In addition to Jon Denison, the Office of External Affairs has welcomed seven other permanent staff members this year to a variety of new and vacant positions. Now that Jon has joined us, our team is nearly complete. We’d like to introduce you to the entire group.
Alumni Affairs
Christine Natsios ’85 ([email protected]) has directed alumni affairs since June 2005. She has 30 years of experience in special events management, catering, and sales with Sheraton, Intercontinental Hotels, Four Seasons Hotels, and Ritz-Carlton, and most recently with the Columbus (Ohio) Museum of Art. She has been an active member of the Cornell Hotel Society for more than 20 years, serving as president of the Washington, DC/Baltimore chapter in 1991–92. She was also an active member of the Cornell Alumni Association of Central Ohio. In addition to her BS from the Hotel School, she holds an AA degree in hospitality management from Columbus State Community College. Christine had an international upbringing and speaks modern Greek, Spanish, and French.
Erin Rodriguez ([email protected]), administrative assistant, came to External Affairs in June from the front desk of the Statler Hotel, where she had worked for one year. In addition to assisting the director of alumni affairs, her responsibilities include supporting the Cornell Hotel Society and its members. Erin earned a BS in education from SUNY Cortland in 2005, where she is currently working toward a master’s degree in English as a second language. The daughter of natives of Ecuador and Colombia, she is fluent in Spanish and well versed in French.
Shuta (Mike) Wu has been temping in the office since February as the “scanner guy” and de facto receptionist. His main responsibility is to digitize/scan all collected documents relating to our alumni. Mike is a “lifelong student” who has earned sufficient credits for two bachelor’s degrees without accumulating enough in any one area to call it a major. He studied for three years each at Michigan State University and Wayne State University and is now pursuing a degree in computer science at Empire State College. His future goals include opening a Chinese noodle shop/bakery. A self-proclaimed geek, Mike loves computers, board games, video games, and animals, except for monkeys, which he finds terrifying. He is fluent in Mandarin and speaks English like a kid from Michigan, which is where he grew up after emigrating from China at age two. He got married last December.
Communication Strategy
Nancy Knowles ([email protected]) has served as interim director since June. A Cornell graduate with a BA in English and an MBA in marketing, she worked for Vice President Susan Murphy from 1992 to 1997 as director of development for student and academic services. She then left Cornell for Western Michigan University, where she had the pleasure of serving under Dean Jim Schmotter, husband of Hotel School associate professor Daphne Jameson, as director of development for the Haworth College of Business from 1998 to 2003. In addition to having held a variety of other professional and volunteer leadership positions, Nancy maintains a busy second career as the wife of Cornell’s head football coach, Jim Knowles.
Joseph Bodden ([email protected]) joined the team in May as electronic communications manager. As such, he is primarily responsible for managing the Hotel School’s web presence and mass email communications. Formerly Syracuse University’s web and technology coordinator for alumni affairs, Joe is a 2000 graduate of SUNY Fredonia with a bachelor’s degree in communications. This summer he and his wife, Kristin, have been discovering parenthood through the efforts of their new daughter, Jessica. An avid singer/songwriter and pianist in the pop/classic-rock genre, Joe has collaborated from time to time on a variety of music projects across the state.
Ruth Devine, though retired from the Hotel School since 2007, still works part-time compiling and editing all alumni news for the School’s magazine. Ruth was hired in 1980 as a custodian but quickly got “discovered” and hired as secretary in what is now the Office of Executive Education. One year later, she became administrative assistant to the associate dean for academic affairs, a position she held for 20 years and through a succession of eight associate deans and the Beck, Clark, Dittman, and Butler deanships. In 2002 she moved to the Office of Communication Strategy. She has been married for 42 years and has three children and six grandchildren.
Jeanne Griffith ([email protected]), senior staff writer, joined the Hotel School staff in July. She has worked at Cornell since 1986, beginning at the James A. Baker Institute, where she was public affairs coordinator and communications manager, and moving to the College of Veterinary Medicine in 2000 as assistant director of communications. From 2004 until recently she was the staff writer for the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Jeannie is a graduate of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, where she received BA and MA degrees in French literature. She continued graduate study in French literature at Cornell from 1984 to 1986. An enthusiastic choral singer, she is currently president of the Ithaca Community Chorus & Chamber Singers.
Brenda Ramin-Thomas ([email protected]), publications assistant, provides administrative and production support for the communications strategy team. She came to the Hotel School in February after working for Cornell for two years in temporary positions in University Student and Academic Services, the Johnson Graduate School of Management, the Office of University Investments, and the College of Veterinary Medicine. Before coming to Cornell, Brenda compiled 16 years of experience in customer-service, financial, healthcare, managerial, and real-estate environments. Brenda has a passion for music and has sung with several a cappella groups.
Corporate Affairs
Joseph Strodel, Jr. ([email protected]), director since 2006, manages and implements the Hotel School's corporate strategy. He also chairs the School’s corporate development committee and is responsible for building corporate and foundation alliances and affiliation programs, managing corporate events, and maintaining stewardship programs. His more than 20 years of experience in business development, corporate relations, marketing, and conference/trade show management have included management positions at Georgetown University and SUNY Upstate Medical University, a management consultancy at PricewaterhouseCoopers, and service as managing director of the Hotel School’s Center for Hospitality Research from 2001 to 2008 and as interim director of the Pillsbury Institute for Hospitality Entrepreneurship from 2006 to 2008. Joe holds a bachelor's degree from Boston College and a master's degree in international relations from the Maxwell School of Citizenship at Syracuse University. He is a graduate of the Leadership Greater Syracuse executive education program. He currently serves as president of the Skaneateles Area Arts Council board of directors and is on the board of the Stella Maris Retreat Center. He has served on a number of other central New York nonprofit boards, including Meals on Wheels and Consolidated Industries, and was board president for the Skaneateles Festival.
Cheri Farrell has served as “outreach ambassador” since she retired from the Hotel School in 2005, to utilize her institutional memory and extensive friendships with alumni and other friends of the School and Cornell. Cheri started her career at the Hotel School in 1972, working for Dean Robert A. Beck. She was promoted to director of admissions, then director of admissions and financial aid, and, ultimately, director of student services. During her 36 years in the Hotel School, Cheri has taken on many leadership roles, including chairing numerous committees and overseeing the creation of a faculty advising program. She counseled students on both personal and professional levels, served as the school's study-abroad advisor, worked closely with the faculty on a variety of administrative projects, and then took on the role of outreach ambassador.
Development
Meg Keilbach ([email protected]), director since 2006, began her employment with the Hotel School in 2002 as a public affairs officer and became associate director of development the next year. Prior to joining the Hotel School, she spent a year as assistant director for the President’s Council of Cornell Women and four years as program officer for alumni regional programs. Meg served four years as an elected official in the town of Lansing, New York, is currently a trustee of her church, and has four children, who range in age from 16 to two. She is a 1988 graduate of Cornell’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
Joyce Leonard ([email protected]), program assistant, supports the director and assistant director of development and provides alumni and event briefings to the dean. She worked in alumni affairs for the Hotel School for over five years before moving to her position in development in June 2005. She began her Cornell employment in 1999 as a temp in the College of Arts and Sciences and the Office of the Councils. Before coming to Cornell, Joyce worked for twelve-and-a-half years for American Agriculturist magazine. A lifelong resident of Tompkins County, Joyce is devoted to her puppy and three cats (and boyfriend) and has volunteered with the Tompkins County SPCA and Animal Aid of Cortland.
Sonia McBean ([email protected]), program assistant, has been with the office for three months. She worked previously for the Division of Alumni Affairs and Development, including one year in donor relations and another in advancement services. In her current position she processes gifts and acknowledgments, tracks funds, and produces financial reports. She has an associate’s degree in international business from Tompkins Cortland Community College and a BS in technical management from DeVry University. Sonia emigrated with her family to Ithaca from Guyana at the age of 12. A member of the Bethlehem Church of Jesus Christ, she “eats, sleeps, and breathes” church.
Sarah Perkins ’05 ([email protected]), assistant director, also joined the office three months ago. After graduating from the Hotel School, she spent a year in Boston working for a “Best of Boston” catering firm and then worked for two years as associate director of alumni affairs and development in the Northeast Regional Office. Sarah travels two weeks per month to meet alumni and encourage their philanthropic and volunteer engagement with the School. When she has time, she enjoys skiing, sailing, and trying new things, especially restaurants.
