Shirley Strum Kenny, Ph.D.
Hall of Fame
Sure, it’s a shaky time for the industry, but Kenny’s overseeing of Stony Brook University’s founding of the new school of journalism certainly scores points with us. But that’s not the only noteworthy expansion of the SUNY school on her watch. Since she took over in 1994, enrollment has shot up from 17,000 to 23,000, and she attracted two of the largest donations made to a SUNY school: Charles Wang’s $50 million-plus donation to build a center celebrating Asian and Asian-American cultures that bears his name opened in 2002, and last month, James Simons donated $60 million to build the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics. Then there was the opening of the now-expanding Manhattan campus in 2002, the takeover of Long Island University’s Southampton campus in 2006 and giving the university a management role at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Needless to say, SBU has become one of the top research institutions in the country, boasting high national science program ratings—and that doesn’t count the new centers that opened at Stony Brook University Medical Center. Basically, this woman has kept the school’s Seawolves on the prowl. All this is essentially the results of her findings since she launched and chaired the Boyer Commission on Educating Undergraduates in the Research University, designed to engage students with resources that would lead them to conduct research themselves. Aside from being the first woman president of Stony Brook University, she won the Fulbright Lifetime Achievement Medal last year and is a literary scholar who has published five books. She’s also an authority on the Restoration era. That, and her start at Texas U, explains the charming Southern drawl most notice upon first hearing her speak.
Inducted to the Hall of Fame in 2008