Alumni Association bestows 10 awards

Always a cornerstone of Reunion Weekend, the alumni awards ceremony this year packed an extra punch: two new awards, given for the first time. The 50th Reunion Golden Service Award honors volunteerism by a member of the 50th reunion class, and the "Creative Thought Matters" Award recognizes professional or volunteer work marked by "innovation or creation of a fresh approach that inspires or enlightens the lives of others and contributes to the greater good."

Here's a summary of the honorees cited for their professional achievements and Skidmore service:

Distinguished Achievement Award
Cynthia Blum Carroll '78 admits she only took geology "to get science over with," but professors Ken Johnson and John Thomas inspired her to major in the field, and she was inducted into Sigma Gamma Epsilon and the National Geologic Honor Society. She went on to earn a master's from the University of Kansas, and later an MBA from Harvard.

From 1980 to 1987, Carroll worked for AMOC, an oil company in Wyoming, Utah, Montana, Idaho, and Alaska, where she supervised fieldwork via helicopter to evaluate potential drilling sites. Leading a three-year energy study that identified $450 million in potential savings, she recommended a 10-year program for economic and operational growth.

In 1989 she joined Montreal-based Alcan Alumninum Ltd. As VP and general manager of Alcan Foil Products, she presided over a quadrupling of production and tripling of profits. By 1996 she was managing director of Alcan's Irish firm Aughinish Alumina, which achieved the top productivity and safety records in the industry. In 2001 she became CEO for Alcan's metal facilities, R&D, and power plants?54 operations in 21 countries?leading the way through expansions, reorganizations, and record profitability.

In 2006, Carroll was named CEO of Anglo American, one of the world's largest mining companies and the largest producer of diamonds and platinum. She is the first woman, and first non-South African, ever to lead Anglo American, which is valued at $90 billion and has 150,000 employees in 40 countries.

In 2007, Forbes magazine named Carroll the seventh most powerful woman in the world, "a powerhouse in the world of commodities," and "a force to be reckoned with by world governments." Her thoughts on that singular position were published in Newsweek's "My Turn" column in January 2007. This year she made Time magazine's list of the 100 Most Influential People.

In accepting her alumni award, she thanked Skidmore for getting her started: "It was Skidmore that provided me with support, close enagagement in learning, lasting friendships, independent and disciplined thinking skills, and open doors to a new world I hadn't considered before."

Front row, from left, Camilo Alvarez '98; Cynthia Blum Carroll '78; Ellen Hannan '78; Bill Ladd '83, Alumni Association President Deb Sehl Coons '72, President Phil Glotzbach. Back row, from left, Monica Reis de Janosi '58; Barb Schallehn; Charlotte "Pixie" Cram Elsberry '63; Nancy "Leggie" D'Wolf '48; Betsy Low '03; Alumni Awards Committee Chair Judy Roberts Kunisch '69; and Linda Jackson-Chalmers '73.

Palamountain Award for Young Alumni Achievement
Camilo Alvarez '98 embraces the risk-taking of cutting-edge art. An art-history and Spanish major, he is owner, director, and curator of Samson Projects in Boston's South End. Conceived as an interdisciplinary laboratory for the convergence of film, video, performance, music, design, and visual art, Samson showcases everything from 19th-century to 1960s Op to the latest art trends. It represents artists including Nicole Cherubini, SunTek Chung, Gabriel Martinez, Rune Olsen, and Suzannah Sinclair, bringing their work to prestigious fairs around the world, including the Scope and Volta fairs in in Basel, Switzerland, and New York City. Samson is a member of the international New Art Dealers Alliance that holds an annual fair in Miami during Art Basel.

Alvarez runs a one-man operation on a shoestring: curating and installing exhibits, managing PR, maintaining the Web site, even stuffing envelopes. "Being self-funded allows me to take risks, but can get me into loads of trouble," he quips. But in just four years, Samson Projects has become an important showcase for contemporary work in Boston and beyond. Although not an artist himself, Alvarez has an intimate connection to their creative processes and an intuitive sense of where art is heading. His exhibitions are intended to "challenge perspectives," sometimes provoking strong public reaction. One critic described him as a "soaring comet" in the Boston art world.

He says his passion for the art world was "cemented" at Skidmore. The art and art-history faculty, as well as fellow art majors, he says, "supported, inspired, and wore me down. Professors Rob Linrothe and Penny Jolly really instilled a love for art history and the socio-historical aspects that go hand in hand with the work. And John Moore revealed a contemporary art world where contributing to the culture was the artist's prime responsibility." Today Alvarez maintains a dialogue with the Tang Museum's Dayton Director John Weber and Malloy Curator Ian Berry. Noting the confluence of influential people in his life, he pointed to the audience where Professor Emeritus James Kettlewell "is sitting next to my wife?whoa!" He said being recognized by Skidmore "is a great honor; there are no sufficient words to describe it."

"Creative Thought Matters" Award
Charlotte "Pixie" Cram Elsberry '63 developed a passion for midwifery in college. Offering one of the nation's premier baccalaureate nursing programs, Skidmore responded to changing attitudes about childbirth with innovation. During their ob/gyn and women's health rotation at New York Cornell Hospital in Manhattan, Elsberry and her cohorts were invited to work with patients from prenatal to delivery to postpartum care, rather than staying within traditional, separate rotations. Elsberry valued "the freedom to follow the same patients regardless of the time of day or night. This was clinical continuity?what happens in real life." She found herself working with three midwives who were leading figures in the resurgence of midwifery and natural childbirth.

With a master's in nursing from Yale, she embarked on a career that culminated in a post as director of midwifery and ob/gyn at the North Central Bronx Hospital. During her 20 years in that position, she oversaw a staff of 42 midwives and two nurse-practitioners who delivered 3,000 babies and provided over 80,000 outpatient visits a year. It was, at one point, the nation's largest midwifery practice and received numerous state commendations for having the lowest rate of Caesarean sections. She says, "The women of the Bronx are wonderful people, and the ethnic diversity is amazing. I often felt like we were a mini United Nations."

Elsberry also co-founded a birthing care program that allowed pregnant teens in New Haven, Conn., to finish their high school educations. She successfully lobbied state and national legistators to ease restrictions on the practice of midwifery, and she helped establish the first accredited midwifery program in the nation that did not require a nursing degree as a prerequisite.

A member of the Fellowship of the American College of Nurse-Midwives, Elsberry received the Golden Commendation Award from the American Society of Nurse Midwives on behalf of the North Central Bronx Hospital Midwifery Service. Mayor Michael Bloomberg cited her as one of "New York's Treasures."

Creative thought has been the chief hallmark of her career. At a time when nurses' options in assisting childbirth were limited to the strict parameters of traditional hospital delivery, Elsberry's patient-centered approach helped change health care and elevate the profession of midwifery. She has noted, "Science writer Jonah Lehrer recognized the need for creativity when he said, 'Sciences need art to frame the mystery, but art needs science so that not everything is a mystery.' " In accepting her Skidmore award, she lauded the College's strategic emphasis on science literacy.

Elsberry says her Skidmore experience allowed her to "drink deeply in the world of knowledge and clinical practice." To be recognized by her alma mater is "like having your mother smile approvingly at you. I am deeply humbled."

Porter Award for Young Alumni Volunteerism
Betsy Low '03 says her great-aunt Verginia Robinson '40 "wore her class ring like a badge of honor" and taught her about service and philanthropy. As a student, Low was active in the Student Alumni Society and the senior-class gift. The art-history and studio-art major also studied in Paris and Florence and helped install exhibits at Skidmore's Tang Museum. She is currently personal assistant to the CEO of Calvin Klein, for whom she coordinates all the firm's philanthropic endeavors.

Low has aided Skidmore admissions, and as class fund chair she works with class agents, sharing her knowledge of Skidmore's campaign priorities. Working with the Alumni Board's Young Alumni Giving Chair Davis Bradford '96, she has helped recruit young Friends of the Presidents-level donors.

She told the alumni audience, "Skidmore taught me never to settle for less than the best." It helped her step "outside my comfort realm, in constant striving to be more conceptual and creative," she recalls. "This award is an honor and one that I wish I could share with my great-aunt. To be recognized by this community is greatly meaningful and inspirational."

50th Reunion Golden Service Award
Monica Reis de Janosi '58 has served as a reunion volunteer, class secretary, class agent, and class historian. In 1998 she was fund chair for her 40th reunion.

She says a business course that taught her to write advertising copy helped her land her first job at a major department store in New York City. But it was her art major that informed her successful and varied career representing photographers, running a decorative importing business, and designing interiors for an international research organization. For the last 10 years, she has served on the Beautification Advisory Board of Chappaqua, N.Y.

She forged strong relationships at Skidmore that she has maintained over the past half-century, despite living in Vienna, Austria, for many years. As the mother of Nicholas '87, she says she was impressed to watch the College's transformation from "a charming but primitive campus" in her day into the top-ranked coed institution of today with its "fabulous, sophisticated new facilities. Each time that I return I am awed by its growth and potential."

De Janosi adds, "For me, it seemed only natural to give back to the college that had benefited me so very much."

Outstanding Service Awards
Nancy "Leggie" D'Wolf '48 arrived on campus at the close of World War II, which helped her form strong bonds with her classmantes by sharing responsibility for air-raid drills, waiting on tables, and growing vegetables. She says she joined "the most remarkable and wonderful collection of young people-I can close my eyes today and see them vividly." A physical education major, D'Wolf embarked on career as a physical therapist, retiring just last year.

At Skidmore she has served on reunion fundraising committees, and as class fund chair for her 50th reunion she joined with three classmates in a campaign to raise a large enough gift to endow a professorship. Arranging matching-gift challenges and rallying her classmates, she helped establish Skidmore's Class of 1948 Chair for Excellence in Teaching, currently held by psychologist Mary Ann Foley. D'Wolf also led the charge to another record-breaking class gift for her 55th reunion. She is currently her class president for a second term.

At the awards event, she attributed her volunteer successes to her classmates, "because without you, nothing."

Ellen Hannan '78, cited as an "all-star" by both the Wall Street Journal and Reuters, was named among the top three analysts in the fuels industry by Forbes.com in 2006. She has worked at Bessemer Trust, Texaco, and Prudential Securities. In 1998 Bear, Stearns & Co. recruited her as senior energy analyst, and she is now managing director. Hannan credits Skidmore with refining her thinking and writing skills, and for encouraging her to "view the world in an infinite number of shades of gray." She went on to earn an MBA from Pace University.

Hannan has mentored Skidmore's business students and advised alumni working in the finance industry. As chair of the Alumni Board's Career and Professional Development Committee, she partnered with the Career Services Office to plan Wall Street Walk and other networking events, and has brought alumni in a variety of fields back to campus for career panels. She is currently a member of the Council of 100, a group of alumni who help chart the growth of Skidmore's endowment.

She told those at the awards event, "It's rewarding to work with so many fascinating alumni. I encourage you to get involved; it's a lot of fun!"

Linda Jackson-Chalmers '73, one of Skidmore's first Higher Education Opportunity Program students, says the "exciting and troubling times" of the late 1960s helped inspire her career in education and advocacy. First an art teacher at Albany's Arbor Hill Elementary School, she was its principal from 1986 to 1998, instituting holistic programs for students and families. She is now the Albany district's assistant superintendent for human resources and community relations. Her work for equal access and educational opportunity has brought honors from the Hudson-Mohawk Association of Colleges and Universities, the Urban League, the YMCA, and many other groups.

A Skidmore class agent and fundraising volunteer in the 1980s, Jackson-Chalmers was appointed as a trustee in 1991 and has served on many key board committees. Along with her family (including "my supportive husband, my Happy Pappy, my wonderful mother"?all on hand for the awards event), she says, Skidmore helped infuse her with its "pioneering spirit." She says, "I am truly grateful to have been embraced and recognized by this special and unique college community."

Bill Ladd '83?or at least his big, sonorous voice?is well known to most alumni. Now in his second term as the Alumni Board's reunion chair, the scriptwriter, actor, and voiceover artist has telephoned more than 4,000 alumni each year to invite them to Reunion. As chair of his class's 25th this year, he worked to increase attendance beyond the record-breaking level he cultivated for his 20th. Ladd has also hosted alumni club events, helped honor Skidmore's nursing majors in a permanent archival exhibition on campus, and spearheaded an alumni professional-networking directory.

He says his grandmother, philanthropist Helen Filene Ladd '22, passed along to him her belief that "one-on-one connections can change people's lives-and he reminded the crowd that in 1967 she received the same award he was receiving. A founding member of the Council of 100, an advisory board to Skidmore's president, he is also a newly elected trustee.

"I consider my classmates among the best and brightest," he says. And he told all the alumni at the ceremony: "Being counted among you has changed my life."

Barb Schallehn, associate director of leadership activities in the Student Affairs Office, has mentored generations of students in their cocurricular activities?and their personal growth. When her sister, Rosanne Sammler in Facilities Services, said Skidmore was a good place to work, Schallehn hired on right out of high school. With her go-getter personality, she soon became a go-to person and moved up to coordinator of student activities, helping student government and club leaders plan their programs.

She says, "It's rewarding to work with students who need extra support to raise an important issue or stage a big event. I love seeing them learn and develop skills, including being disciplined, thorough, ethical, and collegial." Dean of Student Affairs Pat Oles notes that Schallehn "knows how to set limits when necessary and how to nurture as well." And students have called her "SGA's rock" and "the core of my Skidmore family." Thanking her colleagues and other staffers, she said she was "extremely honored and completely overwhelmed" by the award.