photo by Martha Stewart

Boston Area
Campaign Kicks
Off in Style

The elegant and historic Boston Athenaeum provided the setting for a memorable evening on Wednesday, May 5, as members of the UVM community in the Boston area gathered to kick off the Boston phase of The Campaign for the University of Vermont.

Highlights of the night were remarks by three faculty authors — Robert Manning, professor in the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources, author of Reconstructing Conservation: Finding Common Ground; Melanie Gustafson, associate professor and director of graduate studies in the Department of History and a faculty member in the Women’s Studies Program, author of Women and the Republican Party, 1854-1924; and Major Jackson, assistant professor of English in the College of Arts & Sciences, author of Leaving Saturn.

Pam McDermott ’73 welcomed the approximately 150 Boston-area alumni, parents, and friends, and introduced President Daniel Mark Fogel, who spoke about the importance of the effort in Boston to the success of the overall Campaign. President Fogel gave an update on Campaign progress in Boston and nationally, with special thanks for the work of the Alumni Association’s Boston Regional Board and the Boston Campaign Committee.

The Boston phase of the Campaign runs through June 30, 2005.

Those interested in purchasing the books mentioned above can go directly to the publishers’ Web sites.
Robert Manning, Reconstructing Conservation: Finding Common Ground (Island Press, 2003, http://www.islandpress.org)
Melanie Gustafson, Women and the Republican Party, 1854-1924 (University of Illinois Press, 2001, http://www.press.uillinois.edu)
Major Jackson, Leaving Saturn (University of Georgia Press, 2002, http://www.ugapress.uga.edu)

KELLER FAMILY’S $2.3 MILLION GIFT
SUPPORTS HONORS SEMINAR IN FINANCE
When Professor Jim Gatti began thinking about an honors experience for the top students in the School of Business Administration, he wanted to create something unique. Gatti set out to build an honors experience distinguished by its academic rigor. The result was the Honors Seminar in Finance, which puts students in front of UVM alumni working in the major investment banking markets for a penetrating examination of their analysis of real-world investment decisions.

Now, with a major gift to The Campaign for the University of Vermont, alumnus James R. Keller, Sr. ’72 and his wife, Judith, have established the Keller Family Fund for Honors Preparation in Finance, a $2.3 million commitment that will endow Professor Gatti’s honors seminar and provide additional funding for summer internships and for the student Finance and Investment Club.

“This is remarkable generosity,” said Professor Gatti. “An endowment like this ensures that we'll be able to offer our best students a first-rate honors experience in perpetuity.”

James Keller is senior vice president of Weyerhaeuser, a company he’s been with for some 30 years. “I’ve always looked at UVM as a kind of launching point for my career,” he says. His son, James, Jr., graduated from UVM in 2003 and was a student in Jim Gatti’s first honors seminar. “Absolutely first class” is how Keller describes the UVM experience. “We’re very impressed by the quality of the curriculum and facilities and excited at the direction UVM is taking. We wanted to be able to contribute to its future success with something that will make the student experience even richer.”

James Keller, Jr., is currently working as a financial analyst with investment bankers Houlihan, Lokey, Howard & Zukin in New York City. He says he was excited to learn that his family’s name will be permanently associated with the Honors Seminar in Finance, which he describes as a high point of his experience at UVM. “We spent three intense months analyzing companies, learning about debt markets and risk assessment, and then putting it all together in our presentation,” he says. “It was an amazing experience.”