Donna Alvarado, Chair of the Ohio Board of Regents

 

Donna M. Alvarado, of Granville, Ohio, serves as Chair of the Ohio Board of Regents. Regent Alvarado is president of Aguila International, a consulting firm whose practice provides a consortium for businesses and non-profit organizations seeking to collaborate on public policy issues of mutual interest. Regent Alvarado also serves on corporate, foundation and not-for-profit boards of directors. Her prior experience includes service as president and CEO of Quest International, an educational publishing organization with school-based markets in 30 countries.

Regent Alvarado has held senior management positions at the national level as deputy assistant secretary of defense, U.S. Department of Defense; counsel for the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary; and staff member of the U.S. House of Representatives. She also was appointed by President Reagan as director of ACTION, now the Corporation for Community and National Service.

With bachelor’s and master’s degrees earned from The Ohio State University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa and cum laude, Regent Alvarado completed doctoral coursework in Latin American literature at the University of Oklahoma and a postgraduate certificate in financial management at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

She was appointed to the Ohio Board of Regents in 2002.

Dr. Steven Gabbe, Senior Vice President for Health Sciences, The Ohio State University, Chief Executive Officer, The Ohio State University Medical Center

 

Dr. Steven G. Gabbe joined The Ohio State University July 1, 2008, as senior vice president for Health Sciences and chief executive officer of The Ohio State University Medical Center. He received his BA from Princeton University and his MD from Cornell University Medical College. He completed an internship in medicine at New York Hospital and a residency in obstetrics and gynecology at the Boston Hospital for Women in 1975.

 

Dr. Gabbe has served on the faculties of the University of Southern California, the University of Colorado School of Medicine in Denver and nine years at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He was professor and chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at The Ohio State University College of Medicine between 1987 and 1996, and held similar positions at the University of Washington School of Medicine 1996 to 2001. Dr. Gabbe was dean of the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine for seven years prior to returning to Ohio State as senior vice president.

 

Dr. Gabbe is an international expert on high-risk pregnancies and has authored more than 160 peer-reviewed articles and more than 70 book chapters. He is associate editor of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology and has served and on the editorial boards of 15 other publications. He is senior editor of one of the leading textbooks in the field: Obstetrics: Normal and Problem Pregnancies, and he has co-authored five other books.

 

Dr. Gabbe is a member of the Institute of Medicine and co-chairs the Liaison Committee on Medical Education.

 

Donna James, Managing Director, Lardon & Associates LLC, Corporate Director for three Fortune 500 public companies

 

Donna James is the managing director of Lardon & Associates LLC, and a corporate director for three Fortune 500 public companies. As the former president of Nationwide Strategic Investments, and a former executive vice president for Nationwide Insurance and Financial Services, Donna has over 25 years of diverse line and staff business experience at the highest corporate levels. A formal education and beginning as an accounting professional provided the foundation for her growth and effectiveness in both business and community endeavors. During her corporate career she had an opportunity to link financial decisions and business initiatives to well defined people strategies as the senior vice president for human resources. She continued her growth with broader experience in global administrative services before becoming president of a diversified financial services division.

 

As president of Nationwide Strategic Investments, she had direct responsibility for five U.S and global based affiliates, plus a venture capital fund. She also led a new business innovation team with responsibility for discovering, analyzing and commercializing emerging opportunities. Prior to this assignment she was executive vice president and chief administrative officer for Nationwide Mutual Insurance and Financial Services with global responsibility for human capital management, corporate real estate, procurement, security, technology, public relations, advertising, brand management, and aviation.

 

In her roles as a corporate director for Coca Cola Enterprises, Limited Brands, Conseco Inc., and Intimate Brands she has experience serving on the governance, audit, affiliated transaction, compensation, and inclusion committees; as chair of the audit committees for Limited Brands and Coca-Cola Enterprises, and she chaired the special committee for Intimate Brands recombination with Limited Brands. 

 

As the managing director of her own business, Lardon & Associates LLC, she provides advice and counsel to businesses through their board of directors and senior leadership on governance, new business development, strategy, financial management, and organizational and leadership development. Donna is an excellent business and motivational speaker.

 

In her community, Donna is chair of the Center for Healthy Families and a board member of the Women’s Fund of Central Ohio and the Health Policy Institute of Ohio.  She serves as an advisor to the North Carolina A and T State University School of Business, and a faculty member for the Jefferson Academy for Leadership and Governance. Past community roles includes: United Way of America Board of Governors; Bennett College for Women Board of Trustees; chair of the YWCA of Columbus; I Know I Can Board of Trustees; Nationwide Federal Credit Union; and the Wexner Center for the Arts.

 

She has received several recognitions –  elected to the Historically Black Colleges and Universities Hall of Fame in 2007, named in 2005 by Black Enterprise Magazine as one of the top 75  in Corporate America;  received the national Beta Gamma Sigma business achievement award; an honorary doctorate from Tiffin University and the YWCA of Columbus Women of Achievement Award.

 

She is the wife of attorney Larry James partner with Crabbe, Brown, & James in Columbus, Ohio. They have two adult children, Christopher and Justin, and five grandchildren. For more information contact donna.james@lardonassoc.com.

 

john a. powell, J.D., Executive Director, Williams Chair in Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, Moritz College of Law

 

Professor john a. powell is an internationally recognized authority in the areas of civil rights and civil liberties and a wide range of issues including race, structural racism, ethnicity, housing, poverty and democracy. He is Executive Director of the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at The Ohio State University and he holds the Gregory H. Williams Chair in Civil Rights & Civil Liberties at the University’s Michael E. Moritz College of Law.

 

Professor powell has written extensively on a number of issues including structural racism, racial justice and regionalism, concentrated poverty and urban sprawl, opportunity based housing, votingrights, affirmative action in the United States, South Africa and Brazil, racial and ethnic identity, spirituality and social justice, and the needs of citizens in a democratic society. Previously, he founded and directed the Institute on Race and Poverty at the University of

Minnesota. He also served as Director of Legal Services in Miami, Florida and was National Legal Director of the American Civil Liberties Union where he was instrumental in developing

educational adequacy theory.

 

Professor powell has worked and lived in Africa, where he was a consultant to the governments of Mozambique and South Africa. He has also lived and worked in India and done work in South America and Europe. He is one of the co‐founders of the Poverty & Race Research Action Council and serves on the board of several national organizations. Professor powell has taught at numerous law schools including Harvard and Columbia University. He joined the faculty at The Ohio State University in 2002.

 

Karen Schwarzwalder, Regional Executive Director, YWCA Great Lakes Alliance Region

 

Karen Schwarzwalder has served as the Regional Executive Director of the YWCA Great Lakes Alliance Region of the YWCA USA since March 2003. In this capacity, she directs strategic operations for one of nine regional YWCA offices serving 56 YWCA organizations located in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio and Wisconsin. The office plans and implements work to build local association capacity in governance and operations in order to improve ability to achieve the YWCA mission of eliminating racism and empowering women.

 

Prior to this, she served as Chief Executive Officer of the YWCA Columbus for 17 years. YWCA Columbus serves over 40,000 women, men and children annually, who are located in four cities in Central Ohio, through programs of anti-racism, emergency shelter, low income housing, child care and youth services, and wellness programs.

 

From 1995 through 2006, she served as an elected member of the Board of Education of the Columbus Public Schools, a 60,000 student system with an annual budget of over $1 billion.

 

Donn Vickers, General Manager, Kristina Isabelle Dance Company; Adjunct Professor in Arts Administration, The Ohio State University; and Founding Director of The Thurber House, The Jefferson Center for Learning and the Arts, and The Academy for Leadership and Governance

 

Donn Vickers, the retiring executive director of the Academy of Leadership and Governance, has had a kinetic career living in five cities and working in five different professions. In Honolulu and Chicago he taught music in private schools and performed in jazz groups and symphony orchestras. In Rochester he was a Presbyterian clergyman especially involved in the civil rights movement. In Syracuse he did research and development in higher education at the Syracuse University Research Corporation. In Columbus he was the founding director of The Thurber House literary center, and the previous director of the Jefferson Center. Vickers is also an Adjunct Professor in Arts Policy and Administration at The Ohio State University and the General Manager of Kristina Isabelle Dance Company.

 

Arawana Hayashi, The Art of Making a True Move

The conference will close with special guest Arawana Hayashi who will present The Art of Making A True Move, a workshop focused on investigating genuineness and an integrated relationship between body, mind, and environment. For more information please visit: www.arawanahayashi.com.