Symposium Biographies
KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Don Michael Randel, President, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Don Randel is a musicologist who attended Princeton University, where he received bachelor's, master's, and doctorate degrees in music. His scholarly specialty is the music of the Middle Ages and Renaissance in Spain and France. As a music historian, Mr. Randel is widely published, particularly on medieval liturgical chant, and he has also written on such varied topics as Arabic music theory, Latin American popular music, and 15th century French music and poetry.
In 1968, Mr. Randel joined the Cornell University faculty in the department of music. He served for 32 years as a member of Cornell's faculty, where he was also department chair, vice-provost, and associate dean and then dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. He became provost of Cornell University in 1995.
From July 2000 until he joined the Foundation in July 2006, Mr. Randel held the position of President of the University of Chicago. There he led efforts to strengthen the humanities and the arts on campus, as well as a broad range of interactions with the City of Chicago and a further strengthening of the University's programs in the physical and biomedical sciences and its relationship with the Argonne National Laboratory. He also led the University's campaign for $2 billion, the largest in the University's history.
Mr. Randel served as the editor of the Journal of the American Musicological Society. He is also editor of the Harvard Dictionary of Music 4th ed., published in 2003, the Harvard Biographical Dictionary of Music, published in 1996, and the Harvard Concise Dictionary of Music and Musicians, published in 1999.
THE CHANGING CLIMATE OF U.S. CLIMATE CHANGE POLICY
Norman C. Craig '57, Moderator, is Emeritus Professor of Chemistry at Oberlin College. He received a B.A. in chemistry from Oberlin and an M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard. Dr. Craig has published a text on chemical thermodynamics and 125 papers. He has won numerous awards, including: Oberlin College's Harry N. Holmes Prize in Chemistry, a National Science Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship, Oberlin College Research Status Fellowships, a National Science Foundation Science Faculty Fellowship, an American Chemical Society/ Chemical Manufacturers Association Catalyst Award for Excellence in Teaching Chemistry, an American Chemical Society Award for Research in an Undergraduate Institution, an Oberlin College Distinguished Teaching Award, and an Oberlin College Alumni Award. He originated the teaching of the course, "Chemistry and the Environment," was an early member of the Environmental Studies Program committee, and more recently served on the Environmental Policy Advisory Committee, which developed the environmental policy statement for the college.
Panelists:
Karen Florini '79, Senior Attorney, Climate Program, Environmental Defense, focuses on enactment of federal climate-change legislation. She also oversees Environmental Defense's work on climate-change issues in Florida. Ms. Florini double-majored in biology and environmental policy at Oberlin and earned the JD degree from Harvard University Law School, where she was editor-in-chief of the Harvard Environmental Law Review. Ms. Florini clerked for Judge John Fullam of the U.S. District Court (Pennsylvania) and then served in the U.S. Department of Justice's Land and Natural Resources Division for three years before joining Environmental Defense in 1987. She serves as a trustee for Oberlin College as well as for the Reef Environmental Education Fund.
Michael Oppenheimer is the Albert G. Milbank Professor of Geosciences and International Affairs in the Woodrow Wilson School and the Department of Geosciences at Princeton University. He is also the current Director of the Program in Science, Technology and Environmental Policy (STEP) at the Woodrow Wilson School and Faculty Associate of the Atmospheric and Ocean Sciences Program, Princeton Environmental Institute, and the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies. He joined the Princeton faculty after more than two decades with Environmental Defense, a non-governmental, environmental organization, where he served as chief scientist and manager of the Global and Regional Atmosphere Program. Dr. Oppenheimer received an S.B. in chemistry from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a Ph.D. in chemical physics from the University of Chicago, and pursued post-doctoral research at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.
David W. Orr is the Paul Sears Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics at Oberlin College. He is also a James Marsh, Professor at large at the University of Vermont. He holds a B.A. from Westminster College, an M.A. from Michigan State University, and a Ph.D. in International Relations from the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Orr is the author of five books. He is best known for his pioneering work on environmental literacy in higher education and his recent work in ecological design. He raised funds for and spearheaded the effort to design and build a $7.2 million Environmental Studies Center at Oberlin College, a building described by the New York Times as "the most remarkable" of a new generation of college buildings and by the U.S. Department of Energy as one of thirty "milestone buildings" of the 20th century.
INEQUALITY AND SOCIAL JUSTICE: A WORLD VIEW
Ronald Kahn, Moderator, James Monroe Professor of Politics and Law at Oberlin College, received his B.A. from Rutgers and his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He is a specialist on constitutional law, legal theory, and American political development. He is author of The Supreme Court & Constitutional Theory: 1953-1993 (2004), co-author of The Supreme Court and American Political Development (2006), and has published articles in political science and law journals, as well as book chapters on constitutional law, the Supreme Court, and judicial process. He teaches courses on American constitutional law, constitutional theory and practice, and American political development. In 2006, Professor Kahn received the Teaching and Mentoring Award from the Organized Section on Law and Courts of the American Political Science Association. He now is leading efforts to inaugurate the Oberlin Law Scholars Program.
Panelists:
Jacqueline A. Berrien '83, is Associate Director-Counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and a trustee of Oberlin College. She has taught trial advocacy at Harvard and Fordham law schools and is also an Adjunct Professor of Law at New York Law School. Ms. Berrien previously served as a Program Officer of the Ford Foundation Peace and Social Justice Program, overseeing $13 million in grant making in the areas of political participation and equality. She has served as an attorney with the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the ACLU Women's Rights Project, and the National Legal Department in New York City. Ms. Berrien is a native of Washington, DC, and since 1987 has lived in Brooklyn, NY, with her husband, Peter M. Williams, executive director of a community economic development corporation. Ms. Berrien received a B.A. with High Honors in Government from Oberlin College and the J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Francisco X. Dominguez '89 is a shareholder in the law firm of DOMINGUEZ & COYLE, PLLC, focused primarily in the area of employment and civil rights law. The majority of his practice involves representing plaintiffs, but has, in the past, included representation of small employers and serving as the City Attorney for the City of Socorro, Texas. Mr. Dominguez received his B.A. degree in History and Latin American Studies from Oberlin College, his J.D. degree from I.I.T. - Chicago-Kent College of Law, and was a summer fellow at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy at Princeton University. He is currently on the Board of Directors for the Texas Employment Lawyers Association and the Mexican-American Bar Association of El Paso County.
Kenneth N. Kuttner, the Danforth-Lewis Professor of Economics at Oberlin College, received his Ph.D. from Harvard in 1989. He has published numerous articles in the fields of macroeconomics, monetary policy, and financial economics. His research has addressed such issues as the role of monetary aggregates and interest rates in monetary policy, inflation targeting, the estimation of potential output, and the reaction of financial markets to unanticipated changes in Federal Reserve policy.
Prior to joining Oberlin College, Mr. Kuttner was an Assistant Vice President in the Research departments of the Federal Reserve Banks of New York and Chicago, where he specialized in the analysis of monetary policy issues. Mr. Kuttner is a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and currently serves an associate editor of the Journal of Money, Credit and Banking.
Michael A. Santoro '76 is an Associate Professor (with tenure) at Rutgers Business School and the Rutgers Center for Global Change and Governance. He holds a Ph.D. in Public Policy from Harvard University, a J.D. from New York University, an A.B. from Oberlin College and he was a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Hong Kong. Professor Santoro is the editor of Ethics and the Pharmaceutical Industry: Business, Government, Professional and Advocacy Perspectives (Cambridge 2005) and author of Profits and Principles: Global Capitalism and Human Rights in China (Cornell 2000). Santoro teaches MBA courses on the Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Global Business, the Ethical and Legal Aspects of the Pharmaceutical Industry, Business Ethics, Business Law, and an undergraduate course on Business, Government and Society.
ART IN A GLOBAL CULTURE: A FEARLESS PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE
David H. Stull '89, Moderator, is Dean of the Conservatory of Music at Oberlin. After earning a BMus degree in tuba performance and a BA in English literature, he pursued further study at the Juilliard School in the American Brass Quintet program and earned an MM at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Stull has also served as associate director of admissions at the Juilliard School, overseeing all aspects of the admissions process and serving as liaison for the Juilliard Opera Center and the Barnard, Columbia, and Juilliard exchange program. Prior to that, he was a member of the brass faculty, the director of conservatory admissions, and ultimately the assistant dean of the Lawrence University Conservatory of Music in Appleton, Wisconsin.
Panelists:
Matt Albert '97, violinist/violist, was born and raised in Winchester, Virginia. He is a founding member of eighth blackbird, with whom he has received numerous awards, including first prizes at the Naumburg, Concert Artists Guild, Coleman, and Fischoff Competitions, and special recognition for their contributions to contemporary music from the American Music Center and Chamber Music America. With the other members of eighth blackbird he holds concurrent teaching positions at the University of Richmond and the University of Chicago. His principal teachers include Kenneth Sarch, Gregory Fulkerson, Kurt Sassmannshaus, and Almita Vamos. Matt holds degrees from Oberlin College and Conservatory (B.Mus. violin and B.A. English), the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (A.D. chamber music), and Northwestern University School of Music (M.M. violin).
Jennifer Koh '97, violinist, earned a BA in English literature at Oberlin College and a PD from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. In her career, she is said to dazzle audiences with her ability to fuse intensity of temperament with classical poise and elegance. The New York Times describes her as a "fearless soloist" who has a formidable capacity for "living through" the music she performs on stage. Ms. Koh is committed to exploring connections between the pieces she plays, searching for similarities of voice between different composers and within the works of a single composer. Accordingly, her programs often present rare and revealing juxtapositions, offering works by composers as divergent as Mozart and Ornette Coleman, Schubert and Wuorinen. A virtuoso performer with a probing intellect, Ms. Koh maintains a lively interest in writing and literature.
Charles Michener was a longtime senior editor at The New Yorker and, previously, the senior editor for cultural affairs at Newsweek. His profiles about notable figures in the arts have appeared in The New Yorker, Time, Newsweek, Vanity Fair, Esquire and Town and Country, and he writes a classical music column for The New York Observer. He is the co-author of three books of memoirs, The Kid Stays in the Picture (with Robert Evans), Ghost of a Chance (with Peter Duchin) and The Toughest Show on Earth: My Rise and Reign at the Metropolitan Opera (with Joseph Volpe). He is currently working on two books for Knopf: The Hidden City, an examination of Cleveland's efforts to re-invent itself, and an oral biography of the filmmaker Robert Altman. A native of Cleveland, he has degrees from Yale and Columbia. He lives in New York City and Cleveland.
Jill Snyder has been Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland since November 1996. A museum professional for over 20 years, Snyder has held administrative and educational positions at the Guggenheim Museum and Museum of Modern Art in New York City, and served as Director of The Aldrich Museum in Ridgefield, CT, and the Freedman Gallery at Albright College in Reading, PA. She received her B.A. from Wesleyan University and conducted graduate studies in art history at New York University's Institute of Fine Art. Ms. Snyder is co-founder of the national Contemporary Art Museum Directors Association.
Rick Sperling '89 is Founder and CEO of the award-winning Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit. In its 15th year, Mosaic is a national model for youth development through the arts. Mosaic's critically-acclaimed Youth Ensemble has performed at the Kennedy Center, the White House, in 25 states throughout the U.S., and in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Mosaic has been featured on NBC's Today Show, NPR's All Things Considered, and in American Theatre Magazine and The Wall Street Journal. Mosaic's professional-level theatre and music training programs empower Detroit youth to strive for excellence on stage and in life. In an area with staggering dropout rates, 95% of Mosaic's Youth Ensemble members have gradated from high school and gone on to college. Sperling won awards in both sociology and drama while pursuing his B.A. at Oberlin. Recently he was awarded the Detroit Free Press "Lee Hills Award for Lifetime Achievement in Theatre."
EMERGING CHALLENGES IN SCIENCE
Yolanda Cruz, Moderator, received her BS and MS degrees from the University of the Philippines and her Ph.D. degree from the University of California (Berkeley). She has been on the Oberlin faculty since 1986, where she teaches courses at all levels in the Department of Biology and conducts research related to embryonic development in marsupials. Dr. Cruz currently serves as the Convenor in the Division of Natural and Mathematical Sciences at Oberlin College. Dr. Cruz's professional affiliations include the Society for Reproduction and Fertility, Society for the Study of Reproduction, Society for Developmental Biology (Member, Education Committee), American Association for the Advancement of Science (elected Council Delegate and to Committee on Council Affairs), Project Kaleidoscope, and Council for Undergraduate Research (elected Councilor, 2004-2007).
Panelists:
Stuart Card '66, is senior fellow in human/computer interaction at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center. He majored in physics at Oberlin, received his Ph.D. in psychology from Carnegie Mellon, and worked with the group at the Palo Alto Research Center that invented and perfected the computer mouse. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and is considered the leading expert on man-machine interactions.
Jacob A. Gayle '79 has focused his professional career around global health diplomacy. After majoring in Psychobiology at Oberlin, he earned an M.S. in Preventive Medicine, an M.A. in Community Health Education and Ph.D. in Community/International Health from The Ohio State University. While also teaching health education and public health at Kent State University, Dr. Gayle began his commitment to working against HIV/AIDS as consultant to the Ohio Department of Health's AIDS Activities Unit. Leaving his position at Kent State as a newly-tenured associate professor to join the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in 1989, Jacob spent 16 years serving in various capacities worldwide through CDC, including assignments to the Carter Center, US Agency for International Development (USAID), United Nations AIDS Program (UNAIDS), World Bank and US Embassies. In 2005, Gayle left CDC to join the Ford Foundation as Deputy Vice President responsible for its Global HIV/AIDS Initiative.
Pamela Hines '74 is a senior editor at Science, the international weekly journal published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and manages Science's Education Forum, with a focus on science education and the science of education. She is an expert in the field of developmental and molecular biology, and has expanded Science's leadership role in highlighting developmental neurobiology, developmental biology, plant sciences, and stem cell research. While obtaining her degrees, she conducted research on chromatin, gene control, and the mechanisms of DNA replication in eukaryotes during early development. Throughout that time, Dr. Hines taught various subjects, including vertebrate physiology, comparative anatomy, and developmental and molecular biology. Her areas of interest include developmental neurobiology, stem cells, education, plant science, and developmental biology. Dr. Hines received her A.B. from Oberlin College, her M.S. degree from the University of Wisconsin, and her Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University.
