Five alumni to be honored at 2023 Alumni Weekend celebration
The College of Wooster will honor five alumni with awards at this year’s Alumni Weekend celebration, set for June 8 through 11, 2023. The honored alumni include Laura Tuennerman ’88, who will receive the John D. McKee Alumni Volunteer Award, Beverly Brooks ’08, who will receive the Outstanding Young Alumni Award, and Steve Gault ’73, who will receive the Sara L. Patton Stewardship Award. This year’s Distinguished Alumni Award Winners include Jennifer Haverkamp ’79 and Ed Gilbert ’73. The College of Wooster’s advancement staff and members of the Alumni Board selected the recipients in recognition of their professional achievements and philanthropic efforts.
Photo provided by Laura Tuennerman
Tuennerman is a professor of history at PennWest California, where she’s taught for the last 25 years. She is an expert in issues of race, gender, and class in the United States in the 19th and 20th centuries. She also serves on the advisory board for PennWest California’s women’s studies program. Tuennerman graduated from the University of Delaware in 1990 with an M.A. in history and received her Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota Minneapolis in 1997, also in history. Her first book, Helping Others, Helping Ourselves: Power, Giving, and Community Identity in Cleveland, Ohio, 1880-1930 was published in 2001, and she co-authored At the Border of Empires: The Tohono O’odham, Gender, and Assimilation, 1880-1934, in 2013. She served as a cultural resources committee member for the National Council on Public History from 2002 to 2005. Tuennerman is a member of the Washington County Historical Society and is the director of the American Democracy Project at PennWest California. A Wooster history graduate, she was the Class of 1988 class secretary until 2003 and served on the Alumni Board until 2009. Currently, Tuennerman is a regional ambassador for the College, is part of the Notecard Writer campaign and is an interviewer for Global Interview Day. She has also served as an alumni admissions representative.
Photo courtesy St. Mary’s Episcopal School
Brooks is the director of college counseling at St. Mary’s Episcopal School. After receiving her B.A. in classical studies from Wooster, she served as assistant director of admissions at Rhodes College and associate director of college guidance at St. George’s Independent School. She returned to Wooster in 2015 as an admissions specialist and also served as diversity and inclusion consultant at Holland Hall School during that time. Brooks received her M.S.Ed. in Education, Culture, & Society from the University of Pennsylvania, and worked as director of academics & college counseling at YSC Academy, a position she held until 2021. Since 2014, she has volunteered with Baptist Centers for Good Grief and served as a member on the Point Foundation Scholar Selection Committee. Brooks is a former member of NCAA High School Advisory Board, the Memphis In May International Festival Inc. Education Committee, and served as the Southern Association for College Admission Counseling (SACAC) Conference Service Project co-chair from 2012 to 2015. She is also former Girl Scouts of the USA college knowledge advisor. At Wooster, Brooks is an advisor for Fighting Scots Career Connections and an active volunteer with the Notecard Writing Campaign. She was a member of her Reunion Committee and volunteered during several Scots-in-Service programs. She previously served on the Alumni Board from 2016-18 and has been an interviewer for Global Interview Day.
Photo provided by Steve Gault
Gault is the founder and president of Stephen C. Gault Co., a Louisville, Kentucky-based commercial/industrial real estate brokerage and development company established in 1991. For his work, he has received numerous awards, including the inaugural March of Dimes Commercial Real Estate Achievement Award “given annually to an individual whose commercial real estate activities and community service have significantly enhanced the Kentuckiana area.” Before establishing his own company, Gault worked as a real estate broker for fifteen years at Harry K. Moore & Son, now operating as JLL. He earned his degree in sociology at The College of Wooster and received his MBA from the University of Kentucky in 1976. Gault currently serves as a board member of The Morton Center (a Louisville outpatient treatment center for chemically dependent individuals and families), the Louisville Free Public Library Foundation, Greater Louisville Inc. (the Louisville Chamber of Commerce), The University of Louisville Real Estate Foundation (current board chair), and the University of Louisville President’s Council. Gault is a member of the Class of 1973 Reunion Committee and a trustee emeritus on the Board of Trustees where he has served since 2002.
Photo courtesy Graham Sustainability Institute
Haverkamp is the director of the Graham Sustainability Institute at the University of Michigan and an internationally recognized expert on climate change, international trade, and global environmental policy and negotiations. She is also a professor from practice at Michigan Law School, teaching courses on international environmental law and trade and sustainability law, and a professor of practice at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy. Prior to that, she served as special representative for environment and water resources, with personal rank of ambassador, in the U.S. Department of State. In 2016, she also led negotiations of a UN climate agreement for global civil aviation, and oversaw diplomatic engagement in transboundary water management, water conflicts, and global water governance. Her career in government also included nearly a decade as the Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Environment and Natural Resources in the Executive Office of the President, and posts at the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Justice. After graduating from Wooster with a B.A. in Biology as the senior speaker and recipient of the Dan F. Lockhart award, Haverkamp earned an M.A. in politics and philosophy from Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar and a J.D. from Yale Law School. Haverkamp is an active member of Wooster’s alumni community. She has served on the Board of Trustees, chairing several committees and serving on presidential and provost search committees. She is a campaign volunteer, a former member of the D.C. Leadership Group, an APEX volunteer, and delivered the Commencement address for the Class of 2015.
Photo provided by Edward L. Gilbert
Gilbert is the owner of Edward L. Gilbert Co., L.P.A., a private law practice specializing in civil rights and unemployment law. In this role, he serves as legal counsel for NAACP for several Ohio cities. Since 2011, Gilbert has served as president of the Akron/Canton Barristers Association. He is a former member of the Akron Urban League, the Great Trail Council of Boys Scouts of America, and the Akron Bar Grievance Committee. In 2017, he was appointed by the Ohio State Legislature as a member of the Constitutional Modernization Commission, and he is an emeritus member of the Advisory Group for the U.S. Northern District of Ohio. Gilbert has been involved with several international ‘legal tours’ to review systems and civil rights processes, including a 2001 tour to Europe and West Africa, a 1991 tour to South Africa, and a 1987 tour to Kenya. In 2015, Gilbert published his autobiography Swallowing Nickels: A Memoir of a Welfare Child. He went on to testify before the Ohio Senate Finance Committee in support of HB 50, which extends financial support for foster children until the age of 21. The bill passed later that year in September 2016. Gilbert is the recipient of numerous awards, including a Certificate of Appreciation from Akron Bar Association Diversity Committee (2008), the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Akron School of Law (2006), the NAACP’s National Outstanding Corporate Membership Award (1999), the NAACP’s Outstanding Legal Counsel Award (1984), and the Criminal Justice Award from the Black Law Enforcement Officers Association (1988). At Wooster, Gilbert is an active member of the Black Alumni Council and his 50th Reunion Committee, and was a featured speaker at the 2013 and 2016 Africana Studies Seminars.
The awardees will be recognized at the Outstanding Scots Ceremony during the Celebration of Wooster, which will take place on Saturday, June 10, at 10:30 a.m. in McGaw Chapel during the 2023 celebration of Alumni Weekend. The four-day celebration June 8 through 11 is filled with events including reunion celebrations, campus tours, the Parade of Classes, and other fun and educational activities. For a full schedule of events visit the Alumni Weekend home page.
Posted in News on May 10, 2023.
