Cornell Board of Trustees will seat its new and re-elected members

The Cornell University Board of Trustees recently elected new members to the board and voted to change its bylaws to increase the size of the board from 42 to 64 members.

The bylaw change effectively converted 22 trustee fellows to trustees. Trustee fellows previously were fully participating board members, except that they could not vote.

The board elected four at-large trustees to four-year terms, re-elected seven at-large trustees, re-elected one at-large trustee to fill out a vacated two-year term and re-elected one trustee from the field of labor.

Board members also welcomed two new alumni-elected trustees, a new employee-elected trustee, one new faculty-elected trustee and one new student-elected trustee.

In addition, the board elected Samuel C. Fleming and Barbara R. Friedman as vice chairpersons, for one-year terms beginning July 1.

Elected as at-large trustees to four-year terms beginning July 1 were Franci J. Blassberg, Dwight L. Bush, Robert J. Katz and Sheryl WuDunn. Re-elected as at-large trustees were Stephen B. Ashley, Robert T. Blakely, Abby Joseph Cohen, Thomas A. Mann, Rebecca Q. Morgan, Martin Y. Tang and Jan Rock Zubrow.

Blassberg is a partner with the law firm of Debevoise & Plimpton in New York City and is active in the firm's private equity and mergers and acquisitions practices; Bush is a principal of Stuart Mill Capital, LLC, an Arlington, Va.-based investment firm, and vice president and chief financial officer of SatoTravel Holdings Inc.; Katz is special counsel and an advisory director of the Goldman Sachs Group Inc., with headquarters in New York City; WuDunn is a project director in strategic planning for The New York Times.

Robert J. Appel was re-elected as an at-large trustee for a two-year term beginning July 1, completing the term of Ronay A. Menschel, who is stepping down.

Bruce S. Raynor was re-elected a trustee from the field of labor in New York state for a four-year term beginning July 1.

Elected by the alumni body as trustees were C. Morton Bishop, a 1974 graduate of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and Robert S. Harrison, a 1976 graduate of the College of Arts and Sciences. Bishop is president of Pendleton Woolen Mills. Harrison is partner and managing director of Goldman Sachs & Co.

Michael V. Esposito, gifts and exchanges coordinator for the endowed libraries, was elected by nonacademic staff to complete the remaining two years of the term of Cynthia M. Tkachuck.

Elizabeth (Lisa) Earle, professor of plant breeding, was elected by the faculty to a four-year term beginning July 1.

Ifunanya O. Maduka, a rising junior in the College of Arts and Sciences, was elected to a two-year term as a student member of the board effective July 1.