Rosalynn Carter
Former First Lady of the United States of America

First Lady Rosalynn Carter was beloved around the world, but her legacy stands particularly tall in Georgia, where she and former President Jimmy Carter spent most of their lives. In Atlanta, Mrs. Carter partnered with Emory experts for decades throughout her transformative work advancing mental health and working toward a more equitable health care system.

Mrs. Carter’s relationship with the university was just part of an unforgettable chapter in which both Carters turned to Emory to help achieve their ambitious goals after leaving the White House. In 1982, the couple launched The Carter Center in association with Emory to promote peace and democracy and to address issues of global health. 

A powerful advocate in her own right, Mrs. Carter partnered for decades with Emory experts, uniting her vision of a more equitable health care system with the university’s strengths in research, training, and service.

“Her tenure as first lady of the United States was just one chapter in a life that was really devoted to caring and doing good for others,” recalled speaker Kathryn Cade, Mrs. Carter’s friend and her director of projects in the White House, during the national tribute service for Mrs. Carter on Emory’s campus.

Jason Carter, the Carters’ grandson and now chair of The Carter Center’s board of trustees, described Mrs. Carter as the “cool grandma” who used a sword to practice tai chi and once, on a flight with family members for a vacation, whipped out a container of pimento cheese, made sandwiches for her relatives, then continued making them for other passengers as well. “She loved people,” he said.

Recalling her work with The Carter Center, including helping to bring the plague of guinea worm to the brink of eradication, “she poured out her love all over the world,” he said. “It was natural to her to open up her heart to people, not with pity but as partners.”

Evangeline T. Papageorge
29G 37M 68M 71M 79M

Evangeline T. Papageorge made history at Emory when she became the first woman appointed to a full-time faculty position in the School of Medicine, teaching biochemistry and clinical chemistry. Papageorge was also the school’s first female administrator, serving as dean of students for nearly 20 years, and she was beloved by class after class of medical students.

Papageorge retired in 1975 but retained her seat on the alumni board as a regent emerita until her death in 2002. In 1993, the Emory Medical Alumni Association presented the first Evangeline Papageorge Teaching Award. The honor is still bestowed annually to a faculty member whose “intellectual luminosity has generated the greatest excitement about learning among students and colleagues.” Over nearly three decades, the award has become one of the most prestigious awards presented by the School of Medicine or Emory University.

Lee Miller
82L

Lee Miller has never met a stranger. The gregarious wealth management expert is driven by curiosity and study, which ultimately led to her current role as director of the New York Metro region for Glenmede. Her journey began with a yellow pages search when she was an Emory law student. What she learned opened the door to a lifelong interest in trusts and estates.

Armed with this knowledge, Miller chose a career in private banking instead of law, specializing in trusts and estates. Working with three to four generations of a family calls for a high degree of empathy and technical expertise, and this is why the specialty attracts so many women, she said. But when it comes to leadership, women are underrepresented, with Miller being one of few women regional directors.

As a member of the Emory Board of Trustees since 2015, Miller has been working with Emory to turn the tide for women in leadership. She is a leader within the Women of Emory Impact Circle, a collective philanthropic group that funds research to advance the causes of women and girls.

Claire DePalma
Special advisor to the associate vice president of health, well-being, access, and prevention

Claire DePalma was “bitten by the theater bug” in high school, going on to major in theater in college and ultimately earning a master of fine arts in creative writing. It’s not a background one might expect for an extensive career in student affairs. But while teaching theater and English in a Pittsburgh high school after graduate school, DePalma realized she loved working in an educational environment.

DePalma received the 2023 Dissertation of the Year Award from the Southern Association for College Student Affairs for her dissertation, “Antiracist Praxis by White Women in Student Affairs.” As the title suggests, DePalma’s research explores how white women who engage in antiracist practices in their student affairs work understand and enact those practices.

DePalma serves Emory University students as special advisor to James Raper, Campus Life’s associate vice president for health, well-being, access, and prevention.

“I believe antiracist practices are necessary to create a more liberatory higher education, one that empowers community members of all identities to feel they belong,” DePalma adds. “My mission as a student affairs professional is to create conditions in which all students can thrive.”

Leah Ward Sears
80L

In the early 1960s, in the thick of the Civil Rights Movement, a young Leah Ward Sears made the trek from her birthplace of Heidelberg, Germany, to the United States. Decades later, she still recalls the stark confusion she felt when passing through a segregated Manhattan. It was her first glimmer of the existence of racism, and that harsh reality would plague her for the rest of her life.

Sears has made good on that commitment by cementing her place in Georgia history. In 1992, she was appointed as superior court judge in Fulton County, the youngest person and first woman to do so. When she was appointed by former Gov. Zell Miller to the Supreme Court of Georgia, Sears became the first woman and youngest person to serve on that court as well. To top off a growing list of firsts, in 2007 she became the first African American woman chief justice of a state supreme court in the United States.

Sears has also prioritized developing and finding community during her career. She founded and served as the first president of the Georgia Association of Black Women Attorneys, and she founded the Battered Women’s Project in Columbus, Georgia. For her leadership and contributions to local, national, and global communities, Sears received the most prestigious alumni award, the Emory Medal, in 2001.

After 27 years of service, she retired from the Supreme Court of Georgia in 2009. The following year, Sears was elected to Emory’s Board of Trustees. She currently serves as partner at the Smith, Gambrell & Russell, LLP law firm in Atlanta, Georgia.

Eva Rothenberg
19Ox 21C

Eva Rothenberg was selected for the prestigious Marshall Scholarship, which funds up to three years of graduate study in the United Kingdom.

Rothenberg, who graduated in 2021 with highest honors from Emory College of Arts and Sciences with degrees in English and linguistics, is among 51 Americans selected for the highly competitive award funded by the British government. She is Emory’s 19th Marshall Scholar.

“Just two years after graduating, Eva has made impressive contributions as a journalist,” says Emory President Gregory L. Fenves. “This is what we love to see at Emory—our graduates launching into careers with purpose and ambition. With the Marshall Scholarship, Eva will reach even higher, deepening her expertise in linguistics while adding a visionary new chapter to her life and career.”

Rothenberg plans to study applied linguistics at the University of Birmingham. The university is a pioneer in corpus linguistics, the computer-based methodology that examines language qualitatively and quantitatively.

Now working as a business reporter at CNN in New York, Rothenberg wants her academic work to weave together digital humanities and public scholarship.