Holly Buckland Parker, EdD: Educational Developer and Graduate Teaching Program Coordinator, Center for Teaching and Learning

C.V. Dolan, MEd: Research and Grants Manager, QTPiE: Queer and Trans People in Education

Lindsay Furlong O’Hara, MEd, MS: CARE Team Outreach Coordinator, Division of Student Affairs

Larry Long, MEd: Senior Institutional Research Analyst, Office of Institutional Research and Assessment

Joseph Russell: Assistant Dean of Students for Retention, Division of Student Affairs

KC Williams, MA: Assistant Dean for Equity, Belonging, and Student Engagement, College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences

Jackie Gribbons

Jackie Gribbons paved the way for countless women as one of the original architects of UVM’s nationally ranked Higher Education and Student Affairs program (HESA) and as an implementer of Title IX standards. It may have been her role as the straight-talking but compassionate academic adviser, however, that she will be remembered most by the thousands of students she helped during her groundbreaking 40-year career.

Jackie worked at UVM from 1966 to 2006 as a faculty member and in a variety of administrative roles traditionally occupied by men, including dean of students, assistant to the executive vice president, assistant to the vice president for administration, student grievance coordinator, associate to the senior vice president; and director of staff professional development. As a charter member of the HESA faculty, she also served as course instructor, faculty adviser and coordinator of the program’s graduate internships. UVM’s HESA program had been ranked among the top five nationally in the graduate preparation of higher education and student affairs administrators during her tenure. When she retired from her administrative post in 1993, Gribbons continued to teach and advise in the HESA program until 2006.

During her time at UVM, Jackie helped establish the professional practicum requirement – a hallmark of the HESA program – and Vermont Women in Higher Education, and led a task force on women’s athletics at UVM. Gribbons, an avid supporter of UVM athletics, was subsequently named UVM’s first coordinator of Title IX, responsible for bringing the university into compliance with the new law aimed at ensuring equal opportunities in collegiate athletics.

A number of awards have been established in Gribbons' name, including the Jackie M. Gribbons Leadership Award, presented by the Vermont Women in Higher Education; the Jackie Gribbons Practica Supervision Excellence Award, presented by HESA; and the Jackie M. Gribbons Panhellenic Award, presented by Bowling Green State University.

Keith M. Miser

Keith M. Miser was a national leader in the field of higher education student affairs—a practitioner, thinker, teacher, and mentor who significantly advanced the field. After earning his bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees from Indiana University in his home state, Miser’s career soon brought him to Vermont where he would serve the university in several roles across seventeen years, 1971-1988. Originally hired as director of residential life, Miser would later assume the posts of dean of students and associate vice president for administration. During his years at the university, Miser helped establish and taught in UVM’s highly regarded Higher Education and Student Affairs Administration graduate program. He served as the founding advisor to The Vermont Connection, a student affairs journal created, edited, and produced by graduate students in the HESA program.  

Keith left his mark on UVM through his vision, leadership, and the colleagues he mentored who continue to lead student affairs at the university more than twenty years later. In addition to supporting Keith and his work in higher education, his partner Ann served as a mentor and confidant to hundreds of UVM graduate and undergraduate students. Ann has held several positions within education, including high school teacher, assistant principal, associate principal, and principal. Before Ann retired, she served as assistant to the vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Hawaii at Hilo. She was an assistant professor and research associate in the departments of educational leadership and teacher education at Colorado State University and the University of Hawaii.

Keith and Ann were both extraordinary teachers both in and out of the classroom. To honor Keith and Ann’s extraordinary time in service to students, Vermont and UVM, the Keith and Ann Miser Fund for the Higher Education and Student Affairs program in UVM’s College of Education and Social Services (CESS) is being established.

Kenneth P. Saurman

Dr. Kenneth P. Saurman was a professor in the College of Education and Social Services and founder of the HESA program at the University of Vermont. He earned degrees at Penn State University and Kent State University, then earned his doctorate in student personnel at Loyola University. After serving in several student affairs roles at Kent State and De Paul University and as assistant professor in the student personnel program at Loyola, he joined UVM faculty in 1970.

Under his direction, the HESA program at UVM achieved a national reputation for excellence and earned the Northeast Regional Award from NASPA in 1979 that honors outstanding training programs in higher education. Graduates of the program have served in leadership roles throughout the country, and Dr. Saurman was a nationally recognized authority in the field. He authored several seminal articles appearing within the major professional journals of the field and frequently spoke at national conferences. He served as a contributing editor to the NASPA Journal as well.

Dr. Saurman was active in the Civil Right and Peace movements of the 1960’s, and served as a chairman of the Shelburne Democratic Party, a justice of the peace, and a member of the Vermont State Democratic Committee. He also created the P.R.O.V.E. program at Johnson State College that provides educational opportunities for low-income Vermonters. 

To honor Dr. Saurman’s legacy, his friends and family established the Professor Kenneth P. Saurman Memorial Scholarship Fund in Higher Education for graduate students in the HESA program.

Deborah Hunter, Ph.D.

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Kathleen Manning, Ph.D.

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