“Award/Recognition” Class Notes
Laura Platenberg (Col ’87)
Laura Stuart Platenberg (Col ’87) recently competed in the World Masters Track and Field Championships in Perth, Australia. Ms. Platenberg finished fourth in her age group in the 8K cross country race, leading her USA team to third place and a bronze medal. She also competed in the 5K race on the track, where she finished as the first place American runner. At the University, Ms. Platenberg was a member of Pi Beta Phi sorority and played club soccer. She lives in Encinitas, California, where she is an elementary school teacher, with her husband, Scott Platenberg (Engr ’88); and their four children, Torrey, Morgan, Ryan, and Riley.
Robert Rudd (Col ’03)
Robert R. Rudd III (Col ’03) was named a “Young Gun” in 2016 by Mortgage Professional America for his efforts to revitalize the mortgage industry. Rob and his wife, Taylor, reside in Leesburg, Virginia with their two daughters, Penelope and Augusta.
Hillary McClintic (Col ’12 CM)
Hillary McClintic (Col ’12 CM) has been inducted into the Alpha Omega Alpha Medical Honor Society. This award is based on academic merit, leadership activity, research achievements, community service, inter-professionalism, humanism and clinical performance. She is one of six students from the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine’s class of 2017 to be selected for this honor.
Jonathan Moorman (Grad ’04, Med ’91, Res ’94 CM)
Jonathan Moorman (Grad ’04, Med ’91, Res ’94 CM) received the 2016 Distinguished Faculty Award for Research, one of the top three honors given to faculty each year at East Tennessee State University. Winners were nominated by their peers, and each received a medallion, a plaque and a cash prize. Dr. Moorman, who joined the Quillen College of Medicine in 2001, is a professor and vice chair for research and scholarship as well as chief of infectious diseases in the department of internal medicine. His research has focused on mechanisms of immune evasion by chronic viral infection, and he has published more than 60 articles in prestigious medical journals. Dr. Moorman earned both his medical degree and his doctorate from the UVA School of Medicine.
Tracy Shackelford (Col ’89 CM)
Tracy Shackelford (Col ’89 CM) has received a Top Producer 2016 award from Northwestern Mutual for an outstanding year of helping clients achieve financial security. Ms. Shackelford was recognized at the company’s annual meeting in July.
Jason Silverman (Col ’74 CM)
Jason Silverman (Col ’74 CM) has been awarded the Immigrants’ Civil War Award by Long Island Wins, a nonprofit communications organization that focuses on immigration issues on Long Island and beyond. The award, given annually to an academic, author, public historian, scholar or artist who has contributed to the understanding of immigrants during the Civil War era, was awarded for Mr. Silverman’s scholarly work on Lincoln and the Immigrant and for the creation of the new Americans by Belief exhibit at President Lincoln’s Cottage in Washington, among other accomplishments. Mr. Silverman will be retiring next fall after teaching for almost 34 years as a chaired professor of history at Winthrop University in South Carolina and for four years at Yale University.
Mike Lynn (Col ’72 CM)
Mike Lynn (Col ’72 CM) of Texas litigation firm Lynn Pinker Cox & Hurst was named to “Best Lawyers in America” in 2016. Previously, Mr. Lynn was recognized as a “litigation star” and one of the top 100 trial lawyers for 2015 in the country by Benchmark Litigation.
Greg Olsen (Engr ’71 CM)
Greg Olsen (Engr ’71 CM) has been inducted into Cento Amici, a New Jersey philanthropic organization that funds scholarships for underserved students in the state. Mr. Olsen, currently president of GHO Ventures, has served as a research scientist, engineer and entrepreneur, and was the third private citizen to orbit the Earth on the International Space Station. His commitment to education is consistent, and he helps students, especially minorities and women, understand why the varied careers in science, technology, engineering and math are so important.
Joseph Ball (Grad ’70, Grad ’73 CM)
Joseph Ball (Grad ’70, Grad ’73 CM) has been conferred the title of professor emeritus by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors. A member of the university community since 1973, Mr. Ball made significant contributions to the development of a control theory known as robust control, which allows engineers to design for and ensure acceptable performance in the face of interference in sensor signals. His work in operator and systems theories was important to electrical engineering, and he has published more than 240 papers and presented in 26 countries on five continents. In 1997, he was also honored with the Virginia Tech Alumni Award for Research Excellence.
Ronald Hofer (Grad ’73)
Ronald Hofer (Grad ’73) has been named NJC Distinguished Professor by the National Judicial College in Reno, Nevada. He is the first distinguished professor in the college’s 53-year history. Mr. Hofer has taught at NJC since 1994.
Sean Wells (Arch ’95 CM)
Sean Wells (Arch ’95 CM) won first place in a competition of the North American Association of State and Provincial Lotteries, which represents 52 independent lottery organizations. Her Day of the Dead-themed artwork was released on New Mexico Lottery scratchers. A fifth-generation traditional Spanish Colonial artisan, Ms. Wells exhibits at the prestigious Traditional Spanish Market in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Her artwork has appeared on internationally distributed beer labels (Cerveza de los Muertos), national wine labels (La Catrina Vino), and the scratchers. It also has contributed to the branding and logos of many local nonprofits, such as the Day of the Tread Albuquerque bike race, which unveils a new piece by Ms. Wells each year.
John Hudgins (Col ’72 CM)
Selected to Best Lawyers in America 2017 for Personal Injury Litigation-Defense and Medical Malpractice Law-Defendants.
Benjamin Chew (Law ’88)
Benjamin Chew (Law ’88), a litigation partner at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips in Washington, D.C., was inducted as a Fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers in September 2016.
Deliece Blanchard (Col ’75, Grad ’91)
Deliece Blanchard (Col ’75, Grad ’91) has been awarded a fellowship by the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Ms. Blanchard, a painter, will be among 25 Fellows focusing on their own creative projects at a working retreat for visual artists, writers and composers near Sweet Briar College in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
William Ellis (Col ’72 CM)
William Ellis (Col ’72 CM) received the Linda Dégh Lifetime Achievement Award for legend scholarship from the International Society for Contemporary Legend Research in June 2016. Mr. Ellis continues to teach part time in the interdisciplinary studies program of Salisbury University and lives in Berlin, Maryland.
Yolanda Gruendel (Com ’91 CM)
Yolanda Gruendel (Com ’91 CM) received a Distinguished Service Award from the Federal Trade Commission for her contributions during the past two decades. She served as an attorney and leader at the commission, where she dedicated herself to professional and leadership development. She recently left the commission to found Pause for Insight, a professional and leadership coaching firm.
Brittany Perham (Grad ’06)
Brittany Perham (Grad ’06) was selected by Claudia Rankine to win the 2016 Barnard Women Poets Prize for her book, Double Portrait. Perham is a Jones Lecturer in the creative writing program at Stanford University. “It is a huge honor that Double Portrait was chosen by Claudia Rankine,” she says, noting that she taught Rankine’s work in three classes in the past year. Perham describes the poems in her collection as investigations of the relationship to an “other,” linking portraits of lover and beloved, citizen and country, living and dead. As such, she says, “[t]he poems find forms that prioritize mirroring and refrain.” She is currently working on a manuscript of linked prose poems and a memoir-in-essays about managing her relationship to her father (and his legal and financial affairs) after his death.
David Lynn (Grad ’80, Grad ’84)
David Lynn (Grad ’80, Grad ’84) received an O. Henry Award for his short story, “Divergence.” Lynn, a professor of English at Kenyon College and editor of the Kenyon Review, says the award reminds him of his early days at UVA, working with his mentor—and previous O. Henry recipient—Peter Taylor. Lynn’s winning story, “Divergence,” is about a bike accident that leads to subtle but fundamental changes to the main character’s sense of self, connecting the twin fragilities of body and psyche. He says his next project is a book that will trace his regular visits to Exeter, Devon, over the past 40 years, incorporating the area’s local history and examining the threat it faces from climate change.
Vincent Schooler (Engr ’94 CM)
Vincent Schooler (Engr ’94 CM) has been elected president of the Greensboro Medical Society. He is a partner in Eagle Gastroenterology in Greensboro, North Carolina. Dr. Schooler and his wife have two children.
Barbara-Ann Adcock (Educ ’88 CM)
Barbara-Ann Adcock (Educ ’88 CM) is among 213 educators across the nation named as recipients of the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching by President Barack Obama on August 22, 2016. The announcement included both 2014 and 2015 recipients. Up to one science educator and one math educator from each state are named each year. The award, regarded as one of the nation’s top honors for mathematics and science teachers, recognizes teachers who develop and implement high-quality, effective instructional programs. Ms. Adcock, formerly a teacher at Pocahontas Elementary School in Powhatan County, earned the presidential award for K-6th grade science. She is now the STEM coach for Powhatan County Public Schools.
Top