Six alumni were recognized with HAA Awards, for their outstanding service to the University, during the alumni association’s fall meeting.
Salvo Arena, LL.M. ’00, of New York City, has served in various roles since 2004, including as president of the worldwide Harvard Law School Association. He is now president of the New York City chapter, co-chair of the HLSA International Committee, and a graduate-school director on the HAA board of directors. Arena has spearheaded alumni events that blend law with other disciplines, drawing record attendance from across Harvard’s schools.
Paul L. Choi ’86, J.D. ’89, of Chicago, is a former Harvard Club of Chicago president, and has served as a reunion leader for his College and Law School classes, as elected HAA director, and as HAA president (2015–16). As president, he promoted University-wide citizenship and the strengthening of Harvard’s global alumni community; he also led a review process resulting in changes to the HAA board’s structure and approach to work.
Katie Williams Fahs ’83, of Atlanta, is a former Radcliffe Club of Cincinnati president who has been a member of the Harvard clubs of New York, London, Cincinnati, and Georgia, and held board positions in the last two. In Georgia, she initiated the use of Facebook to connect alumni with current local undergraduates and chaired the schools and scholarships committees. In 2011, she was elected to the HAA board, where she has chaired the University-wide schools and scholarships committee and advised the Harvard College Fund.
Kevin Jennings ’85, of New York City, has been an alumni interviewer, Harvard Club of New York member, and, as HAA elected director, co-chair of the fundraising campaign for Harvard’s first endowed chair in LGBT studies. He is the former co-chair of the Harvard Gay and Lesbian Caucus (now the Harvard Gender and Sexuality Caucus). As the first college-bound person in his family, he also founded the First Generation Harvard Alumni SIG, which earned the 2017 HAA Clubs & SIGs Committee Award.
Patrik Johansson, M.P.H. ’01, of Omaha, became an HAA elected director in 2006, and has also served on the School of Public Health’s alumni council and the Harvard Club of Sweden’s board. Of African-American, Cherokee, and Swedish descent, he completed the Harvard-affiliated Commonwealth Fund Fellowship in Minority Health Policy and was integral in ensuring the representation of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, the Nipmuc Nation, and the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head Aquinnah in ceremonies commemorating the 350th anniversary of the Harvard Indian College.
Rev. Gloria White-Hammond, M.Div. ’97, of Boston, joined the School of Public Health’s Children’s Health Advisory Council after graduation, and has spoken at campus gatherings about her work with two fellow Divinity School (HDS) alumnae in aiding the liberation of thousands of enslaved Sudanese women, and the subsequent founding of My Sister’s Keeper, a humanitarian and human-rights initiative. She has also served as a graduate-school director on the HAA board.
