That Skidmore connection? "Nothing like it"
Reunion 2016
Reunion '16 reconnected multi-Emmy-winning 30 Rock and Brooklyn 99 producer David Miner '91 with Jared Greenbaum '11, celebrating their 25th and 5th reunions. Now an Emory University M.B.A. student, Greenbaum got some crucial Hollywood mentoring and career development at Miner's 3 Arts Entertainment agency in 2013–14. For Miner, Reunion also meant joining with other former Bandersnatchers singers for an alumni concert.
Professor of Pyschology Sheldon Solomon's minicollege lecture
Alumni shared photos and thoughts on social media throughout the weekend: posts, tweets, and more.
At the Zankel Music Center, President Philip A. Glotzbach briefed the crowd about the year's strong admissions, the "paradigm-altering" Center for Integrated Sciences to be built soon, the $114 million raised so far for the Creating Our Future campaign, and other initiatives that benefit materially from alumni support.
Attention turned next to nine honorees. The Creative Thought Matters Award was given to Betsy Lowe '76, founder of the Adirondack Wild Center environmental museum. Having "intertwined my studies in science and music in various ways, with the belief that nature inspires the arts," the biology and music major said, "I really am sentimental about the opportunities I got at Skidmore. They were super-valuable."
The Distinguished Achievement Award went to Jill Schuker '66, a communications and policy planner who has worked in the State Department, National Security Council, and US Mission to the UN. She spoke about public service and civic responsibility, reminding everyone that "we all have stake" in America's democratic traditions of openness and civility, and declaring her "faith in the better angels of our nature."
Jessyca Dudley '06, a former Peace Corps public-health worker and teacher in Africa who is now fighting gun violence for the Joyce Foundation, received the Palamountain Award for Young Alumni Achievement. In her switch from a dance major to a women's studies major, "Skidmore opened doors and shaped everything about my future," she said.
The 50th Reunion Outstanding Service Award went to Betsey Wattenberg Selkowitz '66, who says a key benefit of volunteering "has been catching up with the women with whom I shared a wonderful time in my life." Outstanding Service Awards were bestowed on Judith Murdough Rollinson '56, P '90, who got reconnected when her son enrolled in "a co-ed Skidmore on its ‘new' campus"; Barbara Burgess Maier '71 (wearing her mother's Skidmore graduation robe from 1936), who said Skidmore "prepared us for change and challenge"; Susan Flanagan '76, who cited "great faculty" and "substantial financial aid" as among the reasons she gives back; Merilee Mapes Perkins '76, for whom "Skidmore has been my mother, mentor, sister, and friend"; and Melissa Milstein Jacobsen '81, P '10, who thanked her son for "letting this business and economics major see Skidmore from the perspective of an English and theater major."
Also announced and applauded was the 50th-reunion gift from the class of '66, totaling $1.9 million, including more than $200,000 in the Skidmore Fund to support eight student scholarships for five years. The class of '91 broke a 25th-reunion record with its total gift of $758,000. For other giving highlights, click here.
Before the crowd dispersed, the alumni board president, Sibyl Waterman Haley '71, reminded her fellow alumni, "We inhaled learning" and grew into "wicked smart" adults who are "blessed by our Skidmore connection—there's nothing like it."
