Father-Daughter Grads Reward Faculty with Readership
Father and daughter Robert and Sarah Glidden both graduated from Franklin & Marshall. Along with Bob’s wife and Sarah’s mother, Eileen, the two alums recently celebrated their alma mater and the professors that make it so special. The family has established the Robert Glidden ’69, P’99, Eileen Glidden P’99 and Sarah Glidden Kempson ’99 Endowed Readership. It is being used on a two- to three-year rotating basis to support one or more tenured associate professors in recognition of their impressive pedagogical and scholarly accomplishments and future potential. The College’s provost awards these funds in support of scholarly activities aligning with the professor’s teaching, including scholarship, research, professional development, and compensation. Associate professors in economics or business, organizations & society receive special consideration for the funding. “We agreed on this gift because it's the right thing to do,” Robert Glidden, an economics major, said. “F&M was a seminal experience. It began my career trajectory. I have created, and operate, two substantial businesses. My F&M education, with a major in economics, set me up and gave me the initial business acumen to be successful.”This academic year, the Glidden Endowed Readership recipients are Nicole Jones Young, associate professor of organizational behavior, and Leanne Roncolato, associate professor of economics. Young, who came to F&M in 2016, researches criminal history and employment. She has done fieldwork in correctional institutions and explored work-release programs through the lens of gender. She also has analyzed the impact of training programs on equitable employment access among incarcerated women. Roncolato, who has taught at the College since 2014, is a labor economist who studies questions of power and identity among marginalized populations. Her research has focused on international trade, gender, the economics of the household, job quality and informal employment.In 1972, Robert Glidden and his business partner, James Bokor Sr., founded Robert-James Sales, a nationwide distributor specializing in stainless steel pipes, valves and fittings. Glidden also co-founded Trebor, Inc., an international distributor of tissue paper, pulp and containerboard. Sarah Glidden Kempson majored in accounting at F&M. As an undergraduate, Sarah was active in Alpha Phi and the Student Managed Investment Portfolio. Like her father, she went on to earn an MBA from SUNY Buffalo, which launched her career in finance. She was a hedge fund analyst at Goldman Sachs, as well as the business manager of a private school in Princeton, N.J. Today, she is the director of concierge services at Roundview Capital. “F&M shaped who I am,” Sarah said. “I value the liberal arts education I received because it taught me to think broadly. It prepared me to have a well-rounded career.” F&M President Barbara K. Altmann extended her thanks to the Gliddens for their commitment to supporting the high-level teaching and research taking place at their alma mater. “The world needs Diplomats, and no one is better positioned to accomplish that goal than Franklin & Marshall’s faculty,” Altmann said. “Our students are launched into successful careers and lives of meaning in large part due to our faculty’s teaching and mentoring. We are grateful for this gift from the Glidden family. Their foresight in supporting faculty scholarship, research and professional development helps us attract and retain outstanding professors.” Both Glidden graduates cherish their F&M education, remarkably similar experiences despite being 30 years apart. “F&M is a great school,” Bob said. “Students should enjoy their education and think about what they want to do for the rest of their life. They’re going to have false starts, but that’s OK. That's why you go to a liberal arts institution. You learn what you want to do and what you're good at, and you learn how to grow and keep learning.” “I agree,” Sarah said. “I took music and oceanography, but I majored in accounting. I feel like I got to experience it all!”
Father and daughter Robert and Sarah Glidden both graduated from Franklin & Marshall. Along with Bob’s wife and Sarah’s mother, Eileen, the two alums recently celebrated their alma mater and the professors that make it so special.
The family has established the Robert Glidden ’69, P’99, Eileen Glidden P’99 and Sarah Glidden Kempson ’99 Endowed Readership. It is being used on a two- to three-year rotating basis to support one or more tenured associate professors in recognition of their impressive pedagogical and scholarly accomplishments and future potential.
The College’s provost awards these funds in support of scholarly activities aligning with the professor’s teaching, including scholarship, research, professional development, and compensation. Associate professors in economics or business, organizations & society receive special consideration for the funding.
“We agreed on this gift because it's the right thing to do,” Robert Glidden, an economics major, said. “F&M was a seminal experience. It began my career trajectory. I have created, and operate, two substantial businesses. My F&M education, with a major in economics, set me up and gave me the initial business acumen to be successful.”
This academic year, the Glidden Endowed Readership recipients are Nicole Jones Young, associate professor of organizational behavior, and Leanne Roncolato, associate professor of economics.
Young, who came to F&M in 2016, researches criminal history and employment. She has done fieldwork in correctional institutions and explored work-release programs through the lens of gender. She also has analyzed the impact of training programs on equitable employment access among incarcerated women.
Roncolato, who has taught at the College since 2014, is a labor economist who studies questions of power and identity among marginalized populations. Her research has focused on international trade, gender, the economics of the household, job quality and informal employment.
In 1972, Robert Glidden and his business partner, James Bokor Sr., founded Robert-James Sales, a nationwide distributor specializing in stainless steel pipes, valves and fittings. Glidden also co-founded Trebor, Inc., an international distributor of tissue paper, pulp and containerboard.
Sarah Glidden Kempson majored in accounting at F&M. As an undergraduate, Sarah was active in Alpha Phi and the Student Managed Investment Portfolio. Like her father, she went on to earn an MBA from SUNY Buffalo, which launched her career in finance. She was a hedge fund analyst at Goldman Sachs, as well as the business manager of a private school in Princeton, N.J. Today, she is the director of concierge services at Roundview Capital.
“F&M shaped who I am,” Sarah said. “I value the liberal arts education I received because it taught me to think broadly. It prepared me to have a well-rounded career.”
F&M President Barbara K. Altmann extended her thanks to the Gliddens for their commitment to supporting the high-level teaching and research taking place at their alma mater.
“The world needs Diplomats, and no one is better positioned to accomplish that goal than Franklin & Marshall’s faculty,” Altmann said. “Our students are launched into successful careers and lives of meaning in large part due to our faculty’s teaching and mentoring. We are grateful for this gift from the Glidden family. Their foresight in supporting faculty scholarship, research and professional development helps us attract and retain outstanding professors.”
Both Glidden graduates cherish their F&M education, remarkably similar experiences despite being 30 years apart.
“F&M is a great school,” Bob said. “Students should enjoy their education and think about what they want to do for the rest of their life. They’re going to have false starts, but that’s OK. That's why you go to a liberal arts institution. You learn what you want to do and what you're good at, and you learn how to grow and keep learning.”
“I agree,” Sarah said. “I took music and oceanography, but I majored in accounting. I feel like I got to experience it all!”
Latest Bell & Tower
- Liberal Arts is the Future of WorkLiberal arts colleges and educational leaders from around the country will gather at Franklin & Marshall College June 1-3 for a conference to imagine the workplace of tomorrow. “The Liberal Arts and the Future of Work” is expected to focus on the changing nature of education and work and the central role the liberal arts can play in the workplace now emerging. “We’ve reached an inflection point where there is a need for liberal arts colleges to become more forward-looking, to envision and create the knowledge needed for the future,” said Professor of Legal Studies Jeffrey Nesteruk, deputy provost for new academic initiatives.Leading the conference, Nesteruk said this does not mean abandoning the liberal arts’ invaluable tradition of preserving and transmitting the wisdom of the past, but rather it means folding that wisdom into new curricular programs. “Because today’s students will experience a work world significantly different from that of even a decade ago, liberal arts colleges must strive to imagine tomorrow,” he said. Among the institutions that will be represented at the conference are the Aspen Institute Business and Society Program, Babson College, Bentley University, Bryn Mawr College, Bucknell University, Carleton College, College of the Holy Cross, Colorado College, Connecticut College, DePauw University, Gettysburg College, Lawrence University, Mount Holyoke College, New York University’s Stern School of Business, Oberlin College, Prescott College, Swarthmore College, Washington and Lee University and Wesleyan University. A panel of college presidents will open the convening. “It is in addressing this new environment that the classic virtues of liberal arts colleges display their contemporary currency,” Nesteruk said. “Liberal arts colleges have always been integral to strength and cohesion in our flourishing years. In disconcerting times, we may discover their value is even greater.”
- A Q&A with Matthew Thomas ’10, Director of Leadership, Mentorship, and Life Design InitiativesStaff Council is proud to spotlight F&M departments and professional staff in Bell & Tower, a weekly newsletter for the faculty and professional staff of Franklin & Marshall College. We hope these spotlights will reveal some of the tremendous work being done by professional staff across campus, chip away at existing silos, and help you gain an understanding and appreciation of the varied ways in which your colleagues contribute to the mission of the College each day. Do you want your department to be in the spotlight? We invite you to share stories and information about your teams via this form. Tell us about your role and how you support students at F&M. I’m thrilled to be back at my alma mater supporting students in the multiple areas covered by my role: leadership, mentorship, and life design. My position allows me ample room to support F&M students in a variety of ways — from running leadership cohort groups on campus, such as the Harwood Leadership Seminar and the Diplomat Leadership Program, to stewarding some of F&M’s hallmark mentorship initiatives, like our True Blue Mentorship Program. In addition, I have the opportunity to lead a variety of trainings and workshops to support individual groups across campus — from helping club leadership intentionally transition from one year to the next to encouraging students as they build literacy in diverse areas of their lives, from career development and financial management to networking and articulating their own personal and professional stories. I’m excited to offer experiential learning opportunities that support students in being the best version of themselves. Why do you feel leadership, mentorship and life design is important to student success? Success means different things to different people, but no matter the definition, it relies on students having the skills and confidence to chart their own paths in life. Giving students the knowledge that leadership is inclusive, values-based, and collaborative — and the space and guidance to explore what leadership means to them within and beyond these principles — offers them a head start in understanding who they are as leaders, community members, and individuals and how they will achieve their personal goals (or, put another way, design their own lives). Mentorship promotes this growth through individualized connections and support. I’m excited to work with our students as they build their own mentor “board of directors,” a diverse support network that makes it easier to navigate the complexities of our constantly changing world. What exactly does life design mean? Life design is an extension of design thinking, which is a process used by designers and teams in various industries to intentionally create all manner of products and outcomes. In my role, I’m excited to help students connect with the resources they need to explore and chart meaningful, balanced, and fulfilling lives — from courses about financial literacy or etiquette to guidance for choosing an industry that feels personally fulfilling. Life design models can also provide students with tools for making difficult decisions in their lives. Moving from being told “you can do anything” while students are in high school and college, to choosing a defined something in a career or field after college can be a difficult transition. OSPGD and the larger F&M community are here to help students navigate these changes and exciting opportunities. What sort of programs and support can students expect this upcoming year? My career has focused on experiential and leadership education. I’ve taught in a range of settings up and down the East Coast and in the mountains of Colorado, and students will see our programming reflect that background. I’m looking forward to getting students outside and off-campus and connecting with the Lancaster community. We have some exciting plans for students this upcoming year — from community events in Lancaster to a Susquehanna Riverlands tour. I’m so looking forward to working with groups from across our campus and community, and my office door is always open! How do you feel F&M prepares students for success beyond F&M? As an alum, I call upon the skills and critical lens that I developed at F&M on an almost daily basis. In every class I took at the College, I was given the opportunity to develop personal relationships with not only my peers but also my professors — many of whom were the first colleagues I connected with upon returning to campus. It’s wonderful to now be supporting students with programming that compliments this academic power and to be joining a community full of individuals who are part of the same mission — fostering students of intellect, creativity, and character.
- Shout-Out! To Mike WhartonTo Mike Wharton, Groundskeeping/Facilities and Operations, from Donna Pflum: Throughout the year, in all kinds of weather, Mike works tirelessly to keep the grounds and the parking areas around College Square and the ASFC in beautiful, pristine condition. Every day, our community benefits from his hard work and thoughtful care. Job well done, Mike. Thank you!
- Shout-Out! To Kim Bryan and Julia BelserFrom Victoria Waddail to Admission staffers Kim Bryan and Julia Belser: Kim and Julia were the leads in planning our extremely successful Admitted Student Weekend, April 14-15. The events have already resulted in adding members to the Class of 2027, and the atmosphere was fun and upbeat the entire weekend. We have received glowing reviews from many students and parents. So much work goes into this event, so I wanted to acknowledge our lead planners -- and also our entire division and the whole F&M community -- for making this such a success!
- Professor’s Book Examines Government’s ‘Communities of Strangers’For more than two decades, Dean Hammer lectured and wrote about democracies in ancient Rome and Greece, but now he tackles American democracy in comparison to Rome. “I’m really proud of this book,” Franklin & Marshall College’s John W. Wetzel Professor of Government said. “It is my sixth book and serves as a culmination of some different strands of my research program over my career.” Recently published by Cambridge University Press, “Rome and America: Communities of Strangers, Spectacles of Belonging” explores the founding myths in the cultural imagination of the two societies.The range of topics Hammer pulls together for his argument includes American Western movies; bare-knuckle boxing; Native American policy, and the writings of Noah Webster, Charles Eastman, Booker T. Washington, and W.E.B. Du Bois. “Ultimately, American democracy, like the Roman republic, is confronted with a crisis of a government of strangers, in which consensus is shirked and dissensus [widespread dissent] celebrated,” Hammer writes. In three questions, Hammer shared some of his views on republics, democracy and his advice to students who aspire to an academic career. 1) In the final chapter, “The Experience of Politics and the Crises of Two Republics,” you write about how the Roman republic collapsed. Do you see a similar occurrence in the United States? I do. I first wrote about this danger years before it became fashionable. Every time I went back to work on the chapter, I realized that claims I had made that seemed alarmist at the time now seemed downright muted. In particular, I saw some early signs of how violence had seeped into our thinking as an acceptable or necessary aspect of our politics and culture. I’m not talking about fringe groups. I’m talking about how we talk about each other on social media, the increasing threats to government officials and election workers, the rising hate speech directed at each other, the hate-based vandalism and killings, the acts of violence that erupted in the midst of peaceful protests, the acts of overt violence against peaceful protestors, and, of course, the events of Jan. 6. But what is alarming is the frighteningly broad acceptance, and polls bear this out, that violence might be necessary, or that it is OK and can be excused. A democracy cannot survive when citizens see each other as enemies. 2) Is the “community of strangers” in the two republics that you write about the reason that democracy thrives or the reason it dies? The notion of a community of strangers cuts in two ways. The Roman and American shared founding myths are exceptional in imagining a community formed through the continual incorporation of potentially anyone. They are communities that are not premised on any traditional markers of identity such as race, ethnicity, religion, genealogy, or land. That has the possibility of contributing to the openness and vibrancy of a healthy democracy. But there is a lingering question that underlies a community of strangers: If everyone can potentially be us, then who are we? The book explores different attempts to answer this question by turning what we all share—that we began as strangers—into a claim about who really belongs and who remains the threatening stranger. As Rome saw in the final decades of the republic and we are witnessing in our own politics, democracies are imperiled when the community divides into strangers who cannot understand, do not trust, and see as dangerous each other. 3) What book-writing advice would you give students interested in an academic career? Here’s my advice to anyone writing. Write as a practice. I often joke that I am like a farmer plowing a field. I wake up every morning and I write for a certain amount of time. I do not set a particular goal for the day. I rarely end up where I thought I would. I have ups and downs about how I judge my own writing. And the finished product takes shape only after many iterations. I have a second piece of advice. Get a colleague or colleagues who give you honest feedback. It is others who are in a position to help us clarify our own thinking.
- New Purchasing and Business Expense Policies Now in PlaceFollowing recent open comment periods and review by the Committee on College Policy Development (CCPD), two newly approved policies are in place and posted on F&M's website. Please take time to review the Purchasing Policy and the Business Expense Policy. Further communication is coming from Finance & Administration, but feel free to contact fmpolicy@fandm.edu with any questions in the meantime. Please see the College Policies webpage for more information about the policy approval process, and keep a lookout for future policy drafts and announcements in Bell & Tower.