Saturday, Feb. 10, the College of William and Mary Alumni Association held the annual Alumni Medallion and Service Awards Ceremony. The ceremony honors alumni of the College who have made considerable impacts on their community and the school.
The Alumni Association gives several awards in this ceremony, including the Douglas M. Morton Alumni Service Awards and Young Alumni Service Awards, the Coach of the Year Award, the Faculty and Staff Service Award, the Alumni Civic and Humanitarian Leadership Award and the Alumni Medallion, which is the highest honor bestowed by the association.
College Chancellor Robert Gates ’65 opened the event with a few remarks about the College.
“As I have said, William and Mary, this community of learning, listening and working through issues, rooted in the original soil and basic principles of American liberty, has a special role and a special obligation to be part of the solution to the challenges facing our country and the world. It’s heartening each year to find more and more solution finders who call William and Mary home,” Gates said.
The newest award given this year is the Alumni Civic and Humanitarian Leadership Award, which went to Steven E. McNamee ’81. According to the William and Mary Magazine, at Swansboro Elementary School, McNamee led the “Men of Swansboro” program for boys in the third through fifth grades to learn life skills and etiquette. He was also inducted into the William and Mary Athletics Hall of Fame in 1995 in recognition of his football career at the College and his leadership in raising over two million dollars for football scholarships.
Three alumni received the Douglas N. Morton ’62 Young Alumni Service Awards. The award’s namesake was deeply involved in volunteer work at the College, including serving on the board of the William and Mary Foundation. The award honors more recent College graduates for their outstanding service.
“Though these recipients are within ten years of their graduation, they have already accomplished so much,” President of the Alumni Association Tina Reynolds Kenny ’92, P ’24, P ’27 said.
Reynolds presented the awards to the recipients Kelsey M. Carpenter ’15, M.P.P. ’16, Alexandra G. “Ally” Phillips ’16 and Carlton R. Smith ’15, M.ED. ’17.
Another trio of alumni also received the Douglas N. Morton ’62 Alumni Service Awards. The recipients were Ashley V. Glacel ’02, Katherine “Kathy” Dalton Mika ’79, P ’09 and Luis H. Navas ’82, P ’13.
The association also awarded head football coach Mike London the “Coach of the Year” award.
“This [award] was established in 1996 to recognize exceptional coaches at William and Mary. In addition to their success in competition, the award also seeks to honor coaches that mentor and motivate their players,” Reynolds said.
London led the team to the quarterfinal round of the National Collegiate Athletic Association Football Championship Subdivision playoffs as conference champions with a school-record 10 wins during the 2022 regular season.
The staff service award this year went to Director of the William and Mary Washington Center Roxane O. Adler Hickey M.ED. ’02, ED.D. ’23. As leader of the Washington Center, she established the William and Mary Washington Center Advisory Board in 2018, which financially supports students to increase accessibility to the center’s programs and provides a platform for alumni input in the Center’s goals and activities. Hickey also teaches a class at the center.
The association’s highest award, the Alumni Medallion, went to former College Rector Todd A. Stottlemyer ’85, P ’16, P ’21 and Pamela Jordan Penny ’77.
Penny serves as a trustee of the William and Mary Foundation and previously served on the Raymond A. Mason School of Business Accounting Programs board. She and her husband, James D. Penny J.D. ’83, have also donated to the College of William and Mary Law School, creating the school’s atrium space, named the Penny Commons, and the Penny Professorship of Law. They also created a professorship and several scholarships at the Mason School of Business.
In her acceptance speech, Penny reflected on her time spent at the College.
“I’ve always appreciated what my William and Mary education did for me,” Penny said. “It gave me the confidence to tackle complicated issues in business and in my life. I’ve been willing to take on new projects, make tough decisions, provide leadership to teams because I have confidence in my abilities to solve problems, to make the future better. I doubt I could do that without my William and Mary education.”
A freshman roommate of former College Rector Michael K. Powell ’85, D.P.S. ’02, Stottlemyer also serves as a trustee of the William and Mary Foundation. He led the College’s Board of Visitors from 2013 to 2018. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the College in 1985, studying on a football scholarship. He helped lead the “For the Bold” fundraising campaign for the College and the William and Mary Promise initiative.
Outside of his service to the College, Stottlemyer has also served on various company boards and leadership teams, including as former president and managing director of McGuireWoods Consulting. He currently serves as the chief executive officer and board member of Acentra Health.
In Stottlemyer’s acceptance speech, he also remarked on his time spent at the College.
“A friend asked me this week ‘what makes William and Mary special?’ I had to think about it a little bit. But my answer to him is that William and Mary really excels at producing servant leaders in business and government, nonprofits, sports, the arts, and many other professions. You see, servant leaders focus on ‘we,’ not ‘I.’ They understand the difference between what author David Brooks in his book ‘Road to Character’ characterizes as ‘resume virtues’ and ‘eulogy virtues.’ And most importantly, they understand that the latter is more important than the former,” Stottlemyer said.
Attendees James “Jim” Ukrop ’60, L.H.D. ’99 and Barbara Berkeley Ukrop ’61 commented on the commendableness of this year’s awards recipients.
“It’s a great ceremony and well-deserved people,” said Barbara Ukrop.