Nine new trustees elected to Cornell board
At its May 28 meeting, the Cornell University Board of Trustees elected four new trustees to four-year terms: David J. Breazzano, MBA ’80; Alexander D. Hanson ’87; Girish V. Reddy, M.Eng. ’78, MBA ’80; and Jia (Jonathan) Zhu, J.D. ’92.
They join five recently elected trustees representing campus constituencies. Chad Coates, employee-elected trustee; Bruce V. Lewenstein, faculty-elected trustee; and alumni-elected trustees Katrina E. James ’96 and Pamela G. Marrone ’78 were elected to four-year terms. Representing graduate and professional students, Dara Brown ’13, J.D. ’18, was elected to a two-year term.
Their terms begin July 1.
Also at the May 28 meeting, six current trustees were re-elected to additional four-year terms: Mario Cilento, Gary S. Davis ’76, Peggy J. Koenig ’78, Lowell C. McAdam ’76, Barbara G. Novick ’82 and Barton J. Winokur ’61. Donald C. Opatrny ’74 was re-elected to an additional three-year term.
Profiles of the newly elected trustees follow:
Breazzano, who chairs the Johnson Advisory Council, is co-founder, president and chief investment officer of DDJ Capital Management, established in 1996. DDJ manages approximately $7.4 billion for corporate and public retirement funds, insurance companies, endowments and foundations. Breazzano, who earned an MBA from the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management in 1980, previously worked as an executive at Fidelity Investments and T. Rowe Price. In 2013 Breazzano was inducted into Johnson’s Hall of Honor for service and philanthropy. He also sits on the board of trustees of Union College, his undergraduate alma mater.
Brown serves on the Presidential Search Committee and will serve on the board’s Committee on Academic Affairs, Committee on Student Life, Task Force on Student, Faculty and Staff Diversity, and the Trustee Community Communications Committee. As a Cornell undergraduate she was involved in community service and women’s issues initiatives.
Coates, who serves on the Presidential Search Committee, is assistant dean of admissions and academic advising in the College of Arts and Sciences, chairs admissions committees for undergraduate international applicants from the Caribbean, Latin America, Africa and New York, and serves as academic adviser to a cohort of first- and second-year students. He is also a house fellow at Carl Becker House.
Hanson, who serves on the Arts and Sciences Advisory Council, is a senior officer of TGS Management Co., a financial investment company, where he has worked since 1991. He previously ran a hedge fund, Lake Baldwin Management. Hanson was a trustee of D&R Greenway Land Trust, a nonprofit dedicated to the preservation of natural areas in central New Jersey. He studied economics in the College of Arts and Sciences and has led the college’s Major Gifts Committee.
James is strategic operations adviser for secondary and collegiate programs at the Harlem Children’s Zone. She was previously a senior associate at law firms in New York, following a career in social work and academic administration. James served three terms as chair of the Cornell University Council, led the Committee on Alumni Trustee Nominations, the Cornell Black Alumni Association and the Class of 1996.
Lewenstein, who serves on the Presidential Search Committee, is professor of science communication at Cornell, with appointments in the Department of Communication and in the Department of Science and Technology Studies, which he chairs. Trained as a journalist and as a science historian, his research, teaching and service focus on public communication of science and technology.
Marrone, who serves on the CALS Advisory Council, is CEO and founder of Marrone Bio Innovations. The company’s award-winning bio-based products are used in fruit, nut, vegetable and row crop markets and is marketing a product for invasive zebra and quagga mussels. She founded AgraQuest in 1995 and has been recognized as a pioneer in sustainable farming and food. Marrone won the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences’ 2001 Distinguished Alumni Award. She was elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Reddy, who serves on the Board of Trustees Investment Committee, is a member at Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) and co-founder of KKR Prisma, a hedge fund business, and previously was a partner with investment banker Goldman Sachs. Reddy earned a Master of Engineering and an MBA from Cornell. He serves on the executive board of the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad and in 2008 was given the Distinguished Alumnus Award by his undergraduate alma mater, the Indian Institute of Technology Madras.
Zhu, who serves on the Law School Advisory Council, is managing director of Bain Capital Asia, co-head of Bain Capital Private Equity Asia and serves on several corporate boards of directors. Zhu came to Cornell to pursue a Ph.D. in English literature but switched to Cornell Law School, where he earned a J.D. in 1992. He is a board member of Nanjing University in China, where he received a master’s degree.
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