Four new members were elected to the Dartmouth Board of Trustees at the board’s spring meeting earlier this month. Three other board members were appointed to second terms.
Members of the board elected three alumni-nominated trustees and one charter trustee. Susan Finegan ’85, Odette Harris ’91, and Gregg Lemkau ’91 will serve as alumni trustees. Susan Huang ’84 was elected as a charter trustee. They will serve four-year terms beginning July 1.
The board also voted to reappoint trustees Jeff Blackburn ’91, James Jackson ’66a, and Erica Ruliffson Schultz ’95 to second four-year terms, also beginning on July 1.
Trustees Nate Fick ’99, David Hodgson ’78, Rick Kimball ’78, and Benjamin Wilson ’73 will finish their terms following commencement in June, each having completed two four-year terms, the maximum number of terms allowed.
“Leadership transitions on the board are bittersweet,” says board chair Laurel Richie ’81. “As we look forward to the enthusiasm and new ideas our soon-to-be trustees will bring to our deliberations, we will miss the unique contributions of our departing trustees—Ben’s wisdom and sharp legal mind, Dave’s quietly thoughtful analyses and insights, Rick’s generosity and steady hand, and Nate’s integrity and diligence.”
Richie notes that, with the active support of the nominating committee of the alumni council, the trustees are committed to ensuring that the board represents the breadth of experience and the diversity of Dartmouth’s student body and of the world. “When the new class of trustees begins, Dartmouth’s board will—for the first time in our history—be equally represented by women and men,” she says.
President Philip J. Hanlon ’77, as Dartmouth’s president and a trustee, welcomed the new trustees at a time of unprecedented challenge in the nation and across the globe. “In extending a warm welcome to the new trustees, I want to express my appreciation for their commitment to Dartmouth at an extraordinary moment in time. Together Susan, Odette, Susan, and Gregg bring a diversity of backgrounds that will serve the board well as Dartmouth adapts to a rapidly changing landscape in higher ed and throughout the world.”
The board is made up of 26 members: Sixteen are charter trustees, eight are alumni trustees, and the remaining two members are President Hanlon and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu. The state’s governor serves as an ex officio member of the board.
The new board members were elected at the board’s spring meeting, held this year at Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif.
(Read more about the board’s spring meeting.)
About the New Trustees
Finegan is a litigation partner at Mintz and the firm’s pro bono partner. She serves as lead counsel on numerous high-profile pro bono matters and chairs the pro bono committee. She has extensive nonprofit board and commission experience in the Massachusetts legal community, including appointments as co-chair of the Massachusetts Access to Justice Commission and chair of the Massachusetts Judicial Conduct Commission. She majored in government at Dartmouth and holds a JD from Boston College Law School.
A recipient of both the Dartmouth Alumni and Young Alumni Awards, she has considerable volunteer service to Dartmouth, serving as class president, club president, alumni councilor, Rockefeller Center Board member, and Moving Dartmouth Forward committee member. She lives with her husband and two sons (one of whom is a member of the Dartmouth Class of ’22) in Newton, Mass.
Harris is a professor of neurosurgery at Stanford University School of Medicine; vice chair of diversity and director of brain injury; deputy chief of staff, rehabilitation at the VA Palo Alto; and principal investigator of the Defense Veterans and Brain Injury Center. She manages the care of patients suffering from traumatic brain injury by implementing treatment algorithms aimed at improving outcomes.
She majored in biology at Dartmouth and received her MD from Stanford. She earned a master of public health, epidemiology, from the University of California, Berkeley. Harris was appointed a fellow of the Aspen Global Leadership Network in 2018. Since Dartmouth, she has served as an admissions ambassador, alumni councilor, and mentor to undergraduates and alumni pursuing STEM careers. She also serves on several nonprofit and scientific boards. She lives in Silicon Valley with her husband and two daughters.
Huang is a vice chairman, managing director, and global co-head of investment banking at Morgan Stanley, based in New York. She is also a member of Morgan Stanley’s operating and management committees. Her Dartmouth service includes roles on the President’s Leadership Council and the board of visitors for the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding.
She is a member of The Call to Lead executive committee and a founding member of the Centennial Circle of Dartmouth Alumnae. She serves on the board of trustees of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. She majored in history at Dartmouth and earned a JD and MBA from Columbia University.
Lemkau is co-head of the investment banking division at Goldman Sachs and serves on the firm’s management committee. He joined Goldman Sachs in 1992 and has advised clients on hundreds of transactions during his career while working in offices across the United States and Europe.
He has served as chairman of the board of directors for Grassroot Soccer, a nonprofit using soccer to fight HIV and AIDS in Africa. He serves on the board of advisors for Team Rubicon, whose mission is to unite military veterans with first responders to rapidly deploy emergency response teams. He is a trustee of St. Luke’s School in New Canaan, Conn. He majored in government and economics at Dartmouth and serves as chairman of the Dartmouth Athletics Advisory Board and is chairman of Friends of Dartmouth Soccer. Lemkau lives with his wife, Kate, and their four children in Bedford, N.Y.
Susan J. Boutwell can be reached at susan.j.boutwell@dartmouth.edu.
