Coveted Fellowship Goes to Divinity Student
Rising second-year master of divinity candidate Anthony Sandusky will receive a $10,000 stipend, half to be used for educational expenses, the other half to assist in a self-designed ministry project. Sandusky, 23, is one of 20 fellows recently selected by The Fund for Theological Education, a national, ecumenical nonprofit organization dedicated to finding and supporting Christian leaders. The fellowship is funded by Lilly Endowment Inc. and the Henry Luce Foundation. Fewer than 7 percent of clergy in most denominations today are under age 35, and interest in congregational ministry among seminary students has declined in recent years, underscoring the need for leadership development among students from diverse backgrounds.
Alma Maters Honor Schaffner and Vermund
Two Vanderbilt physicians have received top alumni honors.
Dr. William Schaffner, chair of the Department of Preventive Medicine, received the Weill Cornell Medical College Alumni Association Award of Distinction in June for his achievements as a physician, scientist and educator. Schaffner, who received the award at Cornell’s commencement, is the new president of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases and a member of the Executive Committee of the Infectious Diseases Society of America. He is a 1962 graduate of Weill Cornell Medical College.
Dr. Sten Vermund, professor of pediatrics, medicine, preventive medicine, and obstetrics and gynecology and director of the Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health, received the Alumni Lifetime Achievement Award from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Vermund accepted the award at the school’s commencement celebration in May. He is principal investigator responsible for scientific management of the HIV Prevention Trials Network, a worldwide collaborative.
Samar Ali Appointed White House Fellow
Samar S. Ali, BS’03, JD’06, is one of 13 men and women appointed to the 2010–11 class of White House Fellows. Ali is an associate with the law firm Hogan Lovells US, where she was a founding member of its Abu Dhabi office and where her practice addresses mergers and acquisitions, cross-border transactions, Shari’a-compliant transactions, project finance and international business matters.
During her freshman year at Vanderbilt, Ali co-founded the Middle Eastern Students Association. Just two days after the Sept. 11 attacks, Ali rose to an unofficial leadership position at Vanderbilt by speaking publicly about her Muslim faith and her religion’s condemnation of the perpetrators’ actions. She was the university’s first Arab-Muslim student body president.