Excellence Awards: 2008

NEBHE's 2008 New England Higher Education Awards were held on Friday, March 14, 2008 at the Fairmont Copley Plaza Hotel in Boston, Massachusetts. More than 430 guests attended the gala dinner, which featured New England Cable News meteorologist Tim Kelley speaking on his student days and the importance of NEBHE's RSP Tuition Break program, which celebrated its 50th anniversary.

Former NEBHE board chair Mary R. Cathcart, four-term Maine state senator and currently senior policy fellow at the University of Maine’s Margaret Chase Smith Policy Center, second from left at her table with her colleagues from the University of Maine System and their guests.

NECN meteorologist Tim Kelley speaks about his personal experience with the RSP Tuition Break program as a student at Lyndon State College.

Manchester Community College President Jonathan M. Daube, about to receive the Connecticut State Merit Award from NEBHE board chair Mass. state Sen. Joan Menard and former chair Mary Cathcart.

NEBHE Interim President & CEO Michael K. Thomas presents the Maine State Merit Award to Colleen Quint of the Senator George J. Mitchell Scholarship Research Institute, as former chair Mary Cathcart looks on.

Mario Delci from the Mass. Dept. of Higher Education and Carrie Conaway from the Mass. Dept. of Education accept the Mass. State Merit Award from interim president Michael Thomas on behalf of the Massachusetts School-to-College Data Policy Team.

Director Henry Knight of Keene State College’s Cohen Center for Holocaust Studies accepts the New Hampshire State Merit Award from interim president Michael Thomas and former chair Mary Cathcart.

Dorcas Place Adult and Family Learning Center President & CEO Brenda Dann-Messier receives the Rhode Island State Merit Award as Senator Menard looks on.

John F. Brennan, president of Green Mountain College, receives the Vermont State Merit Award.

Kathryn Dodge, NEBHE delegate, chair of the Regional Student Program Advisory Council and executive director of the New Hampshire Postsecondary Education Commission, speaks about the history and importance of NEBHE’s RSP Tuition Break program.

Greg Powell, chairman of the board of directors of the Harold Alfond Foundation, receives a special award honoring the Harold Alfond College Challenge.

Former chair Mary Cathcart enjoys the proceedings from the stage.

NEBHE’s annual Higher Education Excellence Awards are attended by prominent New England legislators, academic leaders, national nonprofit executives, business leaders and special guests.

Robert S. Karam receives the David C. Knapp Award for his years of service as trustee to the University of Massachusetts and to Southern Massachusetts University.

Former NEBHE chair and N.H. state Sen. Lou D’Allesandro accepts the Governor Walter R. Peterson Award For Leadership on behalf of its recipient, New Hampshire Governor John H. Lynch.

The Boys & Girls Club of Burlington, Vermont, receives the Robert J. McKenna Award for Program Achievement. Accepting the award from Senator Joan Menard and interim president Michael Thomas are Vermont B&GC president Roger Preis and executive director Mary Alice McKenzie, along with Roxanne Spillett, president of the Boys & Girls Clubs of America.

University of Rhode Island president Robert L. Carothers is pleased to accept the Eleanor M. McMahon Award for Lifetime Achievement.

The 2008 New England Higher Education Excellence Awards Recipients

Regional Excellence Award Recipients

	The Eleanor M. McMahon Award for Lifetime Achievement Robert L. Carothers President, University of Rhode Island
	The Governor Walter R. Peterson Award for Leadership John H. Lynch Governor, State of New Hampshire
	The David C. Knapp Award for Trusteeship Robert S. Karam Principal, Karam Financial Group
	The Robert J. McKenna Award for Program Achievement Boys & Girls Club of Burlington, Vermont

State Merit Award Recipients

	Connecticut Jonathan Daube President, Manchester Community College
	Maine Senator George J. Mitchell Scholarship Research Institute
	Massachusetts Massachusetts School-to-College Data Policy Team
	New Hampshire Keene State College’s Cohen Center for Holocaust Studies
	Rhode Island Dorcas Place Adult and Family Learning Center
	Vermont John F. Brennan President, Green Mountain College

About the recipients

The Eleanor M. McMahon Award for Lifetime Achievement

Robert L. Carothers

Robert L. Carothers became the 10th president of the University of Rhode Island in 1991. Since then, he has initiated a series of progressive changes to the university’s structure, infrastructure and curriculum.

During his tenure, the university has increased enrollment of the best and brightest students in the state and region; become recognized as a “College with a Conscience;” improved its physical campus environment; increased the diversity among students, faculty and staff; and enhanced its levels of alumni, corporate and state support.

He has also overseen more than $200 million in new construction, renovation and rehabilitation of existing structures. The university currently has a wide-ranging capital improvement program totaling $290 million in active projects.

Carothers’ vision for student education shifts students from being passive listeners to active learners and develops in the students a concern for their neighbors, whether across the street or across an ocean. The Princeton Review named the University a “college with a conscience” in the spring of 2005. This accomplishment is a direct result of President Carothers’ efforts to establish a University that links classroom learning to community service.

He initiated a Centennial Scholarship program to attract high-achieving students to URI and strengthened programs to assist them once enrolled at the university. The Centennial program rewards students strictly on academic accomplishments and now disburses more than $6 million annually. As a result, the average SAT score for incoming freshman has risen nearly 160 points since 1991.

Prior to his arrival at URI, Carothers was chancellor of the Minnesota State University System, which included seven universities, 64,000 students and a campus he helped establish in Akita, Japan. Before becoming chancellor, Carothers served as president of Southwest State University. He has the unique distinction of being a poet, lawyer, scholar and administrator.

The Governor Walter R. Peterson Award for Leadership

Governor John H. Lynch

Inaugurated to a second term in January 2007, Governor John Lynch is continuing to bring a spirit of bipartisan cooperation to the New Hampshire State House and working to make progress on the issues important to the state’s families – improving education, keeping the economy strong, reducing health care costs, ensuring public safety and protecting the environment.

Lynch is working on initiatives to increase New Hampshire’s graduation rate; to direct more state education aid to the communities that need it most; to expand the number of children with access to health insurance; to make health care more affordable and accessible; to protect children from sexual predators; to preserve New Hampshire’s environment; and to strengthen its economy.

In his first term, Lynch joined with bipartisan coalitions of legislators to pass legislation to stabilize health care costs for small businesses; to eliminate a projected $300 million budget deficit and add $50 million to the Rainy Day Fund; and to create one of the toughest and most comprehensive laws in the country to protect children from sexual predators.

As former president and CEO of Knoll, Inc., a national furniture manufacturer, he transformed a company losing $50 million a year into one making a profit of nearly $240 million. Under his leadership, Knoll created new jobs, gave factory workers annual bonuses, established a scholarship program for the children of employees, created retirement plans for employees who did not have them and gave workers stock in the company.

He has served as chair of the University of New Hampshire System Board of Trustees, as director of admissions at the Harvard Business School and as president of the Lynch Group, a business-consulting firm in Manchester, N.H.

Lynch also served on the boards of Catholic Medical Center in Manchester, N.H., and the Capitol Center for the Arts. He is the past president of the University of New Hampshire alumni association and a longtime coach of youth soccer, hockey, softball and baseball.

The David C. Knapp Award for Trusteeship

Robert S. Karam

Robert S. Karam is a principal of Karam Financial Group, located in his hometown of Fall River, Mass. His expertise is in the conceptual design, funding and administration of executive benefit programs and other qualified plans.

Karam is a Chartered Life Underwriter, a Chartered Financial Consultant and a Registered Employee Benefit Consultant.

He has devoted much of his time serving his community and is former chairman of the Board of Trustees of the University of Massachusetts and of the Board of Trustees of UMass Memorial Health Care in Worcester, Mass. Karam has also served as a former member and past chairman of the Board of Trustees of Southeastern Massachusetts University. He currently serves on the Policyholder Protective Board of Savings Bank Life Insurance and the Board of Directors at A.D. Makepeace, Inc.

Karam is a recipient of numerous awards for his community service including the New Bedford Chamber of Commerce Regional Leadership Award and the Greater Fall River Area Chamber of Commerce, Outstanding Citizen Award. He holds honorary degrees from the University of Massachusetts and Southern New England School of Law.

With his brother, James, Karam owns and operates two radio stations, WSAR 1480 AM and WHTB 1400 AM, located on the south coast of Massachusetts. He also develops industrial and residential real estate.

The Robert J. McKenna Award for Program Achievement

Boys & Girls Club of Burlington, Vermont

The Boys & Girls Club of Burlington has been serving the youth in Northern Vermont since 1942. Each year, the club provides programming to more than 2,000 children in grades K-12 in an effort to fulfill the Boys & Girls Club mission to inspire and enable all youth, regardless of circumstances, to realize their full potential as productive, responsible and caring citizens. Life-enhancing programs and character development experiences include Career Development and Life Skills; Health and Athletics; and Arts and Technology.

The mission of the Boys & Girls Club of Burlington’s KnowHow2Go College & Career Readiness program is to introduce middle and high school club members to career and post-secondary options through exploratory and curriculum-based learning. The hope is to increase the rate at which participants complete secondary education and enroll in and graduate from institutions of postsecondary education.

The Boys & Girls Club of Burlington is an affiliate of Boys & Girls Clubs of America, an organization that has been serving America's youth for over 100 years. Almost five million children and teenagers participate in programs and activities in more than 4,000 clubs across the country. Reaching out to at-risk youth in non-traditional ways, clubs exist in every corner of the country – in public housing, schools, homeless shelters, shopping malls, military bases and Native American lands, among others. These young people are impacted by one of the most powerful influences in their lives – positive direction from caring staff and a safe place to go in their non-school hours.

Jonathan Daube

Born and educated in Great Britain, Jonathan M. Daube moved to the United States in 1963. He became president of Manchester Community College in central Connecticut in 1987.

MCC is the largest of the state's community colleges, serving more than 15,000 students a year, with nearly 6,000 undergraduate students in credit programs and more than 7,000 credit-free and 2,000 credit extension students each year.

The college is also home to Great Path Academy, a “middle college” – an alternative high school collaboration between a high school district and a community college – housed at MCC that has an enrollment of more than 100 students. Construction will begin during the 2007-2008 academic year on a new wing for Great Path, which is expected to eventually increase enrollment to about 300 students.

Daube has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Association of American Colleges and Universities, has served as a visiting member of the editorial board of the Hartford Courant and was recently elected president of the Board of Directors of the University of Aberdeen (Scotland) Development Trust.

Previously, he was president of Berkshire Community College in Pittsfield, Mass.; professor and director of Union Graduate School in Yellow Springs, Ohio; superintendent of schools in Martha’s Vineyard, Mass.; and an English teacher, both in Newton, Mass. and in England.

Daube taught at the University of Malawi in Central Africa from 1968 through 1970 and spent 10 weeks on sabbatical in the fall of 2002 at the University of London.

In May 2007, Daube announced his intent to retire after the 2007-2008 academic year.

Senator George J. Mitchell Scholarship Research Institute

The core mission of the Senator George J. Mitchell Scholarship Research Institute is to increase the likelihood that young people from every community in Maine will aspire to, pursue and achieve a college education. Each year, a Mitchell Scholarship is awarded to a graduating senior from every public high school in the state; selection is based on academic promise, financial need and a history of community service. As of spring 2008, the Mitchell Scholarship Program has awarded more than $6.2 million in financial assistance to more than 1,500 Maine students.

Mitchell Institute support programs create ongoing involvement in leadership and professional development, as well as community service and mentoring activities. The Mitchell Institute believes that through participation in these activities, Mitchell Scholars will be more inclined to live and work in Maine after graduation. The Mitchell Institute strives to strengthen the involvement of a new generation of civic-minded and committed citizens while creating educational opportunity for Maine’s young people. Each year, Mitchell Scholars provide a collective 17,000 hours of community service to the state and have a 95 percent persistence rate.

In addition to financial and personal support for students, the Mitchell Institute conducts long-term research on important education issues. Their research not only allows them to know about the impact and outcomes of their efforts but also serves to inform educators and policymakers about effective strategies for removing barriers to college for Maine students.

The Mitchell Institute serves as a key partner in many statewide and regional initiatives – including the Maine Compact for Higher Education and College Ready New England – in an effort to be a catalyst for forward motion in the critical effort to boost educational attainment for students, the state of Maine and the region.

Massachusetts School-to-College Data Policy Team

From 2005 to 2007, the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education and Department of Education, through a grant from the National Governors Association, created the Massachusetts School-to-College Data Policy Team. The team merged their respective education data systems and built the Massachusetts School-to-College Database, a data management system that allows the Commonwealth to track the performance of public high school graduates through public college completion. This streamlined and unprecedented approach to education data systems will enable the agencies to measure the progress of Massachusetts students and the effectiveness of the state’s education policies.

The main purpose of the School-to-College Database is to assess the public high school variables that influence student progress most toward earning a postsecondary degree. Through its School-to-College Report, first made available in January 2008, the data will be used to specifically promote access to higher education by providing schools and school districts with detailed and up-to-date feedback on the enrollment and progress of their graduates. A summary state-level report will also be produced and widely distributed as a resource for policy development.

With additional support from the Nellie Mae Education Foundation, the BHE/DOE team will assist several selected high schools in 2008 in utilizing the School-to-College Report as a basis for developing work plans to address shortfalls in college readiness. In the future, the team plans to enhance the School-to-College database by including a more extensive set of college-readiness variables and expanding the tracking system to extend from pre-K/early childhood to career outcomes. The BHE recently began to work with the Department of Revenue to establish possible avenues for integrating employment data into the shared database with the hopes of creating a school-to-college-to-career tracking system.

The work of the BHE/DOE team will have a significant influence on the quality of preparation for Massachusetts students as they enter college and the workforce. The team has been regarded nationally as a role model for the coordination of other such interagency data sharing, reporting and assessment efforts.

Keene State College’s Cohen Center for Holocaust Studies

Keene State College’s Cohen Center for Holocaust Studies is both a resource center and a catalytic presence for the college and beyond, hosting and maintaining an extensive library collection, coordinating an interdisciplinary team of faculty in Holocaust and genocide studies and providing educational programs for the campus and neighboring region.

Charles Hildebrandt, a professor of sociology, founded the center 25 years ago. Building on Hildebrandt’s vision that the Holocaust is a “human issue” commanding the attention of every person, the Cohen Center prepares students to become responsible citizens in a world wounded by the cruelty of the last century and faced with the expanding violence of contemporary life.

Known as a “hidden gem” of the University of New Hampshire system, the center’s non-sectarian work of teaching the facts and lessons of the Holocaust has helped the college fulfill its mission of service to the community. The Cohen Center supports an undergraduate minor in Holocaust Studies that combines historical background with an interdisciplinary exploration of the Holocaust through film, literature, philosophy, psychology, sociology and other offerings.

The center also supports a series of annual public lectures by top scholars and noted survivors. It sponsors an annual trip for students to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and presents the Charles Hildebrandt Holocaust Studies Awards to recognize outstanding academic achievement in multiple categories and age groups. Throughout the year, the center holds workshops for area educators and hosts a weeklong Summer Institute every other year for teachers from the New England area and with overseas partners from Eastern Europe.

In September 2007, the college announced the establishment of its first endowed academic chair – the Cohen Chair in Holocaust and Genocide Studies.

Dorcas Place Adult and Family Learning Center

Dorcas Place Adult and Family Learning Center of Providence, RI, is in its 27th year of providing a comprehensive scope of adult education programs for low-income Rhode Islanders.

The Dorcas Place mission is to assist low-income adults in realizing their full potential through literacy, employment, advocacy and community involvement. Dorcas Place is a community leader and partner seeking to contribute to the state’s economic growth through the development of a more literate and productive workforce.

Nearly 1,000 students each year are enrolled in: day and evening adult basic education, ESOL and GED classes; college transition programs at two campuses of the Community College of Rhode Island; family literacy and after-school programs to enhance the learning gains of children in local elementary schools; and workforce literacy training, job placement and retention services through the career academy and job center. Dorcas Place provides a learning resource center and computer lab; student case management and support services to improve persistence and reduce barriers to achieving goals; and a clothing collaborative program that provides professional clothing for low-income adults transitioning to college and work.

New service initiatives in 2008 include developmental education institutes for reading and math in collaboration with the Community College of Rhode Island and the Nellie Mae Education Foundation and a Rhode Island Welcome Back Center that will provide English language instruction and certification assistance for foreign credentialed immigrant health professionals seeking to practice in Rhode Island.

Brenda Dann-Messier, president of Dorcas Place for the past eight years, serves on the Rhode Island Board of Governors for Higher Education and chairs the academic and student affairs subcommittee. She also serves on the board of the Rhode Island Higher Education Assistance Authority.

John F. Brennan

John F. Brennan became president of Green Mountain College in September 2002. During his first year, he led efforts to consummate a $10 million bond issue, rescued and expanded an ailing Resort Management Program at the college’s satellite campus in Killington and attracted substantial investment by major new vendors.

Brennan led his management team in producing a $2 million unrestricted surplus, bringing a previous deficit to a positive net worth position for the first time in nine years. Four years later, he completed the college’s first successful capital campaign, raising $9.4 million on a goal of $8 million – which included the college’s first and second million-dollar gifts.

During this time, the New England Association of Schools and Colleges reaffirmed Green Mountain College’s accreditation; 25 majors in liberal arts, environmental studies and pre-professional degree programs were maintained.

Brennan ushered in a new academic era at Green Mountain College when he directed the development of two online master’s programs – an M.B.A. in Sustainable Business and an M.S. in Environmental Studies, the first graduate programs in the college’s 173-year history. He has also helped the college become a national environmental leader through leadership in the Eco League of Environmental Colleges, purchasing more than 50 percent of the college’s electricity from Cow Power and signing the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment.

Prior to his role at Green Mountain College, Brennan served for 10 years as the dean of the Sawyer School of Management at Suffolk University.