Standing before hundreds of faculty, staff and fellow alumni, H. Lewis “Lew” Rapaport ’59 B.A. (AmSt) credited the Maxwell School for his education and for giving him “the foundation” to be involved in numerous charities and organizations throughout his life.

And, after reflecting some on his storied career as chairman and CEO of Component Assembly Systems, he said what has been a guiding principle: “If you make a success in any way, shape or form, share it.”

Rapaport, who has played a key role in the construction of some of this country’s most iconic structures such as One World Trade Center (Freedom Tower), the 9/11 Memorial Museum, Carnegie Hall and Yankee Stadium, was on stage in the Goldstein Auditorium on the evening of Friday, Oct. 18, to accept the Maxwell School’s Centennial Changemaker Award in Economic Development.

A longtime Maxwell Advisory Board member, Rapaport and his wife, Susan, established the Susan and H. Lewis Rapaport Endowed Scholarship in 2018 to support undergraduate study in history or political science. He is a Life Trustee of the USS Constitution Museum in Boston and a member of the Patriots Circle of the World War ll Museum in New Orleans. He also served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army and graduated from the U.S. Army Artillery and Missile School at Fort Sill, Oklahoma.

Rapaport was one of four alumni honored at the school’s Syracuse Centennial Celebration. The event, which capped a year of festivities commemorating Maxwell’s 100th anniversary, also included award presentations to students, faculty and staff.

“Maxwell’s founders in 1924, and we today, believe strongly that public service and citizen engagement are the foundations of our mission of scholarship, teaching, professional development and public impact,” Dean David M. Van Slyke said. “We’ve come a long way in the 10 decades since our founding, from offering a range of highly regarded undergraduate and graduate programs and sharing in the world being a better place for all.”

In addition to Rapaport, alumni honorees were as follows:

John Mandyck ’89 B.A. (PSt)/’92 M.P.A., CEO of the nonprofit Urban Green Council, received the Centennial Changemaker Award in Environmental Stewardship. Prior to joining Urban Green in 2018, he spent 25 years at Fortune 45 United Technologies Corporation working with global brands such as Carrier air conditioning systems, Otis elevators and Pratt & Whitney jet engines. He is an adjunct professor at the University of Connecticut School of Business. Previously, he was a visiting scientist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He is the founding chair of the Corporate Advisory Board for the World Green Building Council and former chair of Urban Green. He is the co-author of the book “Food Foolish,” which explores the hidden connection between food waste, hunger and climate change.

Sharon Owens ’85 B.A. (Econ), deputy mayor of the City of Syracuse, received the Centennial Changemaker Award in Government Leadership. As deputy mayor and chief of staff to Mayor Ben Walsh ’05 M.P.A., she oversees a portfolio of city programs and services, including the departments of Neighborhood and Business Development; Parks, Recreation and Youth Programs; Police; and Fire. She previously worked as the city’s deputy commissioner of neighborhood and business development. She was chief executive officer of Syracuse Community Connections from 2013–17; homeownership director of Home HeadQuarters Inc. from 2007–09; assistant director of Jubilee Homes, Inc.; and spent more than a decade as family service director of P.E.A.C.E. Inc.

Kathryn Ruscitto ’92 M.A. (PA), who retired as president and CEO of St. Joseph’s Health in Syracuse following an esteemed 30-year career, received the Centennial Changemaker Award in Community Health. At St. Joseph’s Health, Ruscitto led 5,000 employees and an annual budget exceeding $800 million, and invested in projects to revitalize the community and improve community-based access for care, housing and jobs, including the construction of a green, state-of-the-art patient tower. Previously, Ruscitto was senior vice president of Loretto Health and Onondaga County’s administrator for human services. She is a founding board member and chair of grants for the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation, and immediate past chair of View Arts Center in Old Forge, New York.

Gladys McCormick, associate dean for diversity, equity and inclusion, presented Dean’s Centennial Citations for Excellence to four staff members: Sarah W. McLaughlin ’04 (Arts & Sciences), Dan Nelson ’04 M.P.A., Amy Schmidt ’14 M.P.A., Deborah Toole ’12 B.A. (Hist).

“The nominations of the awardees for the Dean’s Centennial Citations shared many phrases in common: ambassadors for the school; embodying the Athenian Oath; generous mentors; always willing to go above and beyond; essential members of our community,” she said.

McLaughlin, assistant director of advancement operations, is highly regarded for her dedication, supportive nature and breadth of institutional knowledge. Her ties with Syracuse University go back to her days attending the Bernice Wright nursery school on south campus. She has served as an information coordinator, office coordinator, administrative assistant, interim executive assistant and assistant director. She has long been involved with Maxwell’s Holiday Exchange Committee, leading it as chair for more than 10 years. She was elected to the inaugural Maxwell Staff Council in fall 2019, and she served on the Staff Appreciation and Recognition Committee from 2019-23, serving as its chair for two years.

Nelson, director of accelerated learning and global engagement, has been with Maxwell for over 20 years and oversees Executive Education’s training and research programs with foreign partners. He is instrumental in building engagements within Asia and the Middle East, including leadership of Maxwell’s longtime partnership with India. Additionally, he develops strategy and institutional support for Maxwell’s use of micro-credentials and digital badges to support students and short courses. He also leads the State and Local Initiative, serves as an advisory committee member for the South Asia Center of the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs, and previously served as the elected chair for the Section on International and Comparative Administration at the American Society for Public Administration.

Schmidt, assistant director of the Citizenship and Civic Engagement (CCE) Undergraduate Program, got her start as a staff member in 2018 as a program coordinator. She is engaged in not only academic programming and supporting students, but also with numerous school committees and initiatives. She has served on the MaxPro Planning Committee since November 2018 and served as a Community Engagement Roundtable facilitator; an academic integrity advisor; a SEM 100/FYS 101 lead facilitator; and as an advisor for the Maxwell Living Learning Community. Since August 2023, she has chaired the Maxwell Staff Council. She is a graduate of the University’s Women in Leadership Program and has been honored with a Maxwell Champion Award (2021) and, this year, a Chancellor’s Citation for Excellence for Outstanding Contributions to the Student Experience and University Initiatives.

Toole, administrative specialist in the Geography and the Environment Department, has been with Maxwell for 24 years, starting as a student records coordinator in, as it was known at the time, the Department of Public Administration. In January 2009, she became a records and publications coordinator for the Program for the Analysis and Resolution of Conflict, which was the precursor for the Program for the Advancement of Research on Conflict and Collaboration (PARCC). After a brief departure to work at the College of Engineering and Computer Science, Toole returned to PARCC. She has held her current role for the last five years. In 2023 she was honored with a Maxwell School Legacy Award.

Shana Kushner Gadarian, associate dean for research, presented Dean’s Centennial Citations for Excellence to four faculty members: Devashish Mitra, Jennifer Karas Montez, Chie Sakakibara and Baobao Zhang.

“Each of tonight’s honorees is what people in the theater world call a triple threat—they can sing, they can dance, and they can act—or at Maxwell, their research focuses on substantively important questions, they educate the next generation of students, and they serve the school and broader communities,” she said.

Mitra, professor and chair of the Economics Department and Gerald B. and Daphna Cramer Professor of Global Affairs, joined Maxwell in 2002. He is a senior research associate at the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs and South Asia Center. As chair, he developed a scheme for determining faculty research activity and participated in a key cluster hire in health economics. He has edited numerous books, and he has written several chapters and peer-reviewed journal articles on international trade, political economy and development economics. He has served as editor for major journals, mentored many colleagues and students, and served on various University, school and college committees and groups, including those supporting the advancement of diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility.

Montez, University Professor in the Sociology Department and Gerald B. Cramer Faculty Scholar in Aging Studies, has helped secure competitive grant funding, cultivated health and population scholars and translated her work for public audiences. She has been awarded over $10 million in external grants from sources such as the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Andrew Carnegie Foundation. She is the director of the NIA-funded Center for Aging and Policy Studies, co-director of the Policy, Place, and Population Health Lab, a faculty associate in the Aging Studies Institute and a research affiliate in the Center for Policy Research and the Lerner Center for Public Health Promotion and Population Health. Montez has published numerous articles, and her research was formative in reframing how population health scholars think about state-level context and disparities in mortality.

Sakakibara, associate professor of geography and the environment, joined Maxwell in 2022. She has been widely engaged with diverse Indigenous communities to explore the human dimensions of global climate change. She organized and chaired the 2023 Ray Smith Symposium, “Indigenous Resilience, Climate Change, and the Environmental Humanities” that hosted Indigenous environmentalists, artists and scientists, and the general public. Her projects have been funded by organizations such as the National Science Foundation (NSF), the American Geographical Society, the Barrow Arctic Science Consortium, the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, and the Foundation for Ainu Culture. Most recently, she was awarded a $1.36 million grant from the NSF for a three-year project she leads in partnership with specific circumpolar Indigenous communities to facilitate a socio-environmental knowledge repatriation.

Baobao Zhang, assistant professor of political science and Maxwell Dean Assistant Professor of the Politics of Artificial Intelligence, joined Maxwell in 2021. She is a senior research associate at the Autonomous Systems Policy Institute and the Campbell Public Affairs Institute. Her research, teaching and practice have expanded understanding of the ethics and governance around AI. She led a major research project supported by the Ethics and Governance of AI Fund and she was named an AI2050 Early Career Fellow by Schmidt Futures. In addition, she received the 2023-24 Public Voices Fellowship on Technology in the Public Interest. Her research has been published in numerous journals, including the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Nature Human Behavior, and she has co-edited the Oxford Handbook of AI Governance.”

Editor’s Note: The nine students who received Centennial Scholar Awards will be announced separately.

By Jessica Youngman