GAME Changers Celebrating USF’s 2020 and 2021 Alumni Award recipients
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S A CHILD, CARRIE NERO longed to wear a soldier’s uniform. Not a good idea for a girl, she was told. She became the first African-American nurse to achieve the rank of brigadier general in the U.S. Army Reserves. Stephanie Goforth wanted a career in finance. An industry insider suggested she set her sights on bank teller. She’s now in charge of global sales and marketing for Northern Trust, the Fortune 500 wealth management company, and a longtime USF volunteer leader. Jeff Vinik was a Boston hedge fund manager who saw infinite promise in one of the most unlikely homes for professional ice hockey. Today, he’s the owner of a backto-back championship team and transforming the Tampa Bay area, both literally and figuratively. USF will celebrate these 2021 Alumni Award recipients Nov. 4, along with the five 2020 honorees, whose awards ceremony was postponed due to COVID-19 pandemic restrictions. Nero, ’75, MA ’79 and MS ’88, is USF’s 2021 Distinguished Alumna, recognized for achieving the pinnacle of success in her career. Goforth, ’82, who has devoted years of volunteer leadership to USF and other nonprofits, will receive the Donald A. Gifford Service Award, recognizing graduates for their exceptional service contributions. And Vinik is this year’s Class of ’56 Award recipient, an honor reserved for non-alumni dedicated to the university and community.
Visit USFalumni.org/2020 and2021 awards for more information about the Nov. 4 awards dinner and to nominate future recipients.
2021 Distinguished Alumna Brig. Gen. (ret.) Carrie Williams Nero, Sociology ’75, MA Guidance and Counseling Education ’79, MS Nursing ’88
Retired Brig. Gen. Carrie poses recently at her St. Petersburg home, and in uniform in 1996.
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UNIVERSITY of SOUTH FLORIDA
In 2002, while serving as chief nurse of the “Desert Medics” 3rd Medical Command, which oversees the care of combat troops, Nero became the first African-American nurse to achieve the rank of brigadier general in the U.S. Army Reserves. “From the time I was a child, I had a burning desire to be in the military,” she says. “I was amazed at the order and the discipline, the way service members carried themselves. But my father said I a military career wasn’t appropriate because I was a girl.” Equally enthralled by medicine, Nero enrolled in a practical nursing program at then-segregated Gibbs High School in St. Petersburg, graduating at 17. She went to work in the basement of a local hospital, where African-American patients endured crowded conditions and under-staffing. “I knew I needed more education. Working there put it in my spirit that I need to be a better servant.” Nero would soon become one of three nurses to integrate Mound Park Hospital, now Bayfront Health St. Petersburg. It was there she met a group of health-workers from the local Army Reserve Center and enlisted in 1975. She also enrolled at what was then St. Petersburg Junior College, one of just two African-American students in the school’s associate degree nursing program. An instructor told both they could not possibly succeed.
