Honorary Degree Recipients

At the University of Massachusetts Lowell's 2008 commencement, five honorary degrees will be awarded to:

Gururaj "Desh" Deshpande
Charlayne Hunter-Gault
Mary Jo Leahey
Gerald Martone
Edward O. Wilson

The Distinguished Alumni Award will be presented to Thomas O'Connor, '77 and '80.

Gururaj "Desh" Deshpande

Gururaj "Desh" Deshpande is co-founder and chairman of Sycamore Networks Inc. Prior to co-founding Sycamore Networks, Dr. Deshpande was founder and chairman of Cascade Communications Corp. Dr. Deshpande serves as a member of the MIT Corporation, and his generous donations have made possible MIT's Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation. Dr. Deshpande holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology - Madras, an M.E. in Electrical Engineering from the University of New Brunswick in Canada, and Ph.D. in Data Communications from Queens University in Canada. Since 2000, Dr. Deshpande has been funding approximately one initiative a year and is actively involved in building these organizations.  These initiatives include Tejas Networks, Airvana, A123 Systems and Sandstone Capital. He and his wife are involved in several non-profit initiatives that include support for MIT, IIT, TiE, Akshaya Patra Foundation, Public Health Foundation of India and the Social Entrepreneurship Sandbox in India.

Charlayne Hunter-Gault

Charlayne Hunter-Gault is an award-winning journalist with more than 40 years in the industry, extending her work at various times to all media. In 2005, she returned to NPR as a Special Correspondent after six years as CNN's Johannesburg bureau chief and correspondent.  She joined CNN in April 1999 from National Public Radio, where she worked as the network's chief correspondent in Africa. Hunter-Gault joined NPR in 1997 after 20 years with PBS, where she worked as a national correspondent for The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.  She began her journalism career as a reporter for The New Yorker; then worked as a local news anchor for WRC-TV in Washington, D.C.; and as the Harlem bureau chief for The New York Times. Her numerous honors include two Emmy awards and two Peabody awards. Hunter-Gault also was the recipient of the 1986 Journalist of the Year Award from the National Association of Black Journalists, the 1990 Sidney Hillman Award, and the American Women in Radio and Television award. In August 2005, she was inducted in the National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame. She is the Africa Bureau Chief for Essence Magazine and is the author of "In My Place," a memoir of the civil rights movement, fashioned around her experiences as the first black woman to attend the University of Georgia. Her latest book is "New News Out of Africa: Uncovering the African Renaissance," Oxford University Press. She is married to banker Ronald T. Gault and has two adult children, Suesan and Chuma. Hunter–Gault lives in Johannesburg, South Africa and spends part of the year in her home on Martha’s Vineyard.

top

Mary Jo Leahey

Mary Jo Leahey is the visionary, founding benefactor and inspiration for the Mary Jo Leahey High School Summer Band Camp at UMass Lowell, an experience that has enhanced not only the musical ife of its students, but also of the faculty who participate in the program. Upon graduation from the College of Music at the State Teachers College at Lowell with a degree in education and a certificate in music education in 1937, Leahey declined acting contracts from 20th Century Fox and MGM  to honor a commitment as music supervisor to the public schools of Martha's Vineyard. She returned to the Lowell area to marry local surgeon Brendan D. Leahey, whose groundbreaking corneal transplants she carefully filmed for the benefit of future surgeons. She sang and danced for wounded soldiers at Fort Devens under the auspices of the USO during World War II and directed plays at the Fortis hospital. Through all of her activities she successfully raised four children, ensuring, of course, that each had the opportunity to take music lessons. In 1998, she was recognized by UMass Lowell with the Francis Cabot Lowell Alumni Award in Fine Arts. In 1996, Leahey received the Telemachus DeMoulas Philanthropy Award for her service to Saints Memorial Medical Center. She has served on the Board of Directors of the Greater Lowell Community Foundation, is a member of the Palm Beach (Fla.) Civic Association and was formerly active in numerous local civic, religious and charitable organizations before she permanently relocated to Florida in 1989.

top

Gerald Martone

Gerald Martone is the Director of Humanitarian Affairs at the International Rescue Committee and operates from IRC's international headquarters in New York City. He is involved in advocacy initiatives that influence international policy and public support for people affected by political oppression, disasters and violent conflict. For the previous 10 years at IRC, Martone was the Director of Emergency Response. He has overseen emergency assessments and operations in Burundi, Liberia, Kosovo, Chechnya, Congo, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, East Timor, Albania, Northern Uganda, Bosnia, Ethiopia, Darfur-Sudan, Surinam, West Bank & Gaza, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Tsunami-affected areas of Indonesia. Martone graduated magna cum laude from UMass Lowell in 1979 with a bachelor of science in medical technology. He graduated summa cum laude from Pace University in New York with a master’s degree in nursing in 1984 and completed post-graduate studies in clinical hypnosis in 1989. Immediately upon graduating from UMass Lowell, Martone joined the U.S. Peace Corps for two years in Liberia as a preventative health volunteer. He was appointed as a volunteer support leader to assist isolated volunteers during the violent and bloody coup d’etat in Liberia in 1980. During September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center, Martone volunteered at St. Vincent’s Hospital Department of Mental Health in lower Manhattan providing direct support to affected families and individuals. For the next several months, Martone provided clinical supervision to mental health workers and crisis counseling to firefighters involved in rescue efforts at the World Trade Center site. He served two elected terms as the co-chair of the Disaster Response Committee of InterAction and also served on the Sphere Project Management Committee from 1998 to 2001. Martone is an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s School for International and Public Affairs, course lecturer in humanitarian assistance at Fordham University, and a contributing editor to the American Journal of Nursing. He has published numerous articles and book chapters covering a variety of topics on international aid and is an active spokesperson for human rights and humanitarian assistance. Martone lives in New York City.

Edward O. Wilson

Edward O. Wilson was born in Birmingham, Ala., in 1929. He received his B.S. and M.S. in biology from the University of Alabama and, in 1955, his Ph.D. in biology from Harvard, where he taught for four decades, receiving both of its college-wide teaching awards. He is currently University Research Professor Emeritus and Honorary Curator in Entomology of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard. He is the author of 25 books two of which won Pulitzer Prizes, "Human Nature" (1978) and "The Ants" (1990, with Bert Hölldobler). He is the recipient of more than 100 other international medals and awards, including the National Medal of Science; the International Prize for Biology from Japan; the Catalonia Prize of Spain; the Presidential Medal of Italy; the Crafoord Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, given in fields of science not covered by the Nobel Prize; and for his conservation efforts, the Gold Medal of the Worldwide Fund for Nature and the Audubon Medal of the National Audubon Society. Six of Wilson’s books compose two trilogies. The first, "The Insect Societies," "Sociobiology," and "On Human Nature" (1971–78) founded sociobiology and evolutionary psychology. The second, "The Diversity of Life," "The Future of Life," and "The Creation" (1992–2006) organized the base of modern biodiversity conservation. Wilson has served on the Boards of Directors of The Nature Conservancy, Conservation International, and the American Museum of Natural History, and gives many lectures throughout the world. His most recent books includes "Consilience" (1998), which argues for the uniting of the natural sciences with the humanities. Wilson lives in Lexington with his wife, Irene.

Thomas O'Connor, '77 and '80

Thomas O’Connor ’77, ’80, is chairman, president and CEO of DCP Midstream, LLP, one of the nation’s largest natural gas gatherers and processors, and natural gas liquids producers and marketers. Prior to joining DCP in November 2007, he worked for 20 years in various leadership positions at Duke Energy, including his last role as group vice president of corporate strategy. O’Connor created two endowed funds at UMass Lowell: The O’Connor Family Endowed Fund, which provides scholarship support to sciences students; and the Thomas O’Connor Dean’s Discretionary Endowment Fund, which provides support for the College of Arts and Sciences Division of Sciences. The Lawrence native received a bachelor of science degree in biology, cum laude, and a master of science degree in environmental studies at UMass Lowell. He also completed the Harvard Business School Advanced Management Program. He is a member of the Sciences Advisory Board and received the Francis Cabot Lowell Alumni Award in 2001. He also was honored with the Distinguished Alumni Award from the Biology Department in 2004. He and his wife, Diane, have three children. 

top