor Emerita of Mathematics Ann B. Oaks ’74, P’84, P’85, P’89 graduated

40 years of teaching at the Colleges. Over this period, he led eight terms abroad, chaired two Curriculum Revision Committees, twice served as Chair of the Sociology Department and cotaught the Two Cities course for more than two decades with Professor Emeritus of Economics Pat McGuire L.H.D. ’12. Currently, Spates is writing a book on the sociological thought of 19th century British art and social critic, John Ruskin. He also oversees a blog introducing modern readers to Ruskin. Though some have written on Ruskin’s social thought in the past, according to Spates, no one has ever tried to make his sociological insights accessible to an intelligent audience. In this book, he intends to make modern readers aware of the continuing relevance of Ruskin’s social thought to the problems of our time. “I take it as my task to introduce Ruskin’s genius and importance to a generation that no longer remembers him,” he says. “The blog is one way to do that. The book is another.” In addition to his work on Ruskin, Spates, who lives with his wife, Jennifer Morris, in Geneva, frequently travels, recently visiting Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Japan with several current and former HWS faculty members. He is also heavily involved with a group of local citizens in an attempt to save one of the most important (now abandoned) buildings in Geneva, The Dove Block at the corner of Exchange and Castle streets. The group intends to dedicate the third floor of the building to a museum/memorial to renowned abstract expressionist painter Arthur Dove, Class of 1903. Dove created some of his most important paintings in the building during the 1930s.

as an assistant professor of geology and rose to full professor in 1975. He was co-founder of the Environmental Studies program, co-founder of the Department of Geoscience, and co-designer of the Science-on-Seneca Program. He served the Colleges as associate dean of faculty from 1991-1994 and is a past recipient of the faculty’s scholarship and teaching prizes. He retired in 2001 and received the Distinguished Faculty Award in 2010. Since 2002, Woodrow has worked as a consultant with the Coastal and Marine team of the U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, Calif. There he has worked on sediment cores from San Francisco Bay and a fjord in Alaska. With colleagues, he completed a study of heavy minerals in sands from the San Francisco Bay, its tributaries and nearby coast line. He has also been teaching at community colleges in Berkeley and Oakland. The community colleges have put him in contact with intriguing people, different challenges, and, as at HWS, lots of fun. He says he has learned a lot. Woodrow serves the Richmond, Calif., community in several ways, including as president of the Point Richmond Neighborhood Council and the Richmond Neighborhood Coordinating Council; a board member of the Contra Costa County Library Commission, the Friends of the Richmond Public Library, and the Richmond Public Library Foundation; a member of the Richmond/UC Berkeley Committee planning UCB’s new World Campus in Richmond and a committee overseeing safety planning at Chevron’s Richmond refinery.

magna cum laude from William Smith College, later returning to join the HWS faculty in 1979 where she taught for 23 years. Her scholarship, which focused on the effects of cognitive and affective factors on learning mathematics and additional work on the influence of gender in mathematical achievement, is nationally known. In 1994, Oaks received a special citation from the William Smith Alumnae Association and the Hobart Alumni Association recognizing her as an exemplary member of the HWS community who achieved her goals first as a nontraditional student and later as a faculty member. She also won the Faculty Prize for Teaching in 2002. “I enjoyed teaching and interacting with my students,” Oaks recalls. “The math majors were wonderful and I stay in contact with some of my former students. Hobart and William Smith really is a great place.” Following her retirement, Oaks returned to HWS to teach a number theory course and also served as interim director of the Center for Teaching and Learning. As an alumna, professor emerita and parent of three graduates, Oaks remains deeply connected to the Colleges. In April 2016, Oaks and her daughter, Kathleen Menn-Oaks ’89 will attend the HWS parent and alum tour of Ireland guided by Professor Emeritus of Economics Pat McGuire L.H.D. ’12 and his wife, Sandy. Currently, Oaks lives just a few miles from campus in Oaks Corners, N.Y., where she enjoys growing orchids and collecting antiques.

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Professor Emeritus of Political Science Joe DiGangi retired from teaching in 1997 after 30 years at the Colleges. He served on many committees, advising Honors work and pre-law students, led study abroad programs and co-founded the Washington, D.C. public policy program. The professorship that bears his name was endowed by alumni and alumnae to honor a member of the political science faculty. DiGangi received the Distinguished Faculty Award in 2002. DiGangi lives just outside of Washington, D.C. in Arlington, Va., and serves on the Fine Arts Advisory Panel at the Federal Reserve Board. He also works with the Supreme Court Historical Society and is a member of “just about all” of Washington, D.C.’s museums. He also serves on the board of a small theater company called the WSC Avant Bard. “There is rarely a day when I sit home and have nothing to do,” says DiGangi. “Every once in a while it’s nice to have one of those days.” DiGangi, who used his first paycheck at the Colleges to buy artwork, remains an avid art collector. He has donated numerous works to the National Gallery and Phillips Collection. He remains connected to many former students and has been actively involved in both the semester in D.C. as well as the Day on the Hill program.

Professor Emerita of Religious Studies Mary Gerhart retired in 2005 after more than three decades at the Colleges. During her tenure, she collaborated with the late Professor Emeritus of Physics Allan M. Russell P’81, P’86, initiating one of the Colleges’ first bi-disciplinary courses. For their work, they received a Science and Religion Course Prize Award from the John Templeton Foundation. In 2011, Gerhart received the Distinguished Faculty Award. “I really enjoyed my work at the Colleges since the very beginning, primarily because of the bi-disciplinary and interdisciplinary emphasis,” says Gerhart who taught courses such as “Myth, History and Theory” and “The Religious Imagination.” Following her retirement, Gerhart moved to south-side Chicago and has remained an active scholar. She was a Senior Fellow at the Martin Marty Center for the Advanced Study of Religion at the University of Chicago and recently lectured on violence and on Hildegard of Bingen. The author of several books, Gerhart continues her scholarly work. Her book, New Maps for Old: Explorations in Science and Religion (2001), coauthored with Russell, is scheduled to be reissued by Bloomsbury Press in 2016. Currently, Gerhart is a member of a group of scholars who regularly meet to discuss their latest papers at the nexus of science and religion. She also belongs to a poetry discussion group. Gerhart says her membership in both groups is an extension of her interests and experiences at HWS.

Professor Emeritus of History Marvin Bram P’91, L.H.D. ’99

Professor Emeritus of English Jim Crenner retired

retired in 1997 after 27 years at the Colleges. At HWS, he was given the freedom to construct non-traditional courses, pursuing his own historical discipline: symbolic history. He received the Alumni and Alumnae Associations’ Distinguished Faculty Award in 2003. “Hobart and William Smith are among the very few colleges in the country that if you could persuade your colleagues that what you were doing is important enough, they would support you in doing it,” he says. Bram lives in Geneva and has devoted his time to projects in the public sphere. He is working to revise the language in the existing Federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act, which is currently moving through legal at the Department of Health and Human Services. Bram spends much of his time writing, including a 1,000-plus-page book called Humanity, which is being edited by a publisher. Bram also writes plays, stories and essays, which he self-publishes on Amazon. When he’s not writing or working for the greater good, Bram enjoys playing the violin, taking every chance he gets to play in classical trios with friends. He also enjoys hosting former students for visits at his home in Geneva.

in 2008. During his 41 years at the Colleges, he served as department chair three times and once as interim director of the Writing and Rhetoric Program. He led four semesters abroad. Crenner resides in Geneva with his wife, Professor Emerita of Art History Elena Ciletti and stays involved with the Colleges, mainly through attendance at literary readings, formal talks, musical and theatrical performances and the Friday Faculty lunch talks. He continues to write and publish poetry, to read, to travel and cultivate his gardens. Some of his time, however, is devoted to volunteering in the Geneva community. Crenner has worked at the Food Pantry of the Geneva Center of Concern for the past several years. “It has surprised me to witness just how steady is the stream of needy Genevans passing daily through the Pantry doors,” he says. Crenner also works with the Literacy Volunteers of Ontario-Yates, meeting with a local Chinese couple each week to help them improve their English. “It is my experience that volunteer work does at least as much for the server as the served,” he says. “Simply, it allows you to feel useful in a good way.”

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Professor Emeritus of English Ted Thiesmeyer retired from the Colleges in 2001. During his 33-year career, he served as assistant dean of students in addition to teaching in the Department of English and serving as department chair several times. He was one of the first two Ombudspersons appointed by the Colleges. Thiesmeyer and his wife Elaine, a professor emerita at RIT, still live south of Geneva in the lakeside house they bought in 1968. Together, they run a software company that began while Thiesmeyer was teaching at HWS. As an offshoot of a multidisciplinary course he taught in called “The Mechanical Bride,” Thiesmeyer became interested in computers. Along with his wife, he developed one of the first grammar checkers for English prose in the 1980s. It began as a tool to help teach composition (Editor) becoming a professional publication and eventually a small business. The Thiesmeyers have continued the business into retirement and have customers in more than 70 countries. The software is currently being evaluated for possible acquisition. “I have a lively international correspondence and spend much of my time working on the Internet,” Thiesmeyer says of his typical day. “Thanks to the Internet, we have continued our business while traveling – off Cape Horn, in Istanbul, Alaska, Mexico and the Mediterranean.”

Professor Emeritus of Economics Patrick McGuire L.H.D. ’12, who chaired the Economics Department multiple times, led several study abroad trips and helped establish the semester in Washington, D.C., taught his last class in 2010. He came out of retirement to serve as interim provost for one year, “officially” retiring in 2013.    While he has no “typical day,” McGuire remains connected with the Colleges, most recently serving as co-chair of the Culture of Respect Committee along with Mara O’Laughlin ’66, L.H.D. ’13. Recently, McGuire conducted a study with several students from Professor of Sociology Jack Harris’ P’02, P’06 class on the economic impact of the Smith Opera House on the City of Geneva. He sits on the board of directors of the Finger Lakes Credit Union and is currently serving on a committee to help create a comprehensive master plan for Geneva. “I still enjoy all of my academic interests; I’m a reader of the newspaper and the relevant journal articles. I like interacting with my former faculty colleagues, who I admire and respect,” he says. McGuire and his wife, Sandy, travel often; in the spring of 2015 they visited World War II sites in Germany and in April 2016 will offer their fourth guided tour of Ireland for alums and parents. 22 Pulteney Street Survey | Winter 2016

Professor Emerita of English Claudette Columbus retired from the Colleges in 2003 after a career teaching late-18th and 19th century literature and traveling abroad on two Fulbright grants to Peru. She also led two terms abroad to London and one to Ecuador. Columbus was one of the first two Ombudspersons appointed by the Colleges. During her time on campus, she played an instrumental role in creating the women’s studies and Latin American studies departments. She was the recipient of three faculty awards, one each for teaching, scholarship and public service. She was presented with the Alumni and Alumnae Associations’ Distinguished Faculty Award in 2014. Columbus currently lives in a retirement community in Durham, N.C., which is also home to many retired professors from Duke and the University of North Carolina, keeping the environment intellectually stimulating. Columbus occasionally offers courses at Duke University’s Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. Though enjoying life in North Carolina, Columbus misses the Colleges. “I miss daily interactions with the creative and lively faculty of the Colleges. I miss the students who always add unexpected spice to daily life,” she says. “I miss the beauty of the campus on beautiful Seneca Lake. I miss the adventurous students. I miss everything, except the winters of New York State.”

Professor Emeritus of Political Science Peter Beckman retired in 2001 after 30 years at the Colleges. During his tenure, he advised students, led several study abroad programs and published multiple books. In 2012, Beckman received the Alumni and Alumnae Associations’ Distinguished Faculty Award. He now lives in Chapel Hill, N.C. with his wife, Toby.    “Since leaving, I taught part-time for several universities in the Chapel Hill area—but that turned out to be work, so I retired again!” he jokes. His focus has shifted from writing about nuclear weapons and international relations to fictional murder mysteries. Three of his novels have been self-published and are available on Amazon and at the College Store: A Lecture to Die For, Of Mountains, Sunsets, and Murder and In Terror’s Wake. The protagonist in his books is a professor of political science at a small liberal arts college in upstate New York. Beckman is currently working on his fourth novel. Of his time at the Colleges, Beckman says he continued to learn every day. “That’s the part I miss most,” he says. “I got a hell of a fine education at Hobart and William Smith even if it took me 30 years to graduate!”


“Women Moving Women Up” at Founder’s Day by Avery Share ’15

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PHOTOS BY GREG SEARLES ’13

uring the annual Founder’s Day events in December, the HWS community came together to celebrate the history of William Smith College and the legacy of strength and leadership alumnae share. The Founder’s Day discussion panel, moderated by Maureen Collins Zupan ’72, P’09, chair of the HWS Board of Trustees, featured alumnae who, as Dean of William Smith College Catherine Gallouët stated, exemplify “what it means today to live in accordance to the values that matter most.” They included Kendall Walton Farrell ’92, executive director of Bottomless Closet, and Dr. Fay M. Butler ’84, senior director of enrollment management at LaGuardia Community College and a social media strategist, author and pastor. “You may not realize the impact this place has on you until you’re gone, but there were a number of different communities that impacted me when I was here,” Butler said. “I played sports, so I had that community. I was an African American student so I had that community. I was fortunate enough to connect Dr. Fay M. Butler ’84 (left), senior director of enrollment management at LaGuardia Community College, Kendall Walton Farrell ’92 (center), executive director of Bottomless Closet, and Board Chair and financial analyst with people in the Geneva community. And Maureen Collins Zupan ’72, P’09 (right) discussed the legacy of strength and leadership that alumnae share. what I didn’t realize at the time was the impact that seeing strong women in leadership roles all in innovative ways of activism, bringing his President of William Smith Congress Kim the time, every day, had on me.” perspective into reality with the founding of Gutierrez ’17 spoke about how the history of Acknowledging the uncertainties life has this college.” the College impacts the current community of in store, Farrell urged William Smith students to William Smith women. Earlier that afternoon, Butler, Farrell and “be true to yourselves.... If you have something “William Smith has changed a great deal Zupan also attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony you really want, go for it, but your for the launch of the Colleges’ new Career since 1908, just as women life will most likely take a different Closet, a supply of professional attire available in the past 11 decades have path of how you get to where you to HWS students in need of appropriate changed society’s expectations want it to be,” she explained. “You clothing for job or internship interviews. The of them,” she said. “...there’s have to be true to yourself and you’ll closet was inspired by Farrell’s work with a sisterhood of William Smith find your way, and eventually where Bottomless Closet in New York City. Bottomless women. It’s preserved not just you need to be.” Closet works to reduce the barriers many through current students but During the discussion, Butler, women face in the search for employment as it also through the histories of Farrell and Zupan drew on their also supports and educates women at all levels the women who have attended own experiences in the workplace of their career trajectories. here, and that’s inspiring to be a and in their personal lives to part of.” Throughout the week leading up to President of William Smith empower the youngest generation “The past informs the Founder’s Day, William Smith Congress held a Congress Kim Gutierrez ’17 of William Smith women to become number of events for HWS students to celebrate present,” said President Mark the nation’s next great leaders. As Zupan said the establishment of the College and pay tribute D. Gearan, who provided the opening address. simply, William Smith students and graduates to its founder, nurseryman and philanthropist “My reflection is that we are current stewards “change the world.” William Smith. ● of a proud heritage of someone who thought HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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The Wheeler Society Celebrates a Silver Anniversary by Margaret Popper

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lums of all ages gathered at the Melly Academic Center to celebrate the 25th anniversary of The Wheeler Society, the Colleges’ recognition group for donors of planned gifts, during Reunion 2015. The event marked a time for celebration and reflection on the enormous impact that alumni, alumnae, parents and friends have had on the long-term vitality of the Colleges and the significance for students past and present. The Wheeler Society has grown by more than 150 new members in just the last three years. A group of panels mounted on a gallery wall of the Melly Academic Center told the story of The Wheeler Society: from its namesakes Amy and Schuyler Skaats Wheeler Sc.D. 1888, whose gift was realized in the late 1980s and provided the majority of funds for the renovation of Gulick Hall, to more recent gifts from benefactors including Robert North, Barbara Maynard Chilson ’69, Beatrice Stahl Biggs ’26, George Paulsen ’49 and Bill Scandling ’49 LL.D. ’67.

During the celebration, Board Chair Maureen Collins Zupan ’72, P’09, noted: “It’s amazing when you think about it. More than 100 years have passed since the Wheelers established their gift, yet many of you here tonight benefited from that act of generosity.” Columns within the Melly Center bore the names of more than 1,000 Wheeler Society members – some whose gifts have already made a lasting imprint on the Colleges, while others, including recent graduates, who have designated gifts that will be realized many years from now. What they all have in common is a tremendous commitment to the long-range health of the institution and to the students whose lives will be changed as a result of their thoughtfulness. In attendance that evening were Paul Vichness ’65 and Sharlene Schmidt ’66 Vichness who had just made a Wheeler gift that will support entrepreneurial studies summer internships.

“My gifts are not large (though maybe I will win the lottery one day!). But more than the fact that every little bit does count, my gifts to the Colleges are an affirmation that this relationship matters to me, that Hobart and William Smith Colleges are like family … and I am delighted to give back what I can. I’m proud to be a member of The Wheeler Society.” —The Rev. Lesley M. Adams, HON’12, HON’15, D.D. ’15, former Chaplain of the Colleges

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Sharlene Schmidt Vichness ’66 and Paul Vichness ’65

“Paul and I have always maintained an active part of our lives around Hobart and William Smith. We met on campus more than 50 years ago, and as alums we have attended almost every Reunion of both our classes. The Colleges are part of us and we have participated in many capital initiatives like the William Smith Centennial project and the glorious performing arts center,” Sharlene says. “Becoming a part of the Wheeler Society is a logical next step for us to give back to the place that was our beginning,” Paul adds. “We feel fortunate to have been able to craft a special and personally meaningful way of using our gift to help an aspiring entrepreneur to find a beginning and a launch pad to success.” In his remarks, President Mark D. Gearan recognized the important leadership provided by Trustee Chair Emeritus L. Thomas Melly ’52, L.H.D.’02 and the late William F. Scandling ’49, LL.D.’67 – the “trailblazers” behind the formation of The Wheeler Society in 1989. He also thanked Trustee Chris Welles ’84 and Rene Whitney ’83 Welles P’12, P’15 who together chaired the successful 25th anniversary efforts. Gearan closed the ceremony with appreciation for the Wheeler Society and its members.“Tonight we celebrate and honor those who have done so much to provide a bright future for our students and for the institution through Wheeler Society gifts. I appreciate that Hobart and William Smith has been – and continues to be – a priority in so many lives.” ●


Hobart Athletics | ca.1908

ATHLETICS

Baseball Team, 1908 Charles Stebbins, the grandson of Edward Clinton Stebbins Jr., Hobart Class of 1911 (back row, left), recently presented this photo of the Hobart baseball team to the Colleges. Edward Stebbins was a member of the Hobart baseball and football teams, Theta Delta Chi fraternity and Druid Society. Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., he graduated from Hobart and went on to receive a medical degree, later treating returning WWI Veterans with Spanish Flu. He eventually settled in Niagara Falls where he served his community as a general physician until the age of 78. He passed away in 1982 at the age of 95.

500 Wins

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Enhancing Strength and Conditioning 28 Hobar t Wins Head of the Charles

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From Humble Beginnings

William Smith College Head Soccer Coach Aliceann Wilber P’12 and the Heron soccer program reached 500 wins with a 1-0 victory over the University of Rochester in the championship game of the Upstate Collegiate Cup played at the Yellowjackets’ Fauver Stadium on Sept. 20, 2015.

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Soccer Head Coach Aliceann Wilber (far right) with the William Smith 1981 soccer team.

by Ken DeBolt

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n the Sept. 4, 1980, Finger Lakes Times, under the headline of “Notes ‘n Quotes” a brief paragraph conveyed the news that Aliceann Wilber would be the first varsity head coach of soccer at William Smith. A humble announcement for a legend in the Aliceann Wilber P’12 making. Five games into that first season, the Herons handed Wilber her first coaching victory. Future Heron Hall of Honor inductee Kris Jensen ’82 scored the game winner that day. Her 68th-minute tally gave William Smith a 2-1 lead on visiting Hamilton and unleashed a flurry of Heron goals as the home side went on to win 7-1. Fast forward 12,774 days—just nine days short of 35 years from the first win—and William Smith fans everywhere were on the edge of their seats in anticipation, rooting for the Herons to hand the five-time National Coach of the Year one more victory, the 500th of her illustrious career. The opponent was no ordinary opponent. The match was no ordinary match. William Smith was playing at the University of Rochester in the championship of the Upstate Collegiate Cup, playing the Yellowjackets for the 42nd time, more than any other William Smith opponent. The tension in the stands that night at Fauver Stadium was palpable. Herons across the country and around the world shouted at computer screens pleading for a goal. Then,

in the 77th minute, just as spectators began to allow for the possibility of a draw, Kara Shue ’17 sent a cross in from the right side that classmate Shay Callahan ’17 drilled into the back of the net. First-year goalie Kaileen Murray ’19 (1 save) and a stingy Heron defense (2 shots allowed) made the solitary goal standup, shutting out Rochester for win No. 500. The all-time wins leader in Division III women’s soccer, Wilber is one of only three people, and the first woman, to reach the 500-win plateau in NCAA women’s soccer history joining North Carolina’s Anson Dorrance and UConn’s Len Tsantiris. Congratulations poured in from around the soccer world, arriving via Twitter at nearly the same instant as the game’s final horn. The current Herons huddled around the only leader the program has ever known and literally sang her praises. The song was “Happy 500 Wins,” to the tune of Happy Birthday. Clearly embarrassed, and in true Aliceann fashion, she responded, “It’s not about me.” Asked about how she was feeling after the milestone victory by a television reporter a short time later, Wilber repeated the line. “It’s not about a coach. It’s about all of the people together,” she said. “I had great support from all of the people that have played for us since 1980, a long time, so all the alums, all the players that came before today’s players, all of the assistant coaches, I’ve just been so fortunate. And I’ve had really good administrators to work for, so it’s just one step at a time, one game at a time and they add up.” When pressed to reflect on her career, Wilber expressed her appreciation for the ever-expanding Heron family. “It’s been really special for me that I’ve worked in one place for 36 years. That allows us to have this family that keeps growing and evolving and they’re

all my kids. Some of them are 50-years-old and they’re still my kids. I treasure that. The alums give us so much energy. That’s the thing that has kept me in coaching for so many years is at the end of the day I feel like, ‘Yeah maybe I did make a difference.’” The 2015 season was indeed a special one. After losing its season opener (2-1 in double overtime at then No. 18 Wheaton (Ill.)), William Smith rattled off a 21-match unbeaten streak, which included 18 consecutive victories and 14 straight shutouts. The Herons won their ninth consecutive Liberty League regular season title with a sterling 8-0-0 record that saw them outscore the league 33-0. William Smith breezed into the Liberty League Tournament Championship with a 5-0 semifinal win over Vassar. In the title tilt, the Herons found themselves in the unusual position of trailing after conceding a second-minute goal. In the 66th minute, Liberty League Player of the Year Krista Longo ’16 evened the match and MacKenzie Smith ’17 secured the program’s ninth consecutive tournament crown with her game-winning goal 1:50 into overtime. No. 3 William Smith flexed its offensive muscle early in the NCAA tournament, dispatching Penn State Berks 3-0 and Roger Williams 5-1. In the third round, the Herons needed Shue’s 93rd minute strike to slip past No. 11 Brandeis 1-0. The quarterfinal against No. 6 Williams shaped up much like the Liberty League Championship. The Ephs took an early lead, but Wilber will begin William Smith forced the 2016 season overtime thanks to Callahan’s header in the with a record of 86th minute. Although 515-129-57 the Herons dominated possession, outshooting Williams 7-2 in extra time, the score remained tied through 110 minutes. Officially a draw, the Ephs advanced to the semifinals 3-0 on penalty kicks and went on to win the national championship. Wilber was voted the 2015 NSCAA East Region Coach of the Year, the seventh time she has earn the award. For the fourth time in her career, Wilber had two players earn first team All-America honors, Longo and Zoe Jackson Gibson ’15. Jackson Gibson also picked up her second straight Liberty League Defensive Player of the Year Award. The Herons placed eight players on the all-conference teams and four on the NSCAA All-East teams. Wilber will begin the 2016 season with a record of 515-129-57. ●

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Hobart wins Head of the Charles.

Fall Sports Wrap Up HOBART ROWING: For the second time in program history, the Statesmen won the collegiate men’s eight division at the Head of the Charles. It’s the fourth time Hobart has medaled at the world’s largest two-day regatta and the 10th consecutive season the Statesmen have finished in the top 10.

Enhancing Strength and Conditioning

HWS

recently completed two important improvements to the Colleges’ strength and conditioning program. Support from John Hogan ’88 secured a two-person strength and conditioning staff while funding from Jeremy Foley ’74, James Kraus ’74, and Gordon Sweely ’86 allowed for substantial improvements to the Raleigh-Foley-Kraus Varsity Strength Training Center. “Hobart and William Smith are fortunate to have loyal and passionate alums committed to creating an environment that supports the success of our studentathletes,” says Vice President for Advancement Bob O’Connor. “A strong strength and conditioning staff and facilities give our students the skills and knowledge necessary to participate in their sport and in their academic endeavors at the highest levels. On behalf of the HWS community, I thank these alums for their dedication and generosity.” The Colleges hired their first full-time strength and conditioning coach six years ago. Since then, student-athletes embraced the individual attention the new professional provided, but meeting the needs of roughly 550 students with one person proved challenging. In January, HWS added an assistant strength and conditioning position. Hogan has committed to support the new assistant coach’s position. In honor of his generosity, current head strength coach Matt Dorn has been recognized as the John J. Hogan ’88 Strength and Conditioning Head Coach. Dorn has been with the Colleges for nearly two years and develops and implements training programs for all 23 varsity teams. He is assisted by Jake Alvarez, who came to the Colleges a year ago after completing a strength and conditioning internship at Cornell University. “About 25 percent of HWS students compete in intercollegiate athletics and benefit from the resources in the RFK Varsity Strength Training Center,” says William Smith Head Field Hockey Coach Sally Scatton. “We are grateful to John Hogan for his commitment to our athletic programs. Our student-athletes have received increased teaching, and we have witnessed an improvement in our overall speed, strength, and agility.” Hogan was a two-sport athlete at Hobart, earning four letters in baseball and playing defensive back in football. He earned a bachelor’s degree in economics and has had a long career in finance, most recently as the head of risk at JP Morgan. The enhancements to the RFK Center included new Ultra-Tile flooring complete with inlaid platform lifting stations with custom Hobart and William Smith athletic logos and new polyurethane dumbbells. The renovations to RFK were made possible by gifts from Foley, Kraus and Sweely. Foley played football and lacrosse while earning a psychology degree at Hobart, and is director of athletics at the University of Florida. Kraus played lacrosse for the Statesmen, earned a psychology degree from Hobart, and is president of CaseyWerner Television. Sweely also played lacrosse for the Statesmen, earned his degree in economics, and is a managing director at Nomura Securities International. “The improvements made to our RFK strength and conditioning room are, without exaggeration, monumental,” says Hobart Head Lacrosse Coach Greg Raymond. “We now have a state-of-the-art facility with ample updated equipment affording us every opportunity to grow our strength, speed and agility.” ●

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WILLIAM SMITH FIELD HOCKEY (18-3, 5-1 LL): The Herons captured their 11th Liberty League Championship, earning their 22nd appearance in the NCAA tournament. William Smith reached the quarterfinals before falling to eventual national champion Middlebury. HOBART SOCCER (13-3-2, 5-1-2 LL): The Statesmen finished second in the Liberty League regular season standings and earned a spot in the conference tournament for the second year in a row. Hobart logged its 10th straight winning season and its best league record since 2011. HOBART FOOTBALL (7-3, 5-2 LL): The Statesmen finished just one game out of first place in the league. Hobart landed 16 on the All-Liberty League teams and Marcus Jemison ’17 earned a spot on the D3football.com All-East third team. The Statesmen were nationally ranked at the beginning of the season and one of their biggest victories of the year was a dramatic last second 19-17 win over then No. 25 St. Lawrence. HOBART CROSS COUNTRY: The Statesmen ran in nine meets this fall. Tyler Sutherland ’18 led the Statesmen across the finish line in all eight races he competed in. WILLIAM SMITH CROSS COUNTRY: William Smith runners competed in nine meets this fall. The Herons finished in second place at both the Wildcat Invitational in Utica, N.Y., and the Cross Country Only Conference Championships at Seneca Lake State Park. WILLIAM SMITH ROWING: William Smith opened the year taking second in the varsity eight in the Challenge on the Canal. William Smith wrapped up its fall slate with the Head of the Fish, where the second novice eight claimed third place. WILLIAM SMITH TENNIS: The Herons hosted the Mary Hosking Invitational and the ITA Northeast Regional Championships to open the year and then downed St. John Fisher 9-0 in their lone dual match of the fall. Hannah More ’17 leads William Smith with four singles victories. The pair of More and Michaelann Denton ’18 have recorded six doubles wins. HOBART TENNIS: The Statesmen competed in two tournaments this fall. Jonathan Atwater ’19 and Patrick Gray ’19 each registered two singles wins, while the duo of Atwater and Jonah Salita ’19 notched two doubles victories. HWS SAILING: The Colleges captured first place at the North Fall Qualifier and took second at the MAISA Women’s Regatta and the David Lee Arnoff Trophy. HOBART GOLF: The highlight of their six events was a fourth place finish at the Elmira Invitational. Alex Grant ’17 played in all nine rounds this fall and registered a team-low scoring average of 79.3. WILLIAM SMITH GOLF: The Herons played in five tournaments this fall. Rachel McKay ’18 and Whitney Reynolds ’17 competed in all 10 rounds. McKay and Natalie Powers ’18 have posted a team-best average of 95.3, while Reynolds is right behind them with a 98.5 average.

For up-to-the minute results and scores, visit www.HWSAthletics.com


The Quad | ca.1959

FEATURE

Pulteney Street Students head to class in 1959 through a light dusting of snow covering campus. In December 1959, the Provost of the Colleges, Dr. Laurence O. Ealy and the Dean of Hobart, Benjamin Atkinson, issued a “snowball warning” in The Herald for students to “exercise caution in the use of snowballs on campus.” The warning was prompted as a result of student injuries and damaged property due to flying snowballs.

Ten Years Creating Futures The Salisbury Summer International Stipend — Felipe Estefan ’08 — Kathr yn Klutts W ysor ’09 — Seher Syed ’10 — Daniel Org an ’11 — Raphael Durand ’13

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THE SALISBURY HEL PIN G STU DEN T S

E X P LO R E

CAREERS

AND FULFILL D R E A M S

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FEATURE

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ALUM’S VISION

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INTERNSHIPS

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LIVES CHANGED

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T EN YE ARS C REAT IN G F UT UR ES THE SALIS BURY SUMMER

I NT E RNAT ION AL INTERNSHIP S T I P E N D

by Andrew Wickenden ’09

Princeton Review’s newly released book, Colleges That Create Futures: 50 Schools That Launch Careers by Going Beyond the Classroom, recognizes Hobart and William Smith alongside schools like Stanford University, University of Pennsylvania, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Middlebury College and Swarthmore College as one of the nation’s 50 best colleges and universities for providing students with outstanding outcomes.

The Salisbury Center for Career, Professional and Experiential Education is cited by students as one of the Colleges’ defining strengths for its vital preparation toward those outcomes – from the Pathways Program, to the recently established Guaranteed Internship Program, to the Charles H. Salisbury Summer International Internship Stipend. Indeed, over the past several decades the validation of such programs and their remarkable outcomes can be traced to the vision of Honorary Trustee and former Chair of the Board of Trustees Charles H. Salisbury Jr. ’63, P’94, L.H.D.’08, who “has led the charge in ensuring our students explore their career options and fulfill the Colleges’ call of global citizenship,” says HWS President Mark D. Gearan. “The Salisbury Summer International Internship Stipend stands out as the embodiment of the ambition and empowerment we strive to encourage in our students.” Since the Salisbury International Internship program was established in 2005, the unique and groundbreaking award has supported 30 students with up to $20,000 each to pursue international internship experiences anywhere in the world. “I really wanted to provide the vehicle or opportunity,” Salisbury says. “It’s up to students to go where they see opportunities to contribute or learn, which is unique, and is a tribute to the students themselves and to the Colleges that help prepare them to take on this challenge.”

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“There are a lot of four-year liberal arts colleges scattered around the country. To attract students, the Colleges or any institution in this commodity-driven world have to differentiate themselves. We have to be willing to take chances, to keep looking forward and be willing to do things others haven’t done to attract the kinds of students we want to have and be the institution we want to be.” —HONORARY TRUSTEE AND FORMER CHAIR OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES CHARLES H. SALISBURY JR. ’63, P’94, L.H.D.’08

“The goal at the end of the day is to enhance students’ abilities to compete at the highest levels,” says Bob Murphy, vice president for enrollment and dean of admissions, who also directs the Salisbury Center. “The Salisbury Internship program is the enabler to do that – to take away financial distractions and offer a direct line of sight to a number of very qualified students to pursue what they want to do when they graduate.” Murphy, who consults with students during the early stages of the competitive application process, notes that applicants, “cultivate their ideas and wind up thinking bigger about their internships, from just one opportunity in one country, to two or three. It’s so nice to see someone go from a lower gear to a very high gear.” Salisbury, former managing director and member of the board of directors of T. Rowe Price Associates, says his primary objective in establishing the program was to recognize “that a liberal arts education serves one extremely well in the long term.” “I’m a graduate, if you will, of an international corporate environment, and I believe that a successful business has to have an international viewpoint,” he explains. “To grow a company, you have to grow the individuals, who have to be global citizens. In the short term, by enabling students to link up with a corporate sponsor, they have a chance to look at the business world and prove their mettle. What better opportunity for an individual early on in

their career than to do that overseas? It takes a special person to want to do that and to be able to do that.” In this sense, the Salisbury Stipend “places students in a larger global context,” says Scott MacPhail, associate director of Health Professions Counseling and Fellowship Advising, who works with students (including Salisbury Stipend recipients) as they apply to post-graduate awards and fellowships. “With the Salisbury award, there is a fair amount of independence for students to find their own opportunities, to explore the world and have a sense of where they stand in that larger world. A lot of students have this desire to have a larger role as a global citizen and make a large impact when they come back from their Salisbury experience, in that they know where they are and what they want to do in the world.” Nan Crystal Arens, professor of geoscience, echoes MacPhail’s reflections: “One of the things I’ve noticed about students when they go on any intensive experience off campus is a quantum leap in maturity and professionalism. Students have a different perspective about themselves once they get into the field, into a work setting, and realize that everything they have been learning in class has seeped into their worldview.” Today, having worked and studied in two-dozen countries on five continents, the recipients of the Salisbury International Internship Stipend are economists and

public policy experts, scientists and communications specialists. They are medical doctors and business leaders, award-winning architects and educators shaping future generations at home and abroad. The program has produced two Fulbright Scholars and a Marshall Scholar. Two-thirds of the award’s recipients have earned graduate or professional degrees at the nation’s top universities. Others have transitioned directly into careers at renowned companies and innovative startups around the world. “There are a lot of four-year liberal arts colleges scattered around the country. To attract students, the Colleges or any institution in this commodity-driven world have to differentiate themselves,” Salisbury says. “We have to be willing to take chances, to keep looking forward and be willing to do things others haven’t done to attract the kinds of students we want to have and be the institution we want to be.” With the success of the outstanding Colleges’ alumni and alumnae, “the transformative experiences Hobart and William Smith offer continue to serve as a model of innovation among institutions of higher education,” Gearan says. “And under the stewardship and leadership of alums like Charlie Salisbury, their accomplishments and honors are only the beginning.” n Profiles written and edited by Andrew Wickenden ’09 and Ronny Frishman P’00.

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FELIPE ESTEFAN ’08 Current Position Investment Adviser, Governance and Citizen Engagement, Omidyar Network; Mexico City, Mexico 2007 Salisbury Summer International Internship Mexican Institute of Cinematography; Mexico City, Mexico

PHOTO BY SANTIAGO GALVIS

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“I know wherever I go, I will always find members of the HWS community willing to lend a helping hand. I am eternally grateful, because I know that I am able to make the most out of the opportunities that I have been given because of the education and mentorship that I received at Hobart and William Smith.” —FELIPE ESTEFAN ’08

Graduate Work MA in International Relations and MS in Public Relations, Syracuse University

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s he begins his new role with Omidyar Network, Felipe Estefan ’08 will soon return to Mexico City, where he spent three months as a Salisbury Award recipient, interning and conducting research at the Mexican Institute of Cinematography. Omidyar Network, a philanthropic investment firm established by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife Pam, invests in entrepreneurs to advance social good through contemporary technology, education, financial inclusion, governance and citizen engagement, and property rights. In returning to Mexico City, Estefan will work on Omidyar Network’s Governance and Citizen Engagement portfolio in Latin America, supporting projects surrounding everything from open government, to independent media, to the way public resources are spent. Compared to his most recent role in the Public Integrity and Openness Department at the World Bank’s Governance Global Practice, Estefan says that this new job with Omidyar Network, “thematically speaking, is very similar,” insofar as it will carry him further along the path he began at HWS. A double major in media & society and international relations, Estefan says “the connection between the two areas has been very interesting and has been a theme of everything I’ve been doing since graduation.” His research for his Honors project began during his Salisbury project in Mexico City, where he worked in the Mexican Institute of Cinematography, examining the relationship between contemporary Mexican cinema and the construction of national identity in Mexico. Estefan later attended Syracuse University for a dual master’s degree that focused on how communications and technology are impacting international relations and policy. His internships at the United Nations and CNN— as well as the job he later landed at CNN — again explored the intersection of journalism, transparency and how new technologies and social media impact the understanding of current events. At the World Bank, Estefan specialized in open government and citizen engagement, designing and implementing strategies to advance transparency, accountability and citizen participation as a path toward improved governance and enhanced development outcomes. Estefan has developed digital engagement strategies for clients and organizations in the public and private sectors. “I have been able to pursue all of these opportunities thanks to the guidance of members of the HWS community and thanks to the support of Mr. Salisbury,” Estefan says. “I feel very lucky because I know wherever I go, I will always find members of the HWS community willing to lend a helping hand. I am eternally grateful, because I know that I am able to make the most out of the opportunities that I have been given because of the education and mentorship that I received at Hobart and William Smith.” n


“I worked extremely hard that first summer in Geneva, but I also spent time traveling, hiking in the Alps, and meeting new people. I don’t remember sleeping a lot that summer but I felt like there was way too much to take in to waste time sleeping.”

PHOTO BY ANDREW MARKHAM ’10

—LEANNE RONCOLATO ’07

Graduate Work Ph.D. in Economics, American University

LEANNE RONCOLATO ’07 Current Position Assistant Professor of Economics, Franklin & Marshall College, Lancaster, Pa. 2006 Salisbury Summer International Internship International Labor Organization; Geneva, Switzerland

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n the 10 years since she returned from Geneva, Switzerland, Leanne Roncolato ’07, a double

major in economics and social justice at the Colleges, has maintained ties with the International Labor Organization (ILO), where she interned as a Salisbury Award recipient. As she worked in the integration department of the ILO—editing a book on child labor in India and researching another book on trade union rights in the Philippines— Roncolato says she found Switzerland “to be an intriguing place where people from all over the world merge together in the midst of international politics, humanitarian efforts and financial business.” After her summer at the ILO, Roncolato continued to

work with the organization’s Department of Integration, first as a short-term official and later as an external collaborator. Now an assistant professor of economics at Franklin & Marshall College in Pennsylvania, Roncolato says the internship “has had a significant impact on my career. To this day I still work with David Kucera, my supervisor at the ILO that summer. During my time in Geneva, I also built wonderful friendships with amazing people from around the world. They are friendships that I have to this day.” Roncolato earned her Ph.D. in economics from American University and

has since published in the Cambridge Journal of Economics, International Labour Review, the Journal of Developing Societies and elsewhere, covering topics such as trade liberalization, the trade collapse of the Great Recession, informal employment and structural macroeconomics. Her most recent work examines female labor force participation in South Africa and informal selfemployment in the townships surrounding Cape Town. Her future research plans include continuing research in the areas of gender, labor and international development. n

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KATHRYN KLUTTS WYSOR ’09 Current Position Financial Services Manager, PwC’s Strategy; Washington, D.C. 2008 Salisbury Summer International Internship Duty Free Shops (DFS); Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Vietnam and Abu Dhabi

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s a Salisbury Award recipient, Katie Klutts Wysor ’09 worked with the Duty Free Shops (DFS) management team in Hong Kong and helped with the firm’s expansion into Abu Dhabi, observing and participating in all aspects of strategic planning. Fondly recalling her summer with the luxury travel retailer, Wysor jokes, “That’s where I learned about pivot tables! For an Excel nerd like me who ended up in the insurance industry, that was a pretty big revelation.” She notes, more seriously, that the internship “helped me grasp the business model and see the big picture as I worked with my team to open DFS’s first Middle Eastern location in the Abu Dhabi airport. It also forced me to consider how important cultural differences are in making business decisions.” In her roles educating management on the local context, synchronizing team efforts, and preparing analysis, updates and recommendations for senior executives, Wysor broadened her perspective for an Honors project dealing with social responsibility in corporations. After graduation, she joined GEICO in Washington, D.C. as an underwriting models supervisor before she began her current role at the multinational professional services network PwC (formerly PricewaterhouseCoopers). There, she continues to apply the lessons she learned during her summer in Hong Kong, Abu Dhabi and the other DFS locations she visited. “As part of my internship, I had the opportunity to visit five DFS retail locations in four different countries and meet with the leadership teams to understand the cultures, logistics and other considerations involved in operating in each place,” she says. “As I take on new roles and projects throughout my career, I continue to explore how everything fits together in order to solve problems more effectively.” n

“Learning how to get around, make friends and work in a new country can be intimidating, but it is also exciting. My time abroad through the Salisbury, especially when I was on my own, helped me become more independent and willing to take on new challenges in the future.”

PHOTO BY STEVE BARRETT

—KATHRYN KLUTTS WYSOR ’09

HELPING STUDENTS EXPLORE CAREERS AND FULFILL DREAMS In January 2004, renovations to Trinity Hall, the second-oldest building on the HWS campus, culminated in the opening of the Salisbury Center, named in honor of lead donor and former Chair of the HWS Board of Trustees Charles H. Salisbury Jr. ’63, P’94, L.H.D. ’08. Today, the Salisbury Center for Career, Professional and Experiential Education is home to one of the foundations of the HWS experience, the Pathways Program. Over the past decade, the pioneering career development program has guided students to success as they assess, explore, experience and connect to their future careers. 36 Pulteney Street Survey | Winter 2016


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TEN YEARS C R E AT I N G FUTURES LINH NGUYEN ’07 Current Position Visiting Scholar, South East Asia Program, Cornell University; Ithaca, N.Y.

JANE ERICKSON ’07 Current Position Project Director, ReThink Health Ventures, The Fannie E. Rippel Foundation; Cambridge, Mass.

“Galway was a good primer in helping me understand the meaningfulness of cultural differences. I like thinking about big issues, of conceptualizing ways to solve them and then doing it. I was able to do all of that in Galway.” 2006 Salisbury Summer International Internship Community Knowledge Initiative, National University of Ireland in Galway, Ireland Graduate Work Master of Public Administration and International Relations, Syracuse University

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“The Salisbury internship really allowed me to understand the scope, the benefits, the difficulties and the rewards of doing research. As a junior scholar, it paved the way for me to continue with my Ph.D.” 2006 Salisbury Summer International Internship Research Center for Gender and Development, Hanoi National University in Hanoi, Vietnam Graduate Work Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology, Syracuse University

DIANA HAYDOCK PERKINS ’09 Current Position Executive Manager of Human Resources, Von Maur; Victor, N.Y.

“The experience in Florence was my gateway to independence. I learned who I was and what I was made of. It can be quite intimidating moving to a foreign country alone but once you are immersed in another culture 100 percent and you go with the flow, it is invigorating.” 2007 Salisbury Summer International Internship Stamperia Braille for Regione Toscona in Florence, Italy Graduate Work Masters in Heritage Management, Newcastle University


CHRISTINA KINNEVEY ’09 Current Position Family Medicine Resident, Sutter Health-Sacramento Sierra Region; Sacramento, Calif.

“The life-changing experiences I had while working in Peru impacted my career in that I have a fervent desire to preserve health and prevent disease ... . I discovered how much fulfillment I really find in giving back to others.”

ADAM CROGLIA ’10 Current Position Director, Story Partners; Washington, D.C.

2007 Salisbury Summer International Internship Women’s Health Outreach, Pro World Service Corps in Cusco, Peru Graduate Work M.D. from University of California, Davis

DAVE FISHER ’10 Current Position Consultant, Accenture Strategy; Boston, Mass.

“The Salisbury Internship opened my eyes to the world of international business and all the opportunities that it offers.” 2007 Salisbury Summer International Internship U.S. Commercial Services Department, U.S. Embassy in Paris, France

“I owe entry to the Syracuse Public Diplomacy program to the Salisbury experience, and my first job working in the Middle East to grad school, and my next job to that one. It all started with the Colleges and the Salisbury – to both I am forever thankful.” 2009 Salisbury Summer International Internship Institute of International Education in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Graduate Work Masters in International Relations and Public Relations, Syracuse University

BEN AHEARN ’11 Current Position Furniture Maker/Designer, Chadhaus; Seattle, Wash.

“The Salisbury Internship taught me the importance of curiosity and to always keep challenging your norms. Often the most rewarding experiences result from taking risks.” 2010 Salisbury Summer International Internship Force 4 Architects in Copenhagen, Denmark Graduate Work Master of Architecture, University of Washington

Graduate Work MBA from Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University

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“The benefit of the Salisbury was that it let me gain that initial experience; that’s an opportunity for which I am eternally grateful.” —JOSHUA PARKS ’09

JOSHUA PARKS ’09 Current Position Associate, Maritime Attorney, Betancourt, Van Hemmen, Greco & Kenyon LLC; Red Bank, N.J. 2008 Salisbury Summer International Internship International Justice Network in The Republic of Namibia

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s an associate at the Betancourt, Van Hemmen, Greco & Kenyon law firm in Red Bank, N.J., Josh Parks ’09 specializes in maritime and commercial litigation and arbitration. Parks earned his law degree from Tulane University, interned in the Rhode Island Superior Court and worked for a solo practitioner in New Orleans. He got his start, however, at Legal Assistance of the Finger Lakes (now called Legal Assistance of Western New York), developing advice articles on legal issues commonly faced by clients, which provided the foundation for his summer internship as a Salisbury Stipend recipient, an experience he recalls as “a serious opportunity to grow up and gain some practical experience.” During his summer in Namibia, Parks worked with the International Justice Network (IJN) in the creation of a “sustainable, open source, web-based collaboration system for the Namibian judiciary,” as the IJN describes the project, which “helped Namibia leave behind the apartheid legal structures and address the communication and research technology challenges of this emergent democracy’s legal system.” Effectively, Parks says, the project was to create easy access to the country’s laws for all of Namibia’s judges, many of whom work in very remote areas. “I was the first person from the project to head to Namibia for a length of time, so when I first arrived I knew no one, did not have a place to live, and wasn’t even sure exactly what my role was,” says Parks. “It was up to me to figure it out. With the benefit of hindsight, there are certainly things I would have done differently, but the whole idea of the Salisbury was that it let me gain that initial experience; that’s an opportunity for which I am eternally grateful.” n

Graduate Work J.D. and Maritime Law Certificate, Tulane University PHOTO BY MICHAEL PARAS

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“I am part of the regional corporate citizenship team at Citi where I help develop innovative and sustainable community programs in 18 countries in Asia Pacific ...This is exactly aligned with my experience in Bangladesh which was made possible due to the Salisbury stipend.” —SEHER SYED ’10

Graduate Work Master of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University

PHOTO BY MEHAK QURESHI

SEHER SYED ’10 Current Position Asia Pacific Corporate Citizenship Manager, CITI; Singapore 2009 Salisbury Summer International Internship Grameen Bank in Dhaka, Bangladesh

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uring her internship at Grameen Bank, an institution founded by Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus, Seher Syed ’10 received hands-on training in the practice of microfinance. During that summer internship, funded by the Salisbury Award, Syed undertook field trips to remote villages to broaden her experience and learn about the philosophy and operation procedures of the bank. She participated in the annual International Dialogue Program with Yunus and learned how to replicate the Grameen model elsewhere. “After looking into the organization as a whole, I realized that Grameen was doing a lot more than just making small loans,” says Syed, whose final project in Dhaka focused on Grameen Danone, a social business enterprise joint venture between Grameen Bank and Danone foods. “I realized that businesses and entrepreneurs can increase social impact as part of their overall goals through sustainable business practices with the community in mind.”

After she graduated from William Smith, Syed worked in Washington, D.C. at the Center for American Progress, as a special assistant to the president and CEO. “My work at CAP exposed me to various fields of public policy,” says Syed, who later worked with UNICEF in Nepal. “I learned how to research and develop new ideas, which can be used to influence the national and international debate. It further increased my awareness of public policy issues, ranging from international development in Asia to climate change, which stirred my interest to study international policy, and ultimately led me to apply to graduate school.” While earning her masters from Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Syed “built on prior work experience by focusing on international business relations and global political economy,” she says. Having “gained a deeper understanding of the management of the business enterprise in a multinational context and the interactions between international political and economic dynamics,” Syed is now based in Singapore, where she serves as Citi Asia Pacific Corporate Citizenship Manager, managing Citi Asia Pacific’s community investments and volunteerism across 18 markets in the Asia Pacific region. She oversees around US$12 million in annual Citi Foundation grantgiving including reviewing and tracking all grant submissions. Citi’s community investment activities focus on microfinance, enterprise development, financial capability and asset building, and youth education and livelihoods. These are all areas Syed first gained exposure to during her time in Bangladesh. n

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REGINA TRIPLETT ’10 Current Position Medical Resident in Child Neurology, St. Louis Children’s Hospital; St. Louis, Mo. 2009 Salisbury Summer International Internship The University of Geneva Behavioral Neurology and Imaging of Cognition Laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland

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discovered my passion for and commitment to clinical research while interning at the University of Geneva,” says Regina Triplett ’10. “The Salisbury Internship profoundly influenced my career trajectory by exposing me to a large laboratory group with neuroscientists all researching issues affecting patients in real-time.” During her summer at the Switzerland university, Triplett worked with a research group in the Behavioral Neurology and Imaging of Cognition Laboratory. She assisted in neurological research using Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, fMRI, a noninvasive brain-mapping technology that uses elevated blood oxygen levels to pinpoint specific regions in the brain. She conducted the brain scans and analyzed the images, which allowed the team to better understand how to treat common limitations associated with stroke patients. “On a personal level,” she adds, “the challenge of navigating a new region and communicating almost exclusively in French was a new opportunity for me. It was a critical step in my development, as I was able to more fully understand the many barriers that often stand between people.” With the experience and knowledge she cultivated during the Salisbury Internship Award, Triplett went on to conduct clinical neuroscience research at the University of Rochester for her undergraduate Honors thesis, “which led to my acceptance into the Clinical Scientist Training Program (and more clinical neuroscience research) at the University of Pittsburgh,” she says. As a medical student at the University of Pittsburgh, Triplett also earned a masters in Clinical Research, with her research earning funding from the National Institute of Mental Health and the Child Neurology Society. In 2015, she was presented with the Michael J. Painter Award for Excellence in Child Neurology. Since earning her degrees from Pittsburgh in 2015, Triplett has started her medical residency in a combined Child Neurology program at St. Louis Children’s Hospital, part of Washington University in St. Louis, a major center for clinical neuroscience research. There, she is training as a pediatrics resident for two years, followed by further training in neurology for three more years. At the end of this combined training program, Triplett will be board-certified in pediatrics and neurology and able to practice independently, though she anticipates returning to research and clinical training. n

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Graduate work M.D. and M.S. in Clinical Research, University of Pittsburgh

Through the depth of the professional development offered at the Salisbury Center, students enter into a network of career counselors, alums and employers ready to help them prepare for their futures. The HWS Career Network includes more than 5,000 alums and parents of students and graduates, eager to offer career advice, mentorship or job leads to students.


In 2005, Hobart and William Smith students participated in 70 internships. During the summer of 2015, they participated in more than 600.

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“I’d like to think that I will be a better physician, scientist and human being as a result of what I learned in both Genevas.” —REGINA TRIPLETT ’10

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PHOTO BY BILL SAWALICH, BARLOW PRODUCTIONS

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TEN YEARS C R E AT I N G FUTURES

TOM LULY ’12 Current Position Program Coordinator for the Skoltech Initiative, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Cambridge, Mass.

“Looking back from where I am now, I can draw a linear path that starts with the Salisbury Award.”

LISA PHILLIPONE LIPINSKI ’11 Current Position Donor Specialist, Biomedical Division of the American Red Cross

“I owe the path I am on now to the Salisbury International Internship Program and am thankful I was provided the opportunity to discover the right direction for me.” 2010 Salisbury Summer International Internship Mansukh Organic Farm in Rajasthan, India Graduate Work Masters from the Global Health Institute, Duke University

WENDI BACON ’12 Current Position Post-doc in Hematology, Cambridge University; Cambridge England

“HWS inspired me to be an entire person, not just a scientist, and I believe I will spend my life chasing that idea of having a positive impact on the world, leaving it a better place than I found it.” 2011 Salisbury Summer International Internship Cambridge Institute of Medical Research, Department of Hematology in Cambridge, England Graduate Work Ph.D. in Hematology, Marshall Scholar, Cambridge University

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2011 Salisbury Summer International Internship Carnegie Moscow Center in Moscow, Russia


KATHRYN MIDDLETON ’14 Current Position Software Developer, Markit; New York, New York

MOLLY KRIFKA ’13 Current Position Teacher, El Instituto Cultural Perano Norte Americano; Quitos, Peru

ROSEMARY SCHEIBEL ’12 Current Position Site Director, Mark and Kathryn Ford Family Foundation, FunLimón; Tola, Nicaragua

“If not for the Salisbury stipend, I would not be here in Nicaragua doing what I love. During my summer internship abroad, I was able to realize my passion and transform it into a career.” 2011 Salisbury Summer International Internship Foundation for Sustainable Development; Tola, Nicaragua

“My Salisbury internship experience reinforced my identity as an anthropologist and as a musician, and it reinforced my love for language. Mr. Salisbury wants to give the award to individuals who will have an experience that funnels into the rest of their lives. It’s really rung true for me.” 2012 Salisbury Summer International Internship El Instituto Taki Museum in Ecuador and Peru

ANNIE MANDART ’14 Current Position Education Associate, WNED I WBFO; Buffalo, N.Y.

“My time at William Smith College and the Salisbury Award changed me—entirely. It taught me to affect change by questioning and to influence minds through education.”

“The Salisbury taught me how important communication is in a workplace, especially on a global scale. When working on the same team but in three different continents, communication is key to enhance transparency.” 2013 Salisbury Summer International Internship Markit in London, England and in Noida and New Delhi, India

2013 Salisbury Summer International Internship Chegg and Zinch in California and Beijing City, China; Ad2Pro; Chennai, India Graduate Work Masters candidate in Public Administration, Penn State

Graduate Work Masters candidate in Sustainable Peace in the Contemporary World, University For Peace in Ciudad Colón, Costa Rica

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“The Salisbury Award is probably the most important thing on my résumé… .When you can show you’re on your own, working and navigating a foreign country for three months, it proves you’re up to the challenge.”

PHOTO BY KEVIN COLTON

—DANIEL ORGAN ’11

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DANIEL ORGAN ’11 Current Position Commercial Real Estate Adviser, Cushman & Wakefield; New York, N.Y. 2009 Salisbury Summer International Internship Equity Group Investments in Sao Paulo and Rio De Janeiro, Brazil

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t Equity Group Investments, Daniel Organ ’11 spent a summer examining real estate related to Brazil’s emerging middle class. With two commercial real estate internships already under his belt, Organ trained in Chicago, Ill., before heading to Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, “excited to take my interest in real estate to the international level and get a different perspective on the way the market functions worldwide,” says Organ. While in Brazil, supported by the Salisbury Award, Organ met with management teams of different sectors of the real estate market to review their real estate portfolios, ascertain how each individual company would benefit from the emerging middle class and visit six major Brazilian cities to understand each company’s assets. That experience, he says, prepared him for his current role at Cushman & Wakefield, the largest private real estate services firm in the world. At the company’s main office in New York, Organ assists corporations with their real estate endeavors, specifically working with companies with an office presence in Manhattan. For Organ, building relationships with clients, getting to know new businesses, and bringing in new business is a big thrill. But with approximately 400 million square feet of office space in Manhattan, he says, “There’s a steep learning curve, and you have to take it upon yourself to get to know the market. You have to go out there and develop business, meet with CEOs and CFOs, people who understand business and the economy and how it ties into their real estate. Then you have to service the business you’ve developed.” The requisite skills and confidence for this role Organ attributes to his HWS education and the Salisbury experience in particular. “The Salisbury Award is probably the most important thing on my résumé pertaining to real estate,” he says. “Having that background and that understanding coming out of college addresses a big concern that I think Cushman & Wakefield has when hiring new people: Can this kid work in the real world and be independent to become an integral part of this company? When you can show you’re on your own, working and navigating a foreign country for three months, it proves you’re up to the challenge.” n

HELPING STUDENTS E X P LO R E CAREERS A N D F U L F I L L D R E A M S PROFESSIONALS

In Residence

Throughout the academic year, alums, parents of students and other professionals come to campus to talk about their career path, what it takes to succeed and challenges in their industries. They share their experiences as CEOs, physicians, lawyers, entrepreneurs, artists and more. These Professionals in Residence typically speak at a session open to all students in the evening. The next day, students can meet with them individually, making connections that can lead to internships or job offers.

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Since the Salisbury Center’s founding, HWS students have been selected for some of the most competitive and prestigious postgraduate fellowships and scholarships in the nation, including the Marshall, Fulbright, Rangel and Goldwater. These kinds of fellowships not only support students’ graduate study, but offer one-of-a-kind opportunities that encourage students to turn passion into action.

Collaborating with internal and external partners to facilitate the comprehensive career development process, the Colleges recently announced a groundbreaking guaranteed internship program through the Salisbury Center. Students of good academic and social standing who successfully complete the Pathways Program are guaranteed at least one internship or research opportunity. For those opportunities that are unpaid, the Colleges offer a stipend to offset costs.

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TEN YEARS C R E AT I N G FUTURES KELLY HALEY ’15 Current Position Masters candidate in Architecture and Historic Preservation, School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation, University of Maryland; College Park, Md.

SAM WILLIAMS ’15 Current Position Field Technician, Fruition Sciences; Oakland, Calif.

“Being able to understand and navigate another culture competently in a professional setting is an invaluable skill; employers and graduate admissions counselors are looking for that. It’s a great way to distinguish yourself in the field.” 2013 Salisbury Summer International Internship Department of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology, Stockholm University in Stockholm, Sweden and Samorina, Greece

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“Many graduate professors who had seen my resume constantly asked about my internships abroad and remarked that it made me, as a candidate, stand out.” 2014 Salisbury Summer International Internship National Churches Trust and American Institute of Roman Culture in London, England and Rome, Italy

MEGAN SOULE ’15 Current Position Masters candidate in International Relations and Public Relations, S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University; Syracuse, N.Y.

“Thanks to the Salisbury internship I knew I wanted to find a graduate program that focused on education policy with a strong international focus.” 2014 Salisbury Summer International Internship Reading and Writing for Critical Thinking International Consortium in Cluj, Romania


CAITLIN PETTY ’16 Current Position Double-major in art history and studio art; minor in European studies in antiquity, Hobart and William Smith Colleges

TALIA AZOUR ’16 Current Position Double-major in international relations and sociology, Hobart and William Smith Colleges

KYLE ZAVERTON ’15 Current Position Financial Rotation Program, TE Connectivity; Harrisburg, Pa. and Winston-Salem, N.C.

“The two biggest takeaways from my Salisbury experience were confidence and an interest in continuing to work internationally. I had never been abroad before this opportunity and I was definitely nervous to leave the country, but thanks to the positive experience I had, I know that I have the ability to respond to challenges that will arise in the future.”

“My preparation for a global career in marketing was made possible through the skillset I acquired this summer. Only with the financial assistance of the Salisbury Award was I able to conquer my dream internship with IPG Mediabrands.” 2015 Salisbury Summer International Internship IPG Mediabrands in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

“My ultimate goal is to earn a Ph.D. and become a professor so that I may share my passion for art and culture with students. Hobart and William Smith Colleges and Mr. Salisbury have afforded me an inestimable gift. This opportunity has already changed my life.” 2015 Salisbury Summer International Internship Medici Archives Project in Florence, Italy

JOHN (JACK) SLATTERY ’16 Current Position Major in public policy with a concentration in foreign policy; minor in English, Hobart and William Smith Colleges

“I find the hospitality and beverage industry very intriguing. From wineries in the Finger Lakes to breweries in Brooklyn and Stockholm, there’s a lot of potential in this business. The Salisbury internship has catapulted me into the craft beer industry.” 2015 Salisbury Summer International Internship New Carnegie Brewery in Stockholm, Sweden

2014 Salisbury Summer International Internship Markit in Singapore and London, England

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RAPHAEL DURAND ’13 Current Position Inbound Marketing Specialist, Groovice; San Francisco, Calif. 2012 Salisbury Summer International Internship DFS Group, Ltd., in Hong Kong, Singapore and Bali

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s a Salisbury Award recipient, Raphael Durand ’13 traveled from Hong Kong to Macau to Singapore to New York and, finally, to Bali. During his internship with the luxury retailer DFS, Durand says, “the biggest thing for me was seeing how a corporation functions. It was my first proper internship. Before that, I didn’t know how businesses operated and I didn’t know my options after graduation. The Salisbury experience gave me that ability to look at an organization, look at its different departments, and understand from one business model what the different components were.” After graduation, Durand moved back to Hong Kong to work for DFS, conducting market research and redesigning a department store with the creative director before transitioning to the company’s marketing team, where he worked closely with the senior vice president of consumer marketing. “Getting that international exposure was so valuable,” he says. “I have since brought the knowledge of how brands perceive themselves back to the Bay Area, and that has been directly helpful in terms of what I’m doing now: creating a new brand and image relevant to our startup as well as the market we’re trying to break into.” Durand is currently working in Menlo Park, Calif., for a small startup company, Groovice, a marketplace for homeowners to group home maintenance tasks together. “Right now, we’re still building the product,” says Durand, who wears many hats at the startup but is primarily responsible for managing inbound marketing and sales efforts. Durand was previously Manager of Partner Programs at PurePharma in San Francisco, where he designed social media marketing and within six months was leading the inside marketing division, organizing sales strategies in the U.S. sales division for the health supplement company. He traces his preparation for these roles back to the Salisbury Award, when he was first able to travel, observe customer behavior, and make qualitative observations that he could then compare to the quantitative analysis of what products were selling. “The Salisbury experience gave me huge exposure to market research; not just to data but to the customer experience and how those relationships mix,” he says. “Mr. Salisbury’s trust that I would have a valuable experience no matter what and that I could pursue my dreams with no strings attached launched me into this unknown world. Having the flexibility to say, I’m not on a mission, I’m just here to learn, was a great way to take on this adventure.” n

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HELPING STUDENTS E X P LO R E CAREERS A N D F U L F I L L D R E A M S

“The Salisbury experience gave me huge exposure to market research; not just to data but to the customer experience and how those relationships mix.”

In preparing students for their futures, the Salisbury Center staff helps students cultivate the necessary tools to compete not only for the most prestigious fellowship and career placements, but graduate school positions as well. Within a year of commencement, about half of HWS students go on to graduate study; within five years, nearly 70 percent do.

– RAPHAEL DURAND ’13

be h i n d th e scen es

PHOTO BY KEVIN COLTON

From Wall Street to Hollywood to Capitol Hill and beyond, the Salisbury Center facilitates opportunities each year to take HWS students behind the scenes at film studios, financial trading floors, nonprofits and more. Through these group trips – as well as one-onone informational interviews and job-shadowing – during winter and spring breaks, hundreds of students connect with nearly as many alums and parents as they pursue their dream careers.

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“The skills I learned in South Africa have helped me become a better teacher and leader in the education reform movement.”

PHOTO BY KEVIN COLTON

- BRIANNE ELLIS ’13

Graduate Work Masters in Education and Social Change, University of Miami

BRIANNE ELLIS ’13 Current Position Associate Director of Admissions, Hobart and William Smith Colleges 2012 Salisbury Summer International Internship Coca-Cola Africa Foundation in Johannesburg, South Africa

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he Salisbury experience taught me how to grow up, live by myself and navigate a new place,” says Brianne Ellis ’13, who worked as a liaison intern for the Coca-Cola Africa Foundation in collaboration with the Global Environment and Technology Foundation (GETF). With headquarters in Washington, D.C., the GETF implements safe water, sanitation and hygiene programs, and infrastructures around the world. Through the GETF in South

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Africa, Ellis managed and supported initiatives for ongoing programs at the Coca-Cola Africa Foundation, which focuses its efforts in four key areas: water, health, education and entrepreneurship. “I had never been to Africa and had to quickly learn a new culture, geography and language,” Ellis says. When she moved to Miami after graduating from William Smith to begin a position as a kindergarten teacher with Teach for America, she felt prepared and “able to adapt to Miami because I had that experience. Working for Coca-Cola Africa Foundation, I learned how to manage multiple tasks and how to accomplish them in a timely and efficient manner. There’s lots going on in kindergarten, but I felt prepared with the skills and competencies to reach my students.” While Ellis explains there was a “huge learning curve” when she began at Miami’s Van E. Blanton Elementary School, she began to see in the subsequent months “great growth – from my students and myself.”

Previously, Ellis had interned with the Hope for Honduran Children Foundation in Honduras, where with the support of the Centennial Leadership Fellowship, she worked with students to develop leadership skills and taught lessons on civic engagement, advocacy, self-worth, confidence and sustainable living. This interest in social justice through education is what led her to Teach for America. During her time with the national non-profit, she began a master’s program in education and social change at the University of Miami. Now, having finished her degree, she recently accepted a new job as Associate Director of Admissions at Hobart and William Smith. Ellis says she was excited to work at a non-profit and fell in love working for CocaCola Africa Foundation. “I am now helping students everyday to have the same transformative experiences I had.” n


HELPING STUDENTS E X P LO R E CAREERS A N D F U L F I L L D R E A M S he student demand for career assistance has grown dramatically in the past decade and a strong career office is often a deciding factor for prospective students and their families when making college decisions. The Pathways Program at HWS – unique in higher education for its developmental approach and its outstanding outcomes – encourages students as early as their first semester on campus to explore how their education can translate into a career. Supporting these efforts is a team of 11 professionals, each one with expertise in career counseling, preprofessional development, fellowship advising, and the growth of internship and job opportunities in a variety of fields from business and technology to government and human services. During the fall 2015 semester alone, the staff at The Salisbury Center for Career, Professional and Experiential Education had individual appointments with 1,035 students (about 45 percent of the student body) and partnered with faculty and staff from across campus to facilitate dozens of career planning workshops, seminars and professional networking events. The results of this kind of effort are impressive: during the summer of 2015, HWS students participated in more than 600 internships, up from 70 a decade ago. To volunteer to assist students through the Salisbury Center, contact: Brandi Ferrara Director of the Salisbury Center for Career, Professional and Experiential Education (315) 781-3514 cso@hws.edu To see who in your region is already assisting with career advising, head to the National Regional Network at www.hws.edu/alumni/regional.

PHOTO BY KEVIN COLTON

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The staff of the Salisbury Center for Career, Professional and Experiential Education: Front row (l-r) Jacki Baroody, career services administrator; Ami Cammarota Ford ’00, assistant director of employer development; Erin Brockway, assistant director and pre-law adviser and R.J. Rapoza, assistant director. Back row (l-r) Brandi Ferrara, director; Scott MacPhail, Ph.D., associate director of health professions counseling and fellowship advising; Jackie Doyle P’14, P’19, associate director and Lindsay McGloon, assistant director. Not pictured is Emily Rogowski ’12.

“In this competitive market, internships are critical. To be considered for the best jobs and graduate school opportunities, students must have excellent academic credentials paired with notable internship or research experience.   Our ability to secure promising internships and job opportunities for students directly correlates to our success in attracting and retaining the best prospective students.” ­ BOB MURPHY, VICE PRESIDENT FOR ENROLLMENT AND ADMISSIONS; — DEAN OF THE SALISBURY CENTER FOR CAREER, PROFESSIONAL AND EXPERIENTIAL EDUCATION

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Alumni and Alumnae News Davis ’48 Receives Trustee Community Service Award

STAY UP-TO-DATE!

by Steven Bodnar

PHOTO BY JARED WEEDEN ’91

For up-to-date information on events or to RSVP for an event, visit www.hws.edu/regional or call Alumni House toll free at (877) 497–4438.

for the physical renovation of the space, Davis established The Davis Endowment for Support of the Visual Arts that enables HWS to host important exhibitions on campus and provide necessary funding to develop resources that complement the exhibitions and enhance their educational value.   “The opportunity to bring four professional quality exhibitions to campus each year, to mount two campus-related shows and to allow students to learn gallery and museum skills working in such a great environment has had a significant impact on the arts culture on campus,” says Kathryn Vaughn P’08, the Colleges’ visual arts curator.   After spending a year with the Clarence “Dave” Davis Jr. ’48 is presented the Community Service Award by U.S. Navy, Davis came to Hobart President Mark D. Gearan. College as part of the V-12 program. At Hobart, he earned a t the annual HWS Buffalo summer B.S. in chemistry and economics gathering, alums, parents, friends and before going on to receive an advanced degree in incoming students gathered to honor plant pathology from Cornell University in 1950. Clarence “Dave” Davis Jr. ’48 with the Hobart Following a stint working for large nurseries and William Smith Colleges Trustee Community in Westchester County, Davis returned to Buffalo Service Award. where he opened two garden centers. He donated “The dedication Dave Davis has shown, one property to the Colleges in 2013 and still owns particularly in support of students and the arts and actively manages the larger nursery and garden at his alma mater and in his local community, center. As a long-time resident and businessman, embodies the values of service we champion at Davis is an enthusiastic supporter of his community Hobart and William Smith,” says HWS President and is a particularly strong advocate for his church, Mark D. Gearan. the Albright-Knox Museum, the Buffalo Philharmonic In 2009, the HWS Board of Trustees and the Buffalo Center for the Arts. founded the Trustee Community Service Award A tireless advocate for young people, Davis has to honor and celebrate alumni, alumnae, parents spent countless dollars, time and energy in support and friends of the Colleges who lead lives of of amateur athletics. His first love is track and field consequence and who serve as an example and he founded the Garden Town Track Club in 1954, to all. The Award is given to members of the which continued as the Niagara Frontier Track Club HWS community who have demonstrated until 1989. For more than 50 years, he has been an extraordinary and sustained volunteer involved with the Niagara Association of Amateur commitment in serving their communities – Athletic Union and served as its president from 1974 local, regional, national and international. to 1976 and 1988 to 2013. The gifts Davis has given to the Colleges Davis’ service has been recognized nationally. have been instrumental in enhancing the He is the recipient of the Chevron National visual arts on campus. He funded a significant Community Service Award, the Don Kavadas renovation to the Colleges’ gallery space in Memorial Award for longstanding commitment to Houghton House in 2009 which led to the the betterment of athletics, and the AAU Veterans dedication of the space as the Clarence “Dave” Gold & Silver Awards as well as the AAU Life Davis Jr. ’48 Gallery. In addition to providing Membership Award. ●

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Regional Events

Connect with alums in your region! Visit www.hws.edu/regional for upcoming event information.

Dan Gadigian ’11, Lianne Andreoni Paolino ’81, P’14, Jackie Paolino ’14, Sarah Amundson ’11 and Matt Sousa ’10 pose for a photo during the Newport Summer Gathering hosted by Philip H. Fett Jr. ’82, Beth Tatian Fradin ’82 and Lianne Andreoni Paolino ’81, P’14. James F. ’56, L.H.D.’12 and Cynthia L. Caird, L.H.D.’12 (center, top row) visited Kappa Sigma this Fall while on campus for a football game. Jim Caird is a Kappa Sigma brother.

Led by Professor of Religious Studies Michael Dobkowski and his wife Karen, alums had a memorable opportunity to visit Germany and Poland on the “HWS March for David Belfort ’92 and Sarah Amundson ’11 speak to alums during the Spring Remembrance and Hope” trip. The group toured important landmarks and historical Professional Networking event in Boston, Mass., hosted by Steve Decatur, Jr. ’79, P’15. sites central to understanding the Nazi period, World War II and the Holocaust.

Donny Morrison ’07, Katherine Fell ’12, HWS Trustee Herbert J. McCooey, Jr. ’76, P’04, P’09, Dee McCooey Lentz ’92, Jessica Kulesa Vesonder ’04 and Matt Vesonder ’07 pose for a photo during the Westhampton Summer Gathering hosted by Trustees Tom Poole ’61, P’91, L.H.D. ’06 and Bert McCooey.

Alex Hamilton ’81, HWS Trustee “J.B.” Robinson ’96 and Jean Ann Linney ’72 attend the Philadelphia Summer Gathering at the Aronimink Golf Club in Newton Square, Pa. The event was hosted by Chris Chimicles ’98 and his wife Kate.

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Regional Events

Connect with alums in your region! Visit www.hws.edu/regional for upcoming event information.

Alums and their families enjoy the HWS Day at the Yankees event at Yankees Stadium.

Former Hobart lacrosse players gather at the U.S. Lacrosse Greater Rochester Hall of Fame for Terry Corcoran’s ’78 induction in November. Pictured from left to right are Tom Schardt ’78, Kevin Martin ’87, P’12, Coach Jack McDonald ’64, Tom Marino ’77, B.J. O’Hara ’75, Terry Corcoran ’78, Tom Rosa ’86, Bootie Gringeri ’77, Jack Davis ’78, Joe Corcoran ’79, Ed Cooney ’80, Howie Mulcahey ’78 and Tom Korn ’75.

Alums and their families attend a reception with President Mark D. Gearan and Mary Herlihy Gearan hosted by Trustee Chris ’84 and Rene Whitney ’83 Welles P’12, P’15 in Beverly Farms, Mass.

Heidi Brown McCready ’81, Garth Gibson P’16, Patrick Plunkett ’81, John Collins ’68 and Zoe Jackson-Gibson ’16 pose for a photo during the annual HWS Buffalo Summer Gathering at the Saturn Club in Buffalo, N.Y. The event was hosted by Tom and Kathleen O’Brien P’13, P’14, P’18 and Kristin Augenblick ’12.

Alums joined Assistant Director of William Smith Athletics and Head Coach of Field Hockey Sally Scatton P’02, P’06, (fourth from left) for a reception hosted by Chris Jenco ’10 (third from left) and Lynne Friedlander ’80, P’10 (right) at Jenco Brothers’ Candy in Cincinnati, Ohio.

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Alums and their families enjoy the annual HWS Day at the Races in Saratoga, N.Y. Refreshments were provided by Cornelius “Neil” Evans ’67 and the C.H. Evans Brewing Co.

Alums and incoming students from the Classes of 2019 joined hosts Mitch and Jeanne Cook P’18 and their daughter Merritt ’18 for a reception at the Wayzata Country Club in Wayzata, Minn.

Alums, parents and incoming first-year students gather at the home of Mark Gray ’86, P’19 and Karen Carpenter Gray ’88, P’19 for the Denver, Colo., Summer Send-Off.

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Here’s a look at 24 Hours with Thomas Odelfelt:

Hours with

Thomas Odelfelt ’93

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homas Odelfelt ’93, director of production and live events for HBO Sports, moved from Sweden to Greenwich, Conn., at age 14. He earned a B.A. in Individual Studies from Hobart College and started his career with HBO just after graduating in 1993. Before working on the cable network’s sports mini-series, Odelfelt spent 10 years producing live fights. He was in South Africa in 2001 when heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis got knocked out by underdog Hasim Rahman, and followed Oscar De La Hoya to the top of his career. Odelfelt has earned two consecutive Sports Emmys in the Outstanding Edited Specials category—a 2010 award for a four-episode documentary series, “24/7 Penguins/Capitals: Road to the NHL Winter Classic,” and a 2009 award for a program that followed boxers Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Juan Manuel Marquez before a 2009 fight in Las Vegas. Colleges’ photographer Andrew Markham ’10 was by Odelfelt’s side when he produced a live, action-packed boxing card featuring Top-10 contenders Glen “Jersey Boy” Tapia and “Irish” Seanie Monaghan for truTV® on Friday, May 8 from Prudential Center in Newark, N.J. ●

Meeting with the on camera talent for truTV®’s live, action-packed boxing card featuring Top 10 contenders Glen “Jersey Boy” Tapia and “Irish” Seanie Monaghan. The walk through happened the day before the main event at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J.

Conducting pre-fight interviews with one-time world title challenger Michel Soro of France for on-air talking points.

PHOTOS BY ANDREW MARKHAM ’10

Interviewing Seanie Monaghan, the undefeated World Boxing Council Continental light heavyweight champion for talking points for the on-camera talent.

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ALUMNI & ALUMNAE

A pre-fight walk through of the venue with members of the production team.

Preparing for live TV in the production truck just outside the Prudential Center.

The lighting test and pre-recording review of the evening’s flow.

The Prudential Center just hours before live production.

By the Numbers

Languages Odelfelt speaks (English, French and Swedish)

4 12 Sports Emmys

Screens Odelfelt monitors simultaneously while producing a fight

24/7

While working on HBO’s 24/7 series featuring the Floyd Mayweather vs. Manuel Marquez fight, Odelfelt and his staff spent three weeks working from 10 a.m. to 3 a.m. each day.

30: Workers in his production crew for one fight

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Locations Odelfelt travels throughout the year for production

Flight hours Odelfelt logs in a typical year

200: Boxing rings Odelfelt has visited throughout his career

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of years ½ Number Odelfelt has worked for HBO

Boxing rounds produced during his career

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Join Alumni, Alumnae and Parents for:

Hidden Ireland: The History and Culture of the West of Ireland April 7 - 17, 2016 (9 nights and 10 days) TOUR LEADERS Professor Emeritus of Economics Pat McGuire L.H.D. ’12 and his wife Sandy have a special relationship with Ireland. They spent two semesters in Galway, Ireland while Pat was leading the HWS off-campus program at the National University of Ireland at Galway, and have visited many times since then. Since 2012, they have led three alumni/ae and parent trips to the country, offering unique insight and access to places and people off the tourist trail. Pat and Sandy believe in the transformative impact of off-campus programs for students and hope to provide alums and parents with similar enlightening experiences in Ireland. TRIP OVERVIEW There are many ways Ireland has been described including: a land of saints and scholars, poets and playwrights, of happy wars and sad love songs, and, more recently, the Celtic Tiger. Join us to create your own description of this beautiful and friendly island. We will focus on the West of Ireland, where you can still see and feel Ireland’s long, complex and sometimes tragic history. We will introduce you to the Ireland that we love so much — the sea and coastline, the rolling hills, pre-Christian sites, monastic settlements, the pubs and, most of all, the people of Ireland that you will meet along the way. We will visit cities and small towns, and you will have plenty of time to be on your own in the shops and in the pubs. You will learn about the history, the archeology, the language and the culture of Ireland from friends and colleagues whom we have met during our two off-campus Irish Studies Programs in Galway. We will walk and talk, rain or shine, uphill and down as we attempt to show you the Ireland of legend, song and poetry. We will see and feel the Ireland of the past, the present and perhaps the future. TRIP DETAILS Cost: $2100 per person for double occupancy and $2295 per person for single occupancy. Limited to 25 people on a first-come-first-served basis.

WHAT IS INCLUDED: • Hotel accommodations for nine nights at quality hotels located in the center of Galway, Westport, Sligo, Derry and Donegal. • Breakfast each morning • Lunch on the day of arrival • Four group dinners on nights 1, 6, 7 and 9 – all other dinners are on your own • Transfers to and from Shannon airport with the group • All tours, guides and transport as indicated in the itinerary • All entrance fees for site visits including the fare to and from the Aran Islands For more information and to secure your reservation, go to www.hws.edu/alumni/Ireland, or contact Kathy Killius Regan ’82, P’09 in the Office of Advancement at regan@hws.edu or (315) 781-3700.

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Plans are now forming for a January 2017 tour of Vietnam with Professor of Anthropology and Sociology Jack Harris P’02, P’06. Details will be announced in the HWS e-Newsletter.


ALUMNI & ALUMNAE

REUNION IS FOR EVERYONE! Special events are being planned for Classes ending in 1 or 6, but all alums in all classes are invited to attend with their friends and family.

June 3-5, 2016

hws.edu/reunion Hobart and William Smith are throwing a huge party this June. And you’re invited! Visit hws.edu/reunion for up-to-the-minute details about Reunion 2016 and… See Who’s Coming Back. Wondering if your first-year roommate is planning to return? The Reunion site includes a list of classmates who’ve indicated they intend to return in June. Planning to attend yourself? Add your name to the list so your friends know to expect you!

Plan Your Weekend. There are dozens of activities planned. Take an educational excursion aboard the William Scandling research vessel, head back to class with a favorite professor, enjoy wine and beer tastings on the Quad, or take a stroll with friends along Seneca Lake. Discover all of the opportunities online.

Reconnect with Classmates. If you’re on Facebook but haven’t connected with Hobart and William Smith, now’s the time! The site includes links to the Classes’ Facebook pages for alums in Classes ending in 1 or 6, so you can start the conversation today.

Get Involved. Consider getting involved with your Classes’ Reunion Committee (get classmates back to campus for Reunion and/or help raise funds for your Classes’ Reunion gift). An HWS liaison will connect you with your fellow classmates and give you everything you need to be an advocate for the best Reunion ever.

View Photos from Previous Reunions. If you haven’t been back to campus in a few years or aren’t sure what to expect, check out photos, videos and stories from previous Reunion weekends. And if you’re still not sure, check out the Frequently Asked Questions, which will quash any uncertainties.

Book Your Lodging. For your convenience, the Reunion website includes a listing of area hotels and inns. Or you can stay in one of our residence halls. We “house” Classes together so it’s a fun way to reconnect with college life.

This spring, Alumni House will activate the online registration form. (Notification will be sent to all alums for whom we have current email addresses.) If you wish to register via postal mail, please call Rebecca Frank at (315) 781-3772, and she’ll ensure a form is sent your way.

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HWS Reflects on 70th Anniversary of WWII by Avery Share ’15 and Stephanie Kenific ’17

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n commemoration of the 70th anniversary of World War II, the Colleges paused to reflect on the changes that transformed the nation and campus during the war years. Like colleges and universities across the country, Hobart and William Smith was invested in supporting the war efforts nationally and abroad. In 1943, then President of the Colleges John Milton Potter launched the Navy V-12 training program, bringing an influx of young naval officers to the Colleges at a time when enrollment was hovering just below 30 students. A unique training opportunity, the V-12 unit members attended classes with HWS students and worked toward a bachelor’s degree, all while training to enter the war. From 1943 until the end of the war in 1945, it was common to witness the unit of naval officers assembling and marching across the Quad as they reported to Coxe Hall for their daily inspections and training. Even after it ended, the war had lasting effects on campus as the G.I. Bill brought in hundreds of veterans seeking a higher education. Warren Shaddock ’46, P ’75, GP ’09 was a senior at Brighton High School in Rochester, N.Y., when the attack on Pearl Harbor occurred on Dec. 7, 1941. Preparing to attend Hobart as a pre-med/pre-dental student, Shaddock’s plans changed course when the Navy V-12 program

was established in the spring of his first year at the Colleges. Aside from taking three semesters worth of courses and reporting for inspection in front of Coxe Hall each morning, Shaddock remembers being marched down to the YMCA where they learned how to “abandon ship” by jumping off the high tower into the pool. From Hobart, Shaddock was sent to midshipman school at Columbia University, and then to Harvard University for communications school, where he was trained to use a top secret electronic coding machine. Aboard USS Calvert APA-32, Shaddock was commissioned to Pearl Harbor and later sent to occupy Japan. “We were anchored about seven miles from Hiroshima so out of curiosity a group of us took one of our landing crafts over to see it,” Shaddock remembers. “I believe we were some of the first Americans to see what it looked like after the dropping of the bomb. It was just miles and miles of utter destruction. We found stacks of dishes that had been fused together by the heat of the bomb, and gravel that had been fused to a porcelain pitcher.” After leaving Japan, Shaddock received orders to return to Pearl Harbor at the command post of the amphibious forces until he had enough points to return to civilian life. He returned to Hobart, completing a final semester to earn his B.S. in biology and chemistry before

Warren Shaddock ’46, P ’75, GP ’09

Mary Louise Walworth Koch ’48

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heading to University of Buffalo School of Dentistry. Shaddock, who was previously married to the late Gloris M. Shaddock ’49, practiced dentistry for 42 years in Fairport, N.Y., where he still resides with his wife, Marlene Shaddock. Kenneth Barden ’47 planned to attend a big university and “travel the world,” but his plans changed when he enrolled in the Navy V-12 Program and was assigned to Hobart College, just minutes from his home in Penn Yan, N.Y. Like Shaddock, Barden remembers the “rigorous exercises” and classes, describing his time in the V-12 program as a “stark contrast” to the ordinary college experience. From Hobart, Barden was sent to midshipman school on Lake Champlain in Plattsburgh, N.Y., and was then transferred to Florida, where he learned how to drive landing crafts. In December 1944, Barden was sent with the Navy to Japan for the Battle of Okinawa. In charge of seven landing crafts with Marines on board, Barden was part of the initial landing in Okinawa on Easter Sunday in April, 1945. It was while preparing for battle that Barden experienced what he calls his “15 minutes of fame.” His story was recently featured in his local newspaper, the Vallejo Times Herald. “Ernie Pyle, famed international war correspondent, came aboard my ship, APA-28, the Charles Carroll, for the invasion,” he said in the Times Herald article. “He rode in my landing craft from the time of departure to the line of transfer. Anchored, I was junior officer of the deck on the quarter deck, when a boat pulled up alongside. Clambering aboard came a tiny, wizened, jockey-sized man. It was Ernie Pyle, who had come aboard for the invasion.” After returning from battle, Barden resumed his studies at Hobart and received his B.A. in history. He and his family moved to Concord, Calif., where he served as a teacher and later school administrator until his retirement in 1983. He currently resides in Vallejo, Calif., where he continues to share stories of his war experience with community members.


ALUMNI & ALUMNAE

Mary Louise Walworth Koch ’48 remembers most vividly the war years as one of the few times in the history of the Colleges that the traditions of Hobart and William Smith were broken. “I remember hanging out an upstairs window at the Sigma Chi house watching the young V-12s march up Main Street for their early morning drill,” she reflects. “There was a girl in every window. Why were girls in the Sigma Chi house? Because the V-12 had come to Hobart and needed large housing, so they commandeered the girls’ dorms and the girls dispersed to smaller housing like the fraternities.” While Koch remembers the “hundreds of young men in their uniforms” preparing to serve their country, she also went on to lead a life of service that began during her time as a William Smith student. A three-sport athlete, Koch was a member of the field hockey, tennis and swimming teams, as well as a member of the Canterbury Club, the Herald, Schola Cantorum and the Big Sister Committee. After graduating from William Smith, she received a master’s degree in American and British literature from Northwestern University and became an English teacher in the Rochester City School district.

After graduating from the V-12 program, Geering attended midshipman school in Chicago, and was then stationed in the Pacific Ocean on a tanker ship, the USS Gazelle, which refueled U.S. battleships in the Pacific Theater. In many ways, he calls his service “the best part” of his life. Geering went on to lead a career at Occidental Chemical for 39 years before retirement.

Emil Geering ’44 began his studies at Manhattan College but almost immediately enlisted in the V-12 program and was assigned to report to Hobart College for his training. While preparing to serve his country, Geering worked toward his B.A. in chemistry. The academic component of the program was of particular importance to Geering, who went on to receive his M.A. and Ph.D. from Polytechnic Institute of New York University in Brooklyn after returning from service. “Many of my classmates were very enthusiastic and patriotic, so we volunteered for the Navy V-12 unit,” he remembers. “It was the best option of all our possibilities, because we could continue our college education as well as serve our country. To the professors we could just be typical college students, but of course we weren’t. We knew they were all very supportive of us and very patriotic.”

Grady Jensen ’44, P ’83, L.H.D. ’04, a former HWS Trustee, graduated before the V-12 program was launched on campus, but remembers well the atmosphere at Hobart and William Smith as the U.S. prepared to enter battle. “I remember very specifically when Pearl Harbor happened on December 7,” he says. “I was in the Kappa Sigma Fraternity House, and a bunch of us were sitting around, and that Sunday afternoon when the news came on over the radio about Pearl Harbor we all just couldn’t believe it. They announced that President Roosevelt was going to speak the next morning, so we all crowded around in one of the lounges and listened to him calling for the vote to go to war. I wrote down in a journal that I could ‘feel the hairs on the back of my head standing up’ because we all knew sooner or later we were going to get called into war ourselves.” On campus, he says, the whole “Geneva scene” was a very “interesting and stimulating one.” He remembers the war being on everyone’s mind visually, as well as helping to dig ditches with fellow classmates at Sampson Naval Base when it was being constructed across the lake. Jensen graduated from Hobart in three years and joined the Navy Aviation cadet training program. Though never called into active duty, Jensen remained active in the Naval Reserve and even once flew a torpedo bomber to visit the Colleges, a trip that got him featured in a Finger Lakes Times editorial for his “dangerous” travels. Jensen attended Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and went on to have a career that spanned nearly 50 years as he worked for Chase Manhattan, American Express, The Harwood Companies, New York University and Columbia University, retiring in 1996 as executive director of senior personnel employment.

Grady Jensen ’44, P ’83, L.H.D. ’04

Dr. Sheldon Feinberg ’50

Dr. Sheldon Feinberg ’50, attended Hobart just after the end of WWII when the Colleges’ enrollment surged due to the G.I. Bill. Although not a veteran himself, Feinberg describes that while on campus, he was surrounded by American “heroes,” referring to the many WWII veterans that were his classmates. “These men were like big brothers to me... And with the desire to have freedom and much fun, I started college along with my older friends, the veterans,” Feinberg reflects in his autobiography, Looking Back, and Sharing a Wondrous Life with You. Crediting these veterans with inspiring his course of action following HWS, Feinberg enrolled in New York Medical College and joined the U.S. Air Force as a pediatrician. Stationed at the Donaldson Air Force Base Hospital in Greenville, S.C., Feinberg organized his entire Air Force Base in the construction of a Pediatric Unit while his commanding colonel was away on a brief vacation. Following his discharge from the U.S. Air Force, Feinberg began working as a pediatric doctor in New Jersey. During his distinguished career of more than 40 years, he participated in investigative research on the Respiratory Distress Syndrome in premature babies and served as chair of various medical committees while founding the New Jersey Pediatric Society. He became best known for being a champion of child safety, and for organizing campaigns for school bus and other safety legislation. Now retired for 20 years, he still works to help family, friends and even other doctors, but no longer serves patients. ●

HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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“[C]rime fiction at its best, proving the genre’s deep connections to society’s fears, ambitions, and ability to question the status quo. . . . Luckiest Girl Alive is the ultimate critical companion to millennial femininity.” —Los Angeles Review of Books

“Smart, sexy, and sharp… with more than a bit of heart and hope.” —Maclean’s

“Knoll’s debut truly delivers and will keep readers engaged until the end.” —Library Journal

“Nail-bitingly addictive, equal parts funny and twisted, and full of ‘I never saw THAT coming’ moments.” —Glamour

“Dark, clever and wildly addictive.” —SELF Magazine

Jessica Knoll:

“LUCKIEST GIRL ALIVE” by Andrew Wickenden ’09

J

essica Knoll ’06 always knew she wanted to be a writer — “I always had this passion,” she says. With her debut novel, Luckiest Girl Alive, a New York Times Best Seller for months, reaching as high as No. 7, Knoll’s passion and hard work has paid off.    Knoll was an Arts Scholar at HWS, majoring in English with a concentration in creative writing. After graduation, she moved to New York and worked at the talent and literary agency Paradigm, where she met magazine writers and editors (not to mention her agent, her best friend, and her future husband). After an internship at Parenting magazine and an entry-level job as editorial assistant with Popular Science, Knoll’s early experience and persistence led her to Cosmopolitan, where she eventually rose to senior editor. “I wrote a ton at Cosmo,” she says. “Many of the editors there had their own book careers — my former boss John Searles is an accomplished novelist — so I observed how these people did it, and took the time to decide the kind of book I wanted to write. Magazines teach you to have a perspective and a finely tuned eye, to keep your ear to the ground to find the angle of a story.” When Knoll began working at Cosmo, “that was the year that a lot of chick-lit novels were all the rage,” she recalls, “but that wasn’t me. I felt nothing for stories like that.” When she decided she was ready to sit down and write a novel, Knoll wanted to accomplish three things. “I wanted to create a memorable character with a distinct voice. I wanted to create a ripped-from-the-headlines crime story; the psychological-thriller/suspense genre is what I enjoy most, so I wanted that element of intrigue. But I wanted to put my own stamp on that genre — I wanted the book to have a heart. I wanted you to turn the last page and have some kind of emotional response.” ●

An Instant Best-Seller Luckiest Girl Alive has been hailed by critics as a “dark, twisty” thriller whose “razor-sharp writing” and “propulsive prose” (Entertainment Weekly) has drawn comparisons to Gone Girl but stands apart with its “humor, cultural insight, and thematic heft” (Alissa Nutting, author of Tampa). Named one of the Huffington Post’s “18 Brilliant Books You Won’t Want To Miss This Summer,” the novel centers on TifAni FaNelli, a New York magazine editor who seems, on the surface, to have it all: a perfect job, a perfect apartment, perfect friends, a perfect fiancé with whom she’s planning the perfect wedding. But Knoll upends these early expectations with an unsettling journey into Ani’s high school traumas, which

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have propelled her on her upward course of success. Alternating between the past and present, each chapter chips away at the calculated shell Ani has built to preserve the life she thinks she wants. As Luckiest Girl Alive speeds through a series of shocking twists, Ani’s ambition and caustic wit are layered with pathos and gravitas to reveal a complicated heroine whose “completely enthralling” and “devilishly dark” story (Publisher’s Weekly) explores a host of fears and anxieties troubling contemporary America. “I liked the idea of surprising people,” Knoll says. “I intentionally tried to invert the tropes you see in traditional women’s fiction and play with those. I love the idea of mixing the glamorousness with grittiness. I haven’t read that anywhere. It was organic and unique to my own voice because I wanted to tap into those two worlds.”

Published by Simon & Schuster in May 2015, Luckiest Girl Alive was acquired prior to publication by Lionsgate Films, with Reese Witherspoon producing through Pacific Standard Films. Witherspoon called Luckiest Girl Alive the kind of novel “that grabs you and doesn’t let go. The hero of the book is a wily, intelligent, complex narrator. This character and the thrilling narrative that she drives are exactly the kind of story our company, Pacific Standard Films, wants to produce.” As she adapts Luckiest Girl Alive for the screen, Knoll has started work on a second novel, and admits she is “more daunted by the second book than the screenplay.” “I have a good bone structure in my head,” she says of the new book. “Now I need to sit down and actually write it.” ●


Moonrise over Seneca Lake and the Bozzuto Boathouse.

Where’s the Annual Fund?

Photo by Kevin Colton

N RRE WA ING T HUN TH SMI RY A LIBR lly Me emic d Aca er t Cen eig nsw e s Ro ing rn Lea mons Com

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Everywhere. You make incredible moments possible. Make your gift today and support the areas that matter most to you. www.hws.edu/onlinegiving HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES

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HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES 300 Pulteney Street Geneva, New York 14456

Dominic Facciponte ’16

• Professor of Medicine; Chief, Section of Hematologic Malignancies; Assoc. Dir. for Clinical Research, Division of Hematologic Malignancies and Cellular Therapy, Duke Cancer Institute • Founder of the Thomas J. Glover Endowed Summer Research Fund in the Natural Sciences • At HWS, Majored in Biology, Member of Soccer Team, Phi Beta Kappa

• Major in Biochemistry; Minors in Public Policy and Health Care; Pre-Med Program • Former member of the Hobart Lacrosse Team and Orange Key Society; Biology Teaching Fellow • Internships with Geneva General Hospital and Family Practice Associates PLLC

1. What three things do you need to be successful in health care? Work ethic, empathy, intelligence

1. What three things do you need to be successful in health care? Work ethic, ability to collaborate, compassion 2. What do you think is the most pressing issue in medicine today? Lack of medical/research funding

3. Rank intelligence, compassion, and integrity in the order of importance to you. Integrity, Compassion, Intelligence

3. Rank intelligence, compassion, and integrity in the order of importance to you. Integrity, Compassion, Intelligence

4. Which of your college courses interested you the most? Behavioral Ecology

4. Which of your college courses interested you the most? Developmental Biology

5. What do you do for your personal wellness? Crossfit at least five days per week and read most every night (body and mind!).

5. What do you do for your personal wellness? Go to the gym, listen to and play music, be around my friends, and call my parents regularly.

6. What’s the most interesting thing about you that we wouldn’t learn from your resume? I enjoy learning about and collecting (in a very small way) art. 8. As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? A doctor 9. Which HWS professor had the most influence on you? Dr. Tom Glover, hands down, was the most intimidating though best professor I’ve ever known in undergraduate or graduate studies. 10. What’s your proudest achievement? Trying to build a strong relationship with my children and ensure they are well prepared ‘for a life of consequence.’ 11. What are your specific goals in medicine? As a clinician I start the day with the expectation to help improve the quality of life and hopefully cure every new patient I see. All other goals revolve around that. 12. What gets you out of bed in the morning? I enjoy building things. I’m in a position to have helped build a program from the ground up, having a role in expanding research, patient care and junior faculty career development. It’s very rewarding.

6. What’s the most interesting thing about you that we wouldn’t learn from your resume? I have been a musician since I was seven years old. 7. What quality do you value most in your friends? Honesty 8. As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? A paleontologist or archeologist 9. Which HWS professor had the most influence on you? Associate Professor of Biology Kristy Kenyon pushed me to challenge myself, making me a better scholar and a more critical thinker. 10. What’s your proudest achievement? Walking on to the DI Hobart Lacrosse team as a first-year. Being a part of that program taught me hard work, dedication, personal achievement, teamwork and sacrifice. 11. What are your specific goals in medicine? I aspire to be a physician who impacts the lives of those around me and their families in a positive way. I want to be someone others can turn to for help. 12. What gets you out of bed in the morning? I have a sincere desire to continue my education and to learn more today than yesterday.

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7. What quality do you value most in your friends? Loyalty

PARALLELS PARALLELS

2. What do you think is the most pressing issue in medicine today? Controlling expectations and costs of care

THE SALISBURY

Dr. David Rizzieri ’87

The Pulteney Street Survey

The inside text pages of this publication were printed using recycled paper which enables the environmental savings equivalent to the following: • 204 trees preserved for the future • 20,094 lbs waterborne waste not created • 196,407 gallons wastewater flow saved • 65,913 lbs CO2 not emmited • 169,000,000 BTUs energy not consumed • 85 lbs NOx gases prevented

WINTER 2016

ALUM’S VISION

THE SALISBURY

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INTERNSHIPS

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LIVES CHANGED


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