She shared a quote from an article her mother, Luisa, wrote in 1933, exhorting fellow members of a local political club to express their opinions with confidence.

“It is not my intention to be critical,” wrote DeLauro’s mother, who would go on to serve for 35 years on the Board of Aldermen in New Haven, Connecticut. “Rather, my motive in writing this article is to encourage the female members of this organization to take a more active part in its affairs. … I have noticed that the girls, unlike the men, are timid in asserting themselves, and many a good idea is lost, having been suppressed by its creator.

“Come on, girls. Let’s make ourselves heard.”

DeLauro, who entered public service after earning degrees from Marymount College and Columbia University, has been serving Connecticut’s 3rd Congressional District since 1991. In January, she became chair of the House Appropriations Committee—only the second woman to lead the group responsible for shaping the federal government’s discretionary spending priorities. She’s also the ranking member on the subcommittee that oversees the nation’s investments in education, health, and employment.

Awarding Fervent Service

DeLauro was one of three women honored by the Marymount College Alumnae Association Board during the virtual reception, held as part of Fordham’s virtual Jubilee weekend.

Kathy Higgins, MC ’71, received the Gloria Gaines Award, the board’s highest honor, given to an alumna for service to one’s church, community, and Marymount. Higgins’ service began as a student at Marymount, when she worked in the infirmary on the Tarrytown campus. For the past 30 years, she has worked for ARC Westchester, a nonprofit offering support to individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities in Westchester, New York.

Higgins joked that some people would look at her paycheck and think she was a volunteer, but service and volunteering are what offer her “a true sense of community.”

“I love the work and consider it a privilege to be able to help so many wonderful families,” she said. “Marymount College made a huge impact on my life, not only for the wonderful education I received but also the incredible people I have met. It’s sad that the college we knew and loved is no longer in Tarrytown,” she said of the women’s college, which was part of Fordham University from 2002 until the college closed in 2007. “But I am thankful to those who are keeping the spirit of Marymount alive.”

Teresita Abay-Krueger, MC ’80, was honored with the Golden Dome Award, presented to the alumna whose efforts of continuous service have advanced Marymount as an institution.

While studying biology and chemistry at Marymount in the late 1970s, she landed an internship with Union Carbide Corporation—located close to campus—and that experience, along with some inspiration from three of her professors, spurred her into a 20-year career in research and development at IBM. After leaving IBM, she founded a New York-based consulting practice.

Accepting the award, Abay-Krueger said that, as a commuter student, she often wondered if living off-campus put her at a disadvantage. Today, she realizes that the personal attention and care she received from professors and administrators, and the bonds she formed with her classmates, inspired her to pursue excellence nonetheless.

“It’s always been about being surrounded by that intellectual environment in Marymount; whether I was with other students or with many of the professors, or even among the administrative people, there was always this drive for excellence and intellectual attainment, and I really appreciated that above anything else,” Abay-Krueger said.

“When you’re surrounded with determined, smart women all striving to be their very best, you can’t help but be inspired by that as well—and everyone on this call demonstrates that,” she said.

A Milestone Year

The board also recognized alumnae celebrating their 25th, 50th, and other milestone reunions—including two alumnae celebrating their 75th: Denise Kobel and Josephine Stigliano, both members of the Class of 1946. Though Stigliano was unable to join the event, Kobel tuned in with her granddaughter, Carolyn Budelman, MC ’04.

During the event, attendees got to take a “slide” down memory lane as they viewed photos and spoke about Marymount memories that had been submitted ahead of time. Event organizers also asked Tarrytown-themed trivia questions throughout the event, in honor of Marymount’s original campus location.

Paula Mahayosnand, MC ’93, president of the Marymount College Alumnae Board, said that while she wished they were able to gather at Fordham, she was nonetheless happy to be together in spirit.

“For more than a dozen years, we’ve remained committed to coming together on the Rose Hill campus, meeting each other in person and celebrating our fellow alumni from across classes,” she said. “I don’t think we could have predicted we would be in this for another 16 months of the pandemic … but we have adapted, and here we are today.”

In a pre-recorded message, Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham University, welcomed the Marymount graduates home and congratulated them on their recent fundraising success on Giving Day, saying a record number of people contributed to the Marymount Legacy Fund—which the board created to provide scholarship support to young women at Fordham who “embody the Marymount spirit through learning and leadership.”

“The alumni community showed the power of their love for Marymount, their care for young scholarship recipients, and their commitment to the efforts of the members of the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary,” he said. “More alumni donated this year than ever before. I applaud your efforts.”

Father McShane also congratulated this year’s award winners, and he echoed Mahayosnand’s wishes to see everyone in person sooner rather than later. “I hope that you’ll continue to stay connected, and that I’ll get to see in person again very soon,” he said.

Still, for Heather McWilliam, MC ’88, secretary of the Marymount College Alumnae Board, the virtual event was an emotional one.

“I didn’t expect the overwhelming feeling that I hope all of us are receiving by just sharing this moment,” she said. “I think all of us are here today sharing this event because of our love, and [because we’re]  cherishing moments of what Marymount represents and what it did for us.”

“Marymount showed me the importance of working as part of a team. But I also learned that you can’t always wait for someone to give you an opportunity,” she says. “If you want things to happen, sometimes you need to be the one to push it through.”

MacInnis, who joined the Marymount Alumnae Board in 2016, is taking that same initiative in her new role as the board’s president. “Some of it is about looking backward, being able to continue coming together and getting this cross-section of women that really helps you see the progression of history and how similar and yet radically different things are,” MacInnis explains. This is especially important for Marymount, MacInnis says, which began merging with Fordham shortly after she graduated in 2000 before closing in 2007.

“But I also want to look forward with the women of Fordham, and see where we might be needed to help create future women leaders.”

She’s already begun by reaching out to Deanna Howes, FCRH ’07, the leader of Fordham’s Alumni Chapter of Washington, D.C., who gave her helpful advice on working with alumni. And she hopes to continue growing the Marymount Legacy Fund, which just reached $1 million in June 2017 and provides scholarships to talented female Fordham students with a Marymount affiliation. MacInnis also hopes to find new ways to bring together Marymount alumnae and Fordham’s current students, perhaps by partnering with campus clubs.

“I’m still getting my sea legs,” she says, “but I want to continue supporting this special community.”

Fordham Five

What are you most passionate about?
My favorite hobbies are reading and going to the theater. Both are great ways to learn about experiences outside of your own, and you really develop empathy and respect in the process. And when I’ve gone through difficult times, such as when my father passed away, I took great comfort from reading about how others went through the same experiences and seeing our commonalities.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
Don’t tie your self-worth to your job. Obviously your job is important, but you can’t hang everything on the outcome of a meeting or project. I’ve always taken things to heart more than I should, and I’ve been trying to separate myself from that habit recently.

What’s your favorite place in New York City? In the world?
I don’t know that I have one particular favorite spot in New York, but whenever I visit, I try to walk wherever I go. It’s amazing to see the different neighborhoods and people, a cross-section that is hard to get anywhere else. As much as I love New York, I’m originally from New England, so I immediately feel at home there more than anywhere else in the world.

Name a book that has had a lasting influence on you. Explain how and why.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn stays with me to this day. It was one of the first books I read that described individuals—and especially family—as flawed and complex people that you still love. And the ending is so melancholy—not tidy like children’s books. More recently I loved Long Way Down, by Jason Reynolds, which takes place during an elevator ride. It’s a short book, but he packs a lot of emotion and complexity into it.

Who is the Marymount or Fordham grad or professor you admire most? Explain why.
I have great memories of meeting Geraldine Ferraro my freshman year at Marymount. I still remember asking her about public financing of elections! She attended the Marymount Convent School across from Marymount College, and she graduated from Fordham University’s Law School. I’ve always admired how she was able to combine her commitment to helping others and her professional work, especially at a time when it was not necessarily expected that women would become lawyers, members of Congress, or vice presidential candidates.     

A total of more than $72 million was raised in this five-year Jubilee cycle in time for the University’s Dondransbicentennial year, and alumni spanned multiple generations of Rams—including the Class of 1942, represented by 97-year-old Lionel Weinstein, PHA ’42.

The event also celebrated the close of the 175th year—in which several events have honored Fordham’s efforts to “break the circle of poverty” for 19th-century Irish immigrants, said Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham.

In a welcoming speech in Duane Library’s Tognino Hall, Father McShane said Fordham continues to be a “factory of hope” for the nation and the world. He spoke with pride of a diverse array of alumni that has included several pro athletes, broadcasters, writers, scientists, Fulbright scholars, and five Medal of Honor recipients, all of whom were “called on by God to be great.”
“Lou Gehrig wasn’t the luckiest man in the world; I am,” he said of his 14-year tenure as University president.

He quoted his father, a first-generation college graduate, as having said that when he graduated from Fordham “his whole family graduated” with him.

“It’s our duty to make sure that others have the same opportunity that he had, that you had, and I had,” said Father McShane.

At events across campus, alumni recalled hardscrabble journeys echoing those of their 19th-century peers.

A Step Up

At a CSTEP reunion, Renee Hernandez, M.D., FCRH ’94, celebrated with his wife Madeline Hernandez, FCRH ’94. The two met and married on campus, and continue to bring their children back. Born and raised in the borough, Dr. Hernandez said that as a student he thought of Fordham as a “paradise in the Bronx.” Today, he invites high school and college students to intern at this private practice.

“A lot of it is about exposure, so for the high school students it’s an eye opener that anything is possible,” he said, “and for college then its opening their eyes to other things that are possible, like going to med school, getting a Ph.D., or going into law.”

Jason Atano, FCRH ’01, LAW ’04, said it was clear that Fordham has invested in the program, creating a growing community that comes back to campus each year.

“We come from communities that don’t have a high level of human capital, and this type of program provides us with access to mentorship. Now we’re able to pass along the lessons that we learn while navigating the professional world,” said Atano. “I always try to come back. You know who the students are because you were them 10 years ago.”

The two were recognized by CSTEP for professional achievement and for continued contributions to the program. Also honored were: Ada Aponte, M.D., FRCH ’99; Rev. Ransford S. Clarke, FCRH ’99; Edwardo J. Rodriguez, Ph.D., FCRH ’99; and Joy B. Tolliver, FCRH ’04.

The Sanctum Sanctorum

As Pierre Lehmuller, UGE ’57, GSE ’59, joined other alumni at Loyola Hall for “Mix and Mingle with the Jesuits,” he recalled a time when lay people were rarely granted admittance to the former Jesuit residence.

“When I had to meet a Jesuit on campus, we had to meet out on the (Loyola) porch—even if it was cold,” he said.

He said that he was finally granted admittance after he joined what was once known as the Alumni Federation.

“It is an impressive building, so being admitted into the building was a fulfillment of a dream, like I’d been admitted into the Sanctum Sanctorum. I expected St. Peter to be lurking about, saying, ‘Come in young man.’”

From Broadway to the Bronx

Mary Guardiani, UGE ’62, GSE ’92, reveled in memories at the reception for students who attended Fordham at 302 Broadway. Guardiani recalled taking a class on research methods once at Rose Hill, in which she was one of only two women; it contrasted starkly with the co-ed atmosphere of her base campus in downtown Manhattan.

“It was a very interesting experience because I learned the Jesuits weren’t interested in anything but developing your abilities,” she said. “[But] the [male]students had more problems with women in the class.

“The Jesuits’ . . . message was picked up quickly, that you had to focus on this very difficult course and that was it.”

She recalled that 302 Broadway had a large contingent of commuters from her home borough of Staten Island. “You had a community of people on the ferry boat, where you’d meet and talk for a few minutes, and then study,” she said.

Marymount Memories

At the Marymount Awards Ceremony, alumnae celebrated the announcement that the Marymount Legacy Fund broke the $1 million mark. The fund supports scholarships for young women attending Fordham.

Alumnae from the women’s college, which closed 10 years ago, gathered in Butler Commons to share a few tearful moments and memories from the Tarrytown campus.

Mary Randolph Carter, MC ‘67, an executive at Ralph Lauren, received the Alumna of Achievement award and gave a moving speech in which she quoted appreciations of the college from fellow alumni. But it was her story that most moved the crowd.

Carter shared an anecdote of having to miss the Marymount graduation for an honor at Mademoiselle Magazine, but that her mother had shown up at Marymount to “clap loudly” when her name was read anyway. The Marymount alumni surprised a tearful Carter by presenting her with her her diploma. She said she planned to share the diploma with her 95-year-old mother.

“’Mom,’ I’ll say, ‘I think I finally made it to my Marymount graduation!’”

A GSAS Centennial

At the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) reunion, Dean Eva Badowska, Ph.D., encouraged alumni to explore the 100-year-old history of the school. She said GSAS prides itself on having been “open to a diverse group of students and faculty” over the years, including those fleeing from Nazi persecution, such as Nobel-prize-winning physicist Victor Hess.

Sharon Dietz-Dubois and Ellen Clark, both 1986 graduates, recalled the efforts of Gerald Quinn, the late dean, to make their education at Fordham possible. Clark said Dean Quinn let her postpone, rather than forfeit, her scholarship for a year for personal reasons. Dietz-Dubois said a conversation with Dean Quinn, in which she told him she’d run out of tuition money, changed her trajectory for good.

“I came to Fordham on a wing and a prayer,” said Dietz-Dubois. “He told me ‘I’m giving you a graduate assistantship. You are going to work in my office.’ I felt like I was saved. Because of that conversation, I was able to continue my Fordham education.”

Tumultuous Times

Members of the Class of 1972 viewed a documentary about tumultuous times on campus, including a student takeover of the President’s office led by the Students for a Democratic Society. The film featured 16mm black-and white-footage of student protests, demonstrations, and arguments about the war. Contemporary interviews balanced the narrative with the perspective and wisdom that comes with age.

This was not the peace and love portrayal often associated with movies and documentaries about campus life from the period, but rather “the gritty struggles against capitalism and the Vietnam War waged by blue-collar kids in commuter schools,” said the film’s producers.

Together with Michael Bryce, FCRH ’72, and Mary Colonna, TMC’72, Robert J. Reilly, FCRH ’72, LAW ‘75, assistant dean of the Feerick Center for Social Justice, moderated a discussion that revealed how their participation in the confrontations altered the course of the alumni’s lives.

Participants recalled the very real life and death consequences that the war brought to campus. More than one alumnus recalled the screams emanating from dorm rooms when draft numbers were called. And yet not all students were against the war or having ROTC on campus, alumni said.

Gabelli Students on Investing

At the Gabelli School, a team of students talked about its strategy and choice of asset allocations used to invest a $1 million portion of the University’s endowment, through a two-semester course titled Student Managed Investment Fund. The team produced a 5.44 percent return for the semester, outperforming their benchmark.

Clarissa Cartledge, rising senior, said that part of the students’ success rested on the choice of a pharmaceutical company, Acorn, that had a merger and rose 52 percent.

“That was a really nice investment,” she said.

The course was also invaluable for its real-world aspect, said Cartledge.

“Because it’s real money you feel it is a real job, even though it’s a four-credit class. Everyone is motivated to improve the fund’s performance. We watch the news, we follow the companies and challenge each other to make correct decisions.

“We’re grateful for the opportunity to invest the endowment, and to have the confidence of Fordham behind us as well as the learning experience they are giving us.”

Bensalem’s Back

In the Walsh Library, a small contingent of alumni from Fordham’s Bensalem, an experimental college which opened in 1967 at a residence on East 191st street, gathered to reminisce. Rita Charon, M.D., a 1970 graduate, said it was a time when “the world was exploding” with the Vietnam war and a thriving counterculture.
“I was a Catholic girl from Providence, Rhode Island, and my parents let me come to New York only if I studied with the Jesuits,” she said.

Bensalem’s theme was how best to learn outside of a rigid classroom structure and an enforced ideology, and to cultivate an open mind, she said.

“Those of us who were there from the beginning . . . we’ve never given it up. We’ve been against the grain,” said Dr. Charon, founder and director of the Program in Narrative Medicine at Columbia University. “That’s why we were attracted to it.”

Janet Sassi contributed to this article.

View and order your Jubilee class photo. Use the password jubilee17 to log in.

“I didn’t realize it then,” she says, “but now I see that there’s been a theme in my life of championing women, and that started there.”

Welker, who graduated from Marymount in 1988, likes to say that her alma mater found her twice—once as a public school-educated student who didn’t expect to attend a Catholic, all-women’s college, and again in the early 2000s, when she was asked to join the college’s alumnae board.

“I joined just as Marymount was beginning its relationship with Fordham,” Welker says. “I felt very privileged to be a part of the process of redefining what the face of Marymount would look like through its partnership with Fordham.”

Though Welker admits that the initial transition was difficult (Marymount became part of Fordham in 2002 and closed in 2007), she celebrates the schools’ lasting connections. “Fordham is a collaborator for Marymount and a champion for women. The schools share a goal of empowering the next generation of women and female leaders. And they share a similar educational value system.”

That value system—of caring for others and valuing empathy in leadership—is something Welker has brought to her own work.

“I always tell my daughters, if you are fortunate as I have been to be able to merge your personal and professional value systems, run, don’t walk, toward that opportunity,” she says.

“I was able to do that starting with my first job at Ladies Home Journal, whose mantra was ‘Never underestimate the power of a woman.’” Welker rose to become the magazine’s ad director in less than a decade, and in 1999, she joined Hearst to help launch CosmoGirl! a spin-off of Cosmopolitan magazine for young women. As the founding publisher, she came up with the magazine’s branding: “Born to lead.”

Welker has been a pioneer at Marymount too. Almost 10 years ago, she helped establish the Marymount Endowed Legacy Fund with Patricia Cole, MC ’74, GSS-GABELLI ’15, and Margaret Fitzgibbon Watson, MC ’72, GSE ’73. Since then, many other Marymount alumnae have contributed to the fund, which has grown to almost $1 million and in the process supported 11 Fordham students—all women with some connection to Marymount—with scholarships.

“As members of the founding committee, we seeded the fund,” Cole says. “Kristine is an energetic and tremendous leader who really followed through and got things sewn up. We’re all so delighted by how far it’s come.”

Welker says their goal “was always more than just supporting as many women as possible with scholarships. We also wanted to support them at a higher level. That’s why I’m excited about the upcoming Women’s Summit at Fordham, which I think will transcend schools, ages, and industries.”

Welker and her fellow Marymount Alumnae Association board members are helping plan Fordham’s inaugural Women’s Summit, expected to take place on the Lincoln Center campus this year. Beyond focusing on networking and philanthropy, the event organizers hope to encourage attendees to come together to create positive change—at Fordham and beyond.

That same goal has always motivated Welker in her own career. It’s why she unexpectedly left CosmoGirl! at the height of its success to head up Hearst’s new digital division, why she continued on to Dr. Oz The Good Life magazine, and why she took a break from publishing last year to pursue nonprofit work as a member of the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s board of directors.

“Whatever comes next, I want it to be at the intersection of female leadership and tech, and I want to keep adding social value,” Welker explains. “Sometimes as women, no matter our age, we don’t give ourselves permission to take opportunities. I want to empower the next generation of women to step out of their comfort zone, trust their instincts, and do things differently.

“My hope is that my daughters and all the other young women out there will be empowered to be the next generation of—fill in the blank. Whatever it is, it’s theirs to fill.”

In 1963, Joyce Onorato was a sophomore history major at Marymount College, when she agreed to join one of her suitemates on a double date. She met Brian Abamont, a science major at St. John’s University. Weeks later, he invited Joyce to a movie. She recalls thinking he was not her type, but she went anyway and had a strange flash that she would marry him.

“I thought, what? I don’t even like this guy!” she says.

They didn’t see each other again until the first night of summer classes at 302 Broadway, Fordham’s Manhattan home for undergraduates at the time. Joyce had enrolled in an economics course there, and Brian had transferred to Fordham from St. John’s to major in education. He walked out of an elevator one evening and bumped into Joyce. They began dating, and soon she was wearing his Fordham pin.

“I would ask her every night if she wanted a ride home from class,” says Brian, who, like Joyce, grew up in Queens. “I kept asking, and she said no. One night, she said yes. I took her home that night—and every night since!”

In 1966, Joyce graduated from Marymount and began taking summer classes at NYU for a master’s degree in European history while Brian completed his education degree at Fordham.

“I was following my mother’s instructions not to get engaged until I graduated,” he says. “The night I finished my last course, I was anxious.”

So anxious that he proposed to Joyce in his car in front of 302 Broadway. A year later, they were married.

Brian began his career in education as a high school social studies teacher and retired as an assistant principal in guidance in 2002. Joyce also worked as a teacher but dreamed of law school. Following the birth of their fourth child, with the support of her mother and Brian, she earned a law degree from St. John’s in 1988. She eventually joined MetLife as managing attorney in the company’s Long Island office, a position she’s held for 18 years.

The couple has kept their Fordham-Marymount connection alive. Joyce has served on the board of the Marymount Alumnae Association of Fordham University (she was president of the alumnae board at the time of the consolidation with Fordham). And she and Brian continue to support the Marymount Legacy Fund, an endowed scholarship fund that helps young women follow their educational dreams at Fordham.

Earlier this month, the Abamonts returned to Fordham to celebrate their 50th reunion—their first as Golden Rams—during Jubilee weekend. Joyce was presented with the Marymount Golden Dome Award, which is given each year to an alumna whose efforts of service and achievement have benefited Marymount.

With a 50th wedding anniversary coming up next July, Joyce recalls that it was those days at 302 Broadway that really brought the couple together.

“After that year at Fordham, we both knew,” she says. “And that hasn’t changed.”

—Maja Tarateta

For the last six years, she’s also been a bridge between Marymount College, where she graduated in 1962, and Fordham, which acquired Marymount in 2002. As the University’s current Marymount chaplain, Sister Heyser tends to the spiritual, social, and educational needs of the college’s alumnae.

[She has also been called on to deliver the opening prayers for the 2015 Commencement ceremonies at Rose Hill and for a D.C. alumni chapter’s evening honoring Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor in September 2015.]

On Dec. 6 at a Marymount Founder’s ceremony at the Rose Hill campus, the school’s Alumnae Board will honor Sister Heyser and Sister Margaret Ellen Flannelly, RSHM, with the Mother Butler Leadership award.

Both women have served in the chaplain ministry: Sister Heyser since November 2009 and Sister Flannelly, a former Marymount professor and academic dean, from 2007 to 2009.

Sister Heyser never held administrative posts at the college, but whether she is working against human trafficking or on behalf of the Marymount family, she has always had a knack for making connections.

At Fordham, she makes connections with the Marymount alumnae via monthly newsletters, retreats at Cormaria House, and communications with women who attended the school that Mother Marie Joseph Butler founded in 1907. Part of the job, she said, is listening to alumnae who are still unhappy that the college, located on the Hudson River in Tarrytown, had to close in 2007.

“I listen, because it’s a journey of sadness they have. But I say, look at other women’s colleges that have closed. They have no place to gather, no place to have reunions, no place to have opportunities for educational talks,” she said.

“So we’re very lucky in that sense to have an institution that’s welcoming us and allowing us to be part of the big family.”

When Marymount closed, the alumnae also board started a legacy fund that grants scholarships to Fordham women who have a family member who attended an RSHM school.

Being part of a large Jesuit institution has also given her a platform from which to expand her passion of fighting human trafficking, which afflicts 21 million people around the globe.

She’s on the Coalition of Religious Congregations to Stop Trafficking of Persons (CRC-STOP), which organized two Fordham conferences on the subject. Through the STOP Coalition, she has helped raise funds for LifeWay Network to open its first safe house and to work to open two more safe houses in New York City area. She served on the LifeWay Board for eight years and just recently left that position.

Sister Heyser said the subject resonates deeply with the women in her order. One of the first actions Father Jean Gailhac took when he founded the order with Mother Saint Jean in 1849 was build a shelter for prostitutes and an orphanage for children.

“I look at things that need to be done and try to do them. I may not stay with them forever [as]I invite other people to join me and move on to something else.

“I can’t leave human trafficking issue though. It’s still such a terrible crime,” she said.

Awareness of the problem has been growing, she said, and authorities are beginning to finally focus less on prostitutes and more on johns. But challenges still remain, she said. One challenge is that many people can’t accept the possibility that trafficking could be happening right in front of them.

“It’s that attitude, of ‘Nothing like that happens in my neighborhood, it can’t happen in my building.’ So how do you become alert? You look for signs that persons may not really be in charge of their own lives,” she said.

“They don’t have any papers; they’re not even sure where they live. Maybe there are a lot of men going into a house, or there are a lot of women there. Why are there so many young people there? Just begin to ask the questions.”

If you do see something suspicious, call the National Human Trafficking Resource Center at (888) 373-7888.

It’s a knotty problem that taps into troubling issues of economics, sexuality, and psychology, and fighting it is firmly in line with the teachings of Jesus and of course Mother Butler, she said.

“When Mother Butler founded Marymount, she told the students they should be focusing out to the world ‘You should be somebody who speaks out in society, and knows what’s going on,’” she said.

“There was not one woman in my class who ever said, ‘Will we get to do what we want to do? Will that be OK?’ Rather, the conversation was, ‘We want to do this, and this is what we’re going to do.’ Nobody hesitated. So much of that is attributed to the Marymount education, and I’m so grateful every day for that,” she said.

Lucci, who created the iconic character Erica Kane on ABC’s All My Children and now stars on Lifetime’s Devious Maids, received the Alumna of Achievement Award at the Marymount Alumnae Awards Ceremony at Fordham’s Rose Hill campus on Saturday.

She later posted a photo of herself at the ceremony with Brigid Driscoll, RSHM, former president of Marymount, calling Sister Driscoll the “Dynamo behind us all.”

“I will never forget her leadership and support. … I will always treasure the education I received,” wrote Lucci, who also gave shout-outs to Maura Gaines, PhD, MC ’58, and the former head of the Marymount drama department, “the late outstanding Mr. Ronald Weyand.”

Lucci was one of three alumnae honored at the annual event, which was part of Fordham’s Jubilee weekend.

“These three women have shaped our world, supported their alma mater, and been a source of pride for all Marymount graduates and the order of the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary,” said Jean Wynn, MC ’80, vice president of the Marymount Alumnae Association Board of Directors.

Mary Donohue, MC ’79, received the Gloria Gaines Memorial Award, given in recognition of service to community, church, and college. Donohue has served in leadership roles in the Marymount alumnae community since 1985 and spearheaded community service projects at employers including JPMorgan and Bank of America.

The Golden Dome Award went to Kay Delaney Bring, MC ’60, in recognition of her commitment to advance the legacy of Marymount College.

A groundbreaking female executive in the media industry, Delaney Bring joined CNN in 1980, helping to launch the cable channel’s New York office. She retired 25 years later as executive vice president of CNN International.

She has named the Marymount Legacy Fund as the beneficiary of a $500,000 life insurance policy. To date, it’s the single largest gift to the fund, which was established to preserve the Marymount name and tradition of preparing women for leadership roles. The fund provides financial support to female Fordham students who embody the Marymount spirit.

Lucci, Donohue, and Delaney joined the newly minted Butler Society, a community of Marymount women who have received the alumnae board’s highest honors through the years. The society will serve as an advisory panel to the alumnae board.

Joseph M. McShane, SJ, president of Fordham, commended the 90 alumnae present for carrying on the ideals of Marymount and its founder, Mother Marie Joseph Butler, RHSM, even though the college is no longer in operation.

“Your spirit is a clear indication that the spirit of Marymount and the vision of Mother Butler are not only alive but vibrantly alive,”Father McShane said. “You are treasured, honored, much-loved members of the larger Fordham family.”

Fordham pre-med student Christina Dowe was among those in attendance. The rising senior, whose mother graduated from Marymount, is a recipient of the Marymount Legacy Fund Scholarship. She’s grateful to be a part of the Marymount legacy and for the support of its alumnae.

“This community is so enthusiastic about empowering young girls to go out into the world and become leaders,” Dowe said.

—Jennifer Spencer