2007-2008 term (July 1, 2007, through June 30, 2008)

Executive Council Officers

• President – Marty Siederer LC’73
• 1st Vice President – Jason Goldstein LC’02, RBS’05
• 2nd Vice President – Karen Kanu LC’99
• Treasurer – Jeff Isaacs LC’84
• Secretary – Harsh Dutia LC’03

• Federation Rep. 2006-09 – William Bauer LC’86, GSNB’89
• Federation Rep. 2007-10 – Iris Martinez-Campbell LC’75, SSW’81
• Alternate Fed. Rep. – Jason Goldstein LC’02, RBS’05

Committees

• Budget and Finance – Jeff Isaacs LC’84
• Elections and Nominations – Michael Beachem LC’73, GSE’78, ’84
• Membership – Yash Dalal LC’92
• Reunion and Class – Carla Alexander LC’96, GSNB’95, SSW’02
• Programming and Events – William Bauer LC’86, GSNB’89
• Public Relations – Jason Goldstein LC’02, RBS’05 
• Young Alumni – Tiffany Ross LC’03

Additional Executive Council Members

• Staff Liaison – Michael Rutkowski UCNB’96, SCILS’96

Sourced from Livingston Alumni News, Winter/Spring 2008. 

Michael R. Greenberg studies environmental health, environmental policy and risk analysis. He is a Distinguished Professor of the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy, Rutgers University-New Brunswick and served as the Bloustein School’s 2017-2018 Interim Dean. 

Greenberg joined the faculty at Rutgers’ Livingston College in September 1971, as an associate professor of urban planning, urban studies and geography.

He served as a Livingston College Fellow. He also served on Livingston College’s appointments and promotions (A&P) and academic standing committees; and led in the building the undergraduate community health program, which became the undergraduate public health program.

He and Bernard Goldstein of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) worked to establish the New Jersey graduate program in Public Health, which eventually became the Rutgers School of Public Health. 

Rutgers’ Livingston Alumni Association (LAA) honored Greenberg on March 20, 2018, with the Livingston Legacy Award, honoring his key role in the establishment and growth of Livingston College and its mission, and for his overall contributions to the Rutgers and global communities. 

In an interview for the 2018 award, Greenberg tells us that “Livingston was a terrific place to work with people who … didn’t think in standardized ways. They would challenge what you had to say.

“You’d get up at one of the faculty meetings in Livingston College, and if you could get through a sentence without being challenged, that was an accomplishment.

“The things I learned at Livingston have served me well throughout my entire career at Rutgers.”

In the 1970s, Rosemary Agrista (LC’76) was a student in Greenberg’s senior seminar on urban studies, related to her major in Urban Communications (Journalism). Greenberg’s teaching about conservation and interpreting master plans later led Agrista to become an environmental activist.

As of 2018 Greenberg also serves as Director of the Environmental Analysis and Communications Group at the Bloustein School, and previously was Associate Dean of the Faculty. He had joined the Bloustein School faculty in 2000, and also holds appointments in Rutgers’ School of Public Health.

His 2017 book, Urban Planning and Public Health: A Critical Partnership (with Dona Schneider, American Public Health Association) provides an in-depth summary of the historic connections between the fields of public health and urban planning since the Industrial Revolution.

It also draws the connections between urban planning and public health through case examples and outlines critical challenges to integrate science, policy and politics to further the health of communities across the U.S.

Greenberg has written more than 30 books and more than 300 articles on topics including water supply and quality, solid waste management, mathematical programming, population and employment projection methods, and environmental cancer.

Some of his other recent books include:

• Explaining Risk Analysis (Earthscan, 2017);
• Protecting Seniors Against Environmental Disasters: From Hazards and Vulnerability to Prevention and Resilience (Earthscan, 2014);
• Nuclear Waste Management, Nuclear Power and Energy Choices: Public Preferences, Perceptions, and Trust (Springer, 2012);
• The Environmental Impact Statement After Two Generations: Managing Environmental Power (Routledge, 2011).

Greenberg also chaired a committee, which in 2017 reported to the U.S. Congress on the extent that the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) emphasizes human health and safety in its allocations for remediating former nuclear weapons sites.

He has also served on several government committees related to the destruction of the U.S. chemical weapons stockpile and nuclear weapons; chemical waste management; and the degradation of the U.S. government physical infrastructure, and sustainability and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). As of 2018 he is a member of the Plutonium Disposition Committee, reporting to the DOE.

Greenberg served as area editor for social sciences and then editor-in-chief of Risk Analysis: An International Journal from 2002-2013, and continues as associate editor for environmental health for the American Journal of Public Health.

He had earned his master’s and Ph.D. degrees in geography from Columbia University. He served as an assistant professor at Columbia before joining the Livingston College faculty.

Photos courtesy of Michael Greenberg. In collage: Greenberg at age 8, in 1965, in the 1970s and in 1999; With several of his studies; Featured in an editorial cartoon in The Daily Targum, by Roy Wollen.

The Livingston Alumni Association (LAA) has partnered with the Rutgers Oral History Archives (ROHA) to record the narratives of alumni and others associated with the history of Livingston College. ROHA staff have recorded and transcribed interviews with the people listed below, chronicling their lives including their Livingston College experiences.

Note that interviews may have been conducted over multiple sessions, in which case there will be a transcript for each session.

The interviewees’ contributions to the Alumni Memories section of the LAA website are also listed below.

ALUMNI:

• Rosemary Agrista, LC’76
• Ndidi Amutah-Onukagha, LC’03 / (Livingston College Distinguished Alumna)
• Joseph Birish, LC’75 / Music, Risk, Three-Eyed Frogs and Other Experiments: Life in Livingston College’s House 15, Circa 1972-1975
• Saskia Leo Cipriani, LC ’04
• Nicholas Ferroni, LC ’02 / (Livingston College Distinguished Alumnus)
• Patricia Graham, LC’72 (two sessions) / Joyful Memories of Livingston College from a 1972 Alumna
• Harry R. Knabe, LC’93
• Sue Kozel, LC ’81, GSNB ’85
• Eric Schwarz, LC’92, SCILS’07 (two sessions) /  Livingston College’s Challenges at Age 21  
• Marty Siederer, LC’77
• James Simon, LC’74
• Robert W. Snyder, LC’77 (three sessions) / Long Live Livingston / (Livingston College Distinguished Alumnus)
• Mercedes Valle, LC ’73
• Steven Walker, LC’86 / Towering Memories: Livingston College Students Move In to Dorms on North Side of Campus
• Steven Zurier, LC’76

FACULTY MEMBERS:

• Jerome Aumente, inaugural Director of Livingston College’s Department of Journalism and Urban Communications / (2011 Livingston Legacy recipient)
• Michael R. Greenberg (two sessions)
• Allen M. Howard, a professor of African history at Livingston College (two sessions)
• Arnold Hyndman, Dean of Livingston College (two sessions)
• Peter Klein, Livingston College philosophy professor (four sessions)
• George Levine, inaugural Chairman of the English Department at Livingston College (three sessions)
• Peter Lindenfeld, Physics Faculty
• Gerald Pomper, inaugural Chairman of the Political Science Department at Livingston College (two sessions) / (2011 Livingston Legacy recipient)

This project is made possible through financial support received from the Rutgers University Alumni Association.

The Rutgers Alumni Association (RAA) honored Jeffrey M. Armus, a 1977 graduate of Livingston College, as one of eight Loyal Sons and Loyal Daughters of Rutgers for 2018.

As of 2021, Armus is the President for the Livingston Alumni Association (LAA), and previously served as the LAA’s Vice President, Secretary, and Secretary.

Giving back to his school and to the university at large has been a labor of love for Armus.

As a student he discovered his passion and commitment to volunteerism and turned that into almost two decades of service to Livingston College. He has served on the Livingston College Dean’s Advisory Council and the LAA’s executive board, including serving as Community Service and Nominations Awards chair.

He extended his alumni work to the Rutgers Alumni Association, as a Community Service Committee chair. Armus also stepped up to serve as Class of 1977 Gift Campaign Chair for his class using his enthusiasm and drive to convince alumni to support their alma mater.

A lover of history, Jeff was instrumental in the historical preservation of Livingston College through the Livingston Legacy Archive Project.

Armus, who also graduated from Rutgers’ School of Business in 1982, was  honored on April 14, 2018, during the 60th Annual Loyal Sons and Daughters Dinner, a “scarlet” tie event held at Neilson Dining Hall on Rutgers’ Douglass Campus.

The Loyal Sons and Loyal Daughters of Rutgers are individuals who have made a meaningful and longstanding commitment to the betterment of Rutgers, the State University by exemplifying extraordinary alumni service or by making a significant impact on University life and culture. Nominations are made by existing Loyal Sons and Daughters, and the finalists named by a special selection committee of the RAA. The RAA is the nation’s fourth-oldest alumni association, serving alumni in multiple colleges and schools on Rutgers’ New Brunswick/Piscataway campus. 

Bios for all of the 2018 honorees are online. In addition to Armus, they are:

• Harold P. Baird, RC’59
• Robert L. Barchi, Rutgers University President
• Anthony J. DePetris, CCAS’84
• Ladislas F. (Laddie) Feher, RC’56, NLAW’59
• Lora L. Fong, DC ’79, NLAW ’91
• Christopher J. Paladino, RC’82, CLAW’85
• Helen F. Pirrello, UCNB’00, SSW’05

Photos: Jeffrey Armus in 2016 (top), and in the 1977 Livingston College yearbook, The Rock, Volume II. 

The Livingston Alumni Association (LAA) and the Livingston Theatre Company (LTC) Alumni Association have partnered with the Internet Archive to scan and digitize the printed programs from the Livingston Theatre Company’s productions — from the first production in 1999, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, through the final production of the 19th season, Oklahoma!, in 2017.

The LAA has partnered with the LTC to offer All-Alumni Theater Night/Afternoon events.

This project is made possible through financial support received from the Rutgers University Alumni Association.

Links to the individual printed programs are below:

2009-2010 term (July 1, 2009, through June 30, 2010)

Officers

• Marty Siederer, President
• Jason Goldstein, 1st Vice President
• Rob Bertrand, 2nd Vice President
• Jeff Isaacs, Treasurer
• Eric Schwarz, Secretary

Committee Chairs

• Budget and Finance: Jeff Isaacs
• Election and Nominations: Mike Beachem
• Membership: Joe Capo
• Programming and Events: Maxine Robinson and Kaz Wright
• Public Relations: Jason Goldstein
• Reunion and Class: Bill Bauer
• Young Alumni: Bob Cavezza

Livingston Alumni Association (LAA) Executive Council

Carla Alexander, Rosemary Agrista, Jeffrey Armus, Bill Bauer, Michael Beachem, Rob Bertrand, Joseph Capo, Bob Cavezza, Yash Dalal, Martin Dickerson, Jason Goldstein, Jeff Isaacs, Karen Kanu, Iris Martinez-Campbell, Mike Middleton, Michele Ostrowski, Maxine Robinson, Eric Schwarz, Marty Siederer, and Kaz Wright.

Photo: LAA board members, Livingston College alumni and guests at the Rutgers-New Brunswick Reunion on May 15, 2010.

2010-2011 term (July 1, 2010, through June 30, 2011)

Officers

• Marty Siederer, President
• Jason Goldstein, 1st Vice President
• Rob Bertrand, 2nd Vice President
• Jeff Isaacs, Treasurer
• Eric Schwarz, Secretary

Committee Chairs

• Budget/Finance – Jeff Isaacs
• Elections/Nominations – Mike Beachem
• Membership – Joe Capo
• Programming/Events – Bill Bauer
• PR – Jason Goldstein, Vice Chair Rob Cavezza
• Reunion – vacant
• Young Alumni – vacant

LAA Executive Council 

Rosemary Agrista, Jeff Armus, Bill Bauer, Mike Beachem, Rob Bertrand, Joe Capo, Rob Cavezza, Yash Dalal, Martin Dickerson, Jason Goldstein, Jeff Isaacs, Iris Martinez-Campbell, Mike Middleton, Debra O’Neal, Michele Ostrowski, Eric Schwarz, Marty Siederer, Bob Uhrik and Derek Young.

Abena Pokua Adompin Busia, a Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies and of English at Rutgers-New Brunswick’s School of Arts and Sciences, was named as Ghana’s Ambassador to Brazil in July 2017.

On August 2, 2017, she was sworn to that post by Ghana’s President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, in a ceremony at the President’s residence, Flagstaff House, in Accra, Ghana.

In 1998 the Livingston Alumni Association (LAA) at Rutgers University named Professor Busia as an Honorary Member to recognize her contributions to Livingston College. She joined the Rutgers faculty in 1981.

Professor Busia served as the Women’s and Gender Studies chair from 2011 to 2017, and also formerly directed Rutgers’ Center for African Studies. She teaches courses in African American and African diaspora literature, colonial discourse and black feminism.

Her scholarship keeps her actively connected to her native Ghana, where a Fulbright-Hays Group Projects Abroad Grant enabled Professor Busia and two Rutgers historians to lead an interdisciplinary program on “Teaching the History of the Slave Trade Routes of Ghana and Benin.”

Among Professor Busia’s other work with students, she has directed a summer internship taking undergraduates to work with women’s rights organizations in Ghana and has led Rutgers’ study abroad program to Ghana. In 2005 she was one of several professors who led a discussion with students surrounding the Dalai Lama’s visit to Rutgers, as part of Livingston College’s first-year mission course, Building Community.

Born in Accra, Abena Busia settled with her family in the United Kingdom where she earned a degree in English language and literature at St. Anne’s College in 1976, and a Ph.D. in social anthropology at St. Antony’s College in 1984.

She is a daughter of Kofi Busia, who served as Ghana’s Prime Minister from 1969 to 1972, when he was overthrown in a coup d’état, according to an October 4, 2012, article from Rutgers Focus. Abena Busia spent much of her childhood under house arrest and “remembers waking to the sound of gunfire during political unrest,” according to the same article.

She was also an associate editor of a 20-year project which resulted in the publication of Women Writing Africa, a four-volume collaboration published by the Feminist Press at the City University of New York. According to Professor Busia’s Rutgers biography, this collection is designed to recognize the cultural legacy in that assortment of voices by gathering together the original “cultural production” of African women.

Professor Busia is the co-editor of Theorizing Black Feminisms (1993) as well as many articles and book chapters on topics including black women’s writing, black feminist criticism, and African literature. She is also the author of two poetry collections, Testimonies of Exile (1990) and Traces of a Life (2008).

Photos: (top) Abena P.A. Busia; (bottom) Ghana’s newly installed envoys, from left, on August 2, 2017: Busia, Ambassador to Brazil; Alowe Leo Kabah, Ambassador to Benin; Francisca Ashietey-Odunton, High Commissioner to Kenya; Virginia Hesse, Ambassador to the Czech Republic; and Dufie Agyarko Kusi, Ambassador to South Korea. Photo from The Presidency, Republic of Ghana, via Graphic Online.

2016-2017 term (July 1, 2016, through June 30, 2017)

Officers

• Eric Schwarz, President
• Jeffrey Armus, Vice President/Secretary
• Michelle Josias, Vice President
• Debra O’Neal, Vice President  
• Jeff Isaacs, Treasurer

LAA Executive Council 

Maria Alba (SAS’17), an aspiring clinical psychologist from Cranford, New Jersey, has been named as the 2017 recipient of the Riki Jacobs Livingston Pride Award, given by the Livingston Alumni Association of Rutgers University. She will begin studies toward a Doctor of Psychology degree at Rutgers’ Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology in fall 2017.

In 2013, the summer before she entered Rutgers’ School of Arts and Sciences, Alba attended an orientation program about campus sexual assault and bystander intervention. Around the same time, a friend confided that she had been the victim of sexual and domestic violence. “I wanted to fight for justice for her, and for every other individual whose voice has not been heard,” Alba wrote in her essay for the award.

“The message was clear: If you see something wrong, say or do something. Be a positive, active bystander no matter how big or small your intervention.”

These two events helped Alba realize that Rutgers’ SCREAM Theater, a violence prevention program, was her calling.

As a member of the SCREAM Theater staff, Alba traveled throughout New Jersey and across the country to educate people about sexual and domestic/dating violence through improv theater. She also created a video called “I Am Part of the Revolution,” showcasing other student leaders who spoke about why they choose to take a stand.

In her undergraduate research, Alba studied the effect of stress on health issues such as smoking and obesity, especially among minorities and women who identify as lesbian or bisexual. She also conducted research on psychotherapy and counseling as it related to the gay liberation movement at Rutgers from the 1950s to the 1980s. In fall 2016 she taught an introductory seminar on psychology to first-year students.

Alba has garnered numerous awards for her academic performance, and for her work on women’s and gender studies, women’s rights, and violence prevention and victim assistance.

“I believe a successful leader knows when to lead and when to listen,” she said. “I have carried this lesson with me throughout my life as an activist, student leader, and an aspiring clinical psychologist.”

The Riki Jacobs Livingston Pride Award has been given annually since 1990 by the Livingston Alumni Association (LAA) to the Rutgers-New Brunswick graduating senior who most embodies the spirit of Livingston College and its attributes of leadership and social action. Livingston College is a former undergraduate college of Rutgers which was merged into the School of Arts and Sciences in 2007.

Riki E. Jacobs (1957-2009) was the director of the Hyacinth Foundation, an AIDS support organization, among many roles she fulfilled to assist vulnerable populations, and also was one of LAA’s first Livingston College Distinguished Alumni, honored in 2000.