The University of Vermont will award honorary degrees at the May ceremony to commencement speaker Darren Walker, Suzanne Preston Blier, John Bramley, Jackson JW Clemmons, Michela Gallagher, and Marcelle Leahy.
Darren Walker presides over the Ford Foundation, one of the world’s most influential social justice philanthropies. After a promising career start in international law and capital markets, in 1995 Mr. Walker left the corporate world to volunteer at an elementary school in Harlem, a career reset that moved him into the nonprofit and philanthropy sectors. As chief operating officer of a community development organization, he advanced revitalization efforts in Harlem—building affordable housing, organizing to open the first supermarket in Harlem in 25 years, and developing the first public school in the city to be built by a community organization. In 2002, Mr. Walker joined the Rockefeller Foundation, where he managed a $25 million annual grant-making portfolio focused on anti-poverty strategies in the US. Promoted to vice president for foundation initiatives in 2006, he oversaw a wide range of Rockefeller Foundation programs in the US and overseas, including leading the Rebuild New Orleans initiative following Hurricane Katrina. In 2010 he joined the Ford Foundation as vice president for education, creativity and free expression, supervising more than 30 percent of the foundation’s grants and overseeing regional programming in Africa and the Middle East. The Ford Foundation named Mr. Walker president in 2013, the tenth in the foundation’s 77-year history. Mr. Walker’s personal journey deeply informs his commitment to philanthropy as a powerful force for social progress. An alumnus of the first Head Start class of 1965, Mr. Walker attended the University of Texas at Austin as a Pell-grant recipient. He graduated in 1982 with a bachelor of arts in government and a bachelor of science in speech communication, and in 1986 graduated from the University of Texas School of Law. His vocation in philanthropy and his many volunteer commitments underscore the depth of his civic commitment. Communities across America and around the world bear the imprints of Mr. Walker’s vision, his skillful coalition building, and his ability to lead and to listen as an active partner in advancing an equitable and hopeful future for all. He will be awarded a Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa.
Suzanne Preston Blier ’73, the Allen Whitehill Clowes Professor of Fine Arts and Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University, is a world-renowned investigator and interpreter of precolonial African art and material culture and a pioneer in the digital humanities. Since first encountering the early art of West Africa as a Peace Corps volunteer in Bénin, her life’s passion is looking deeply into the materials and methods as well as the societies and historical moments that shape African art. Regarded as one of the most honored historians of African art, she is also considered one of the field’s broadest thinkers. Her many celebrated books encompass issues of form and aesthetics, as well as African architecture, psychology, and philosophy; in 2018 she was honored with a Yoruba chieftaincy title in Nigeria, in recognition of her scholarship on ancient Ife art. An early adapter of using digital arts to inform and support humanities, in 1993 Professor Blier created the electronic media project Baobab: Sources and Studies in African Visual Culture, at the time one of the largest academic studies of African art. The Baobab project was the precursor to AfricaMap, a website created in 2007 to bring together the best cartographic data on the continent in an interactive GIS format. In 2011, the AfricaMap website, at Harvard’s Center for Geographic Research, expanded into WorldMap, a web platform for creating, displaying, analyzing, and searching spatial and other forms of data across multiple disciplines. Professor Blier’s visionary and pioneering work is a vibrant testimony to the cross-disciplinary inquiry and collaborative scholarship at the heart of humanities education, to which she is a rich contributor. She will be awarded a Doctor of Letters, honoris causa.
John Bramley’s prodigious efforts as an academic leader have grown the profile of the University of Vermont and built productive partnerships throughout the state. Professor Bramley graduated summa cum laude in microbiology from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1971 and completed his PhD at the University of Reading in 1975. Early in his career, as a research scientist at the U.K.’s National Institute for Research in Dairying, he became an internationally recognized authority on bovine mastitis, a serious mammary gland infection and the most common infectious disease in dairy cattle. Professor Bramley came to UVM in 1990 to chair the Department of Animal Sciences, where he and colleagues made history developing the world’s first mastitis-resistant cattle. In 2001, Professor Bramley was tapped to serve as UVM’s chief academic and chief operating officer. The university made considerable strides in academic stature and program expansion under Professor Bramley’s leadership: the Honors College, the Writing-in-the-Disciplines program, the Food Systems Initiative, and the expansion of service-learning opportunities were shaped during his tenure. In 2007, Professor Bramley left UVM to serve as president and CEO of the Windham Foundation, promoting Vermont’s rural communities. Returning to UVM as interim president in 2011, Professor Bramley challenged university leadership and faculty to advance transdisciplinary research, student success, and resource-allocation initiatives to secure a bright future for UVM. His contributions to Vermont’s flagship university have advanced UVM and created thriving partnerships across the state and beyond, and are helping to redefine the land-grant mission for the 21st century. He will be awarded a Doctor of Science, honoris causa.
Jackson JW Clemmons is a pioneer and an innovative leader, both in his profession and his avocation. Born in Beloit, Wisconsin, he earned a bachelor of science, a master’s of science, and a doctorate in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. As the first African American student in the biochemistry department there, he paved the way for young African American scientists and premedical students to follow. He received his Doctor of Medicine in 1961 at Western Reserve University School of Medicine, and in 1962 was appointed assistant professor of pathology at the University of Vermont Medical School. Nationally recognized for his groundbreaking work in perinatal pathology and cytogenetics, Dr. Clemmons was known as a highly inventive and creative researcher, often designing and building his own research equipment at UVM. As the second African American on the UVM medical school faculty, he advocated for recruitment strategies to attract and retain more students and faculty of color. Upon his arrival in Vermont in 1962, Dr. Clemmons and his wife purchased a 148-acre farm, joining a small cadre of African American farm owners nationwide. The Clemmons Family Farm, currently in transition from a private holding to a nonprofit, features six historic buildings dating to the late 1700s and mid-1800s, all beautifully improved and hand-restored over five decades by Dr. Clemmons—whose grandfather taught him the skills of the carpentry trade—and a small team of local artisans. The nonprofit is a gathering place for all people to celebrate African American and African diaspora history, art, and culture—a fitting legacy for a family that has long put community values into action. Jackson and Lydia Clemmons served as co-presidents of the Charlotte Central School PTA, and Jackson Clemmons served as school director and as vice chair of the Champlain Valley Union High School board. Researcher, physician, educator, farmer, artisan, devoted community builder—Jackson Clemmons’ decades of pioneering work are an inspiring testimony to a life lived in service to the potentials inherent in our common humanity, and to honoring the gifts that define us. He will be awarded a Doctor of Science, honoris causa.
Michela Gallagher, University of Vermont Graduate College 1977, leads a diverse team of scientists researching the underlying brain changes that occur with memory loss. The Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation considers Professor Gallagher’s groundbreaking research, which has led to a late stage clinical trial, to be the most promising program in their portfolio of drug development. Professor Gallagher’s therapeutic approach is to treat a transitional condition from normal aging to a clinical diagnosis of early dementia, a high-risk phase referred to as “mild cognitive impairment” (MCI). The study, named HOPE4MCI—the most advanced of its kind—is designed to track progression in participants to determine whether treatment will prevent dementia. Professor Gallagher is the Krieger-Eisenhower Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences and the Director of the Neurogenetics and Behavior Center at Johns Hopkins University. Her forty years of scientific work have made her a leader in the realm of brain studies: she specializes in understanding the neurobiology of learning, memory, and the aging brain. In 2008 she founded AgeneBio, a company that specializes in drug discovery and development, with the mission of providing novel therapeutics for unmet needs. She now serves as a scientific advisor and holds a position on the company’s board of directors. She is also widely recognized as a superior mentor training the next generation of scientists; she has mentored nearly 50 pre- and post-doctoral scientists who themselves are now influencing academia and industry. Professor Gallagher’s devotion to understanding the mechanisms of disease and healing in human neuroscience are bringing us closer to an intervention for Alzheimer’s disease, potentially affecting the well-being of millions around the world. She will be awarded a Doctor of Science, honoris causa.
Marcelle Leahy is the warm, egalitarian, behind-the-scenes support to the most senior member of the United States Senate, Vermont senator Patrick Leahy. Respected for her ability to bring people together to work toward common goals, Marcelle Leahy has served as the senator’s most trusted confidante as they have advocated for justice, economic and educational opportunity, health care access and equality, and other pressing concerns of our time. A licensed registered nurse, Mrs. Leahy has contributed her skills to medical organizations in Vermont and Virginia, serving on several boards, including the Vermont Visiting Nurse Association and the Vermont Nursing Initiatives Project. An active member of the UVM College of Nursing and Health Sciences Board of Advisors for nearly twenty years, Mrs. Leahy has been instrumental in advocating for a program of simulation activities for UVM students across the health disciplines and the Vermont National Guard, to best prepare health providers and first responders for hands-on work experiences in the field. As honorary chair of the Vermont National Guard Family Readiness and Support Program, she offers leadership and inspiration to a cadre of volunteers helping National Guard member families before, during, and following deployment. Transforming personal experience into public effort, Mrs. Leahy is also a strong supporter of cancer research and of services to children with cancer. She currently serves on the board of the Prevent Cancer Foundation and has been on the board of Tracy’s Kids—a nonprofit organization that provides art therapy to children with cancer and their siblings—since its inception in 1991. Health services advocate and educator, engaged supporter of the National Guard, and widely respected partner to Vermont’s Democratic senator—Marcelle Leahy lives the values the University of Vermont holds high for dedicated public service. She will be awarded a Doctor of Laws, honoris causa.
UVM’s main commencement ceremony will take place on the University Green on Sunday, May 19, 2019.
Source: UVM News