JOSHUA BOGER ’73, chairman and chief executive officer of Vertex Pharmaceuticals, was recently named as one of 40 Technology Pioneers by the World Economic Forum. Selected for their company’s innovative approach, potential impact, growth and sustainability, proof of concept and leadership, these individuals traveled to Switzerland to participate with other business leaders in the forum. Vertex Pharmaceuticals, a biotechnology corporation, applies an integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to discover, develop and commercialize drugs. In the last three years alone, Vertex has used its proprietary drug discovery capability to advance 12 new drugs into development with the potential to treat debilitating and life-threatening diseases. Boger, a trustee of Wesleyan, received both his master’s and doctoral degrees from Harvard University.
Robert R. Birge, PhD ’72, The Harold S. Schwenk, Sr., Distinguished Chair in Chemistry at the University of Connecticut, has won the 2009 Connecticut Medal of Science, the state’s highest honor for scientists. “Dr. Birge’s pioneering work in protein engineering and biomolecular electronics has led to seminal discoveries in the fields of vision, quantum computation, and protein-based data processing,” said Frank W. Ridley, chairman of the Board of Governors for Higher Education. Birge was the first scientist to propose using proteins to store data. A protein-based disk drive that his research group developed in 1982 was the first such memory device ever produced. (See Graduate Notes for further information.)
Ethan Bronner ’76, assistant editorial page editor of the New York Times, delivered the annual Philip Hallie lecture in the College of Letters Lounge at Wesleyan on Sept. 17, 2003. His talk was titled “The Ethical Challenges of Journalism (As Viewed from the New York Times),” and he drew from his own experiences to discuss the ethical dilemmas reporters face in attempting to cover countries where the flow of information is tightly controlled, such as Syria, versus those where information is freely available, such as Israel. A COL graduate himself, he is a Wesleyan trustee and the author of Battle for Justice: How the Bork Nomination Shook America (1989).
Benjamin Brown ’05 and David Delcourt ’05 are the chief executive officer and chief operating officer of MakeMeSustainable, a venture dedicated to providing individuals and businesses with the knowledge and tools necessary to track energy consumption and environmental impact, as well as identifying and accomplishing sustainable goals. Previously, Brown was an analyst for energy consulting groups. At Wesleyan, he had received the John Plukas and Horace White Awards for excellence in economics, as well as a Davenport Grant for thesis study on climate change and adaptation in the developing world. Delcourt, who majored in economics and Latin American Studies and completed the Certificate of International Relations, was a member of the Omicron Delta Epsilon International Honor Society in Economics. He was previously affiliated with the Bank of America Securities Global Investment Banking Team and NERA Economic Consulting.
Musician Darius Brubeck ’69 received a Rockefeller Foundation residency fellowship, spending November at the Bellagio, Italy, Conference Center in composition and collegial exchange with other artists and scholars. His upcoming winter months will also be filled: “I’ll be taking part in concerts with my father, Dave, and brothers Chris and Dan in London with the London Symphony Orchestra in December, with some dates in Germany following. Will visit New York and vicinity mid-January for the International Association of Jazz Educators Conference, then a Memphis concert Jan. 29,” he says. For further information on Brubeck and his family of musicians, please visit www.brubeckmusic.com.
For the second year in a row, Phillip Buchanan ’92, president of the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP), has been named to The Nonprofit Times “Power and Influence Top 50.” This honor recognizes leaders who have had a major impact on the nonprofit field in the last twelve months, and whose leadership is responding to, and growing with, challenges in the charitable sector. Buchanan joined CEP, which develops comparative data to enable higherperforming foundations, as its first staff member in 2001. He has overseen the growth of the Cambridge, Massachusettsbased organization to a staff of 30, with a new office in San Francisco slated to open in October. He was a government major at Wesleyan and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School. His past experience includes strategy consulting at the Bostonbased Parthenon Group and six years in higher education administration, as assistant to the presidents of Wesleyan University and Mount Holyoke College.
Nancy Campbell, MALS ’80 and former first lady of Wesleyan, recently earned the National Trust’s Louise Du Pont Crowninshield Award for her dedication to historic preservation, extending over more than 25 years. After several years serving on state historical trusts, in 1983 Campbell was nominated to the National Trust’s Board of Advisors and was later selected to serve on the Board of Trustees. Marking an important milestone in history, in 1966 Campbell was chosen as the first woman chair of the Trust and successfully led the Campaign for America’s Historic Places to vastly exceed its fundraising goals. President of the trust Richard Moe, says Campbell, “epitomizes the spirit of volunteerism that is the bedrock of preservationalism.”
Barbara Casey ’71 was honored at the 10th annual Angels in Adoption awards ceremony, held in Washington, D.C. The program is organized by The Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute to raise awareness about children, in foster care and orphaned, in need of permanent, loving homes; Senator Arlen Specter nominated Casey, who directs Adoption Associates, LLC, a licensed Pennsylvania adoption agency, and also heads a law firm specializing in adoption issues. She is a fellow of the Pennsylvania Academy of Adoption Attorneys, the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys, and Resolve. She earned a master’s degree, as well as a JD, from the University of Pennsylvania.
TriWest Healthcare Alliance, the largest contractor for the U.S. Department of Defense, headquartered in Arizona, named Blake Chaffee ’73 vice president of the Behavioral Health division. He will oversee the administration of the psychological health programs offered in the government’s TriCare System. Chaffee, a former Navy clinical psychologist and widely published author, earned a Ph.D. and a master’s degree in psychology at American University.
Prince Chambliss ’70 was named one of America’s leading litigators by Black Enterprise magazine. Chambliss, a partner with Stokes, Bartholomew, Evans & Petree, in Memphis, Tenn., is a graduate of Harvard Law School, with more than 30 years of litigation and mediation experience. “He has been lead counsel in jury trial verdicts in areas ranging from contractual disputes to class action personal injury suits to insurance and securities fraud,” the magazine notes, in addition to being “the first African American partner of a majority law firm in his state and the first African American president of the Memphis Bar Association.” Other attorneys named in this all-star list include Michele Roberts ’77 and Ted Shaw ’76.
