The Board of Governors names Bill Moyers, longtime, award-winning broadcast journalist, as Rutgers-New Brunswick’s 250th Anniversary commencement speaker

The following are news and developments from the April 6, 2016, Rutgers Board of Governors meeting:

Bill Moyers
Bill Moyers, Renowned Journalist and Author, Named Rutgers-New Brunswick’s 250th Anniversary Commencement Speaker
A groundbreaking broadcast journalist for more than four decades, Moyers will receive an honorary Doctor of Laws degree at the May 15 ceremony at High Point Solutions Stadium in Piscataway. Moyers, who also worked on Lyndon B. Johnson’s Senate and presidential staffs and was the founding organizer and deputy director of the Peace Corps in the early 1960s, will be joined by astronomer S. Jocelyn Bell Burnell, visiting professor, Department of Physics, University of Oxford, and pro-chancellor, Trinity College, Dublin. She will receive an honorary Doctor of Science degree. Read the full release.


Gregory Q. Brown Endowed Chair in Cell Biology and Neuroscience Created
Funded by a $1.5 million gift from Motorola Solutions Inc. in honor of Brown, a 1982 Rutgers alumnus and chair of the Rutgers Board of Governors, the endowed chair will focus on neuroscience in honor of the CEO of Motorola Solutions’ late mother, Winifred Brown. The university aims to draw outstanding scholars in neuroscience to the School of Arts and Sciences to help work toward cures for diseases such as dementia. Read the full release.


Board of Governors Approves Joachim Messing Endowed Chair in Molecular Genetics
The newly endowed chair – named in honor of  Joachim Messing, the director of the Waksman Institute of Microbiology – is intended to recognize, retain and recruit outstanding molecular genetic researchers to teach at Rutgers’ Waksman Institute. Gifts totaling $1.6 million make the new chair possible. Read the full release.

 


Rutgers-Camden Honors Sister Mary Scullion at 2016 Commencement
An advocate for the homeless and mentally ill and the co-founder of Project HOME, Sister Mary Scullion will receive an honorary Doctor of Letters degree during the commencement ceremony at Rutgers University-Camden on May 19. Scullion has advocated for and helped  the homeless and mentally ill since 1978 and in 1988 founded the first U.S. program coordinating private and public agencies providing outreach to homeless people living on the street. Read the full release.


Rutgers School of Business-Camden Names Entrepreneurial Father and Daughter as Honoree, Speaker
Raymond Ackerman, a South African entrepreneur, philanthropist and a founder of Pick n Pay, the second largest supermarket chain store in South Africa, will receive an honorary Doctor of Letters degree during the commencement ceremony for the Rutgers School of Business-Camden on May 19. His daughter, Suzanne Ackerman-Berman, Pick n Pay’s transformation director, will deliver the keynote speech. Read the full release.  


Rutgers-Newark Names Alexander E. Gates Distinguished Service Professor
Gates, professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Rutgers University-Newark, has been named a Distinguished Service Professor by the Rutgers Board of Governors. Gates is a geologist specializing in tectonics. He has played a prominent role at Rutgers-Newark during his career, leading several initiatives to help underserved students gain access to opportunities in the sciences. Read the full release.


Board of Governors Approves Creation of Rutgers Health
Rutgers Health will bring together the missions of all university clinical activities under one umbrella, Rutgers President Robert Barchi said. It will become one of the first academic health care provider organizations in the nation to integrate a full range of health-related specialties – including medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, nursing and clinical psychology, in addition to more traditional fields, such as neurology, surgery, cardiology and oncology. Read the full release.

- Dory Devlin