ASU Alumni Association honors Sun Devil leaders with Homecoming 2011 Awards
The ASU Alumni Association will honor Sun Devil leadership during the Homecoming game pitting ASU against the University of Colorado on Oct. 29. The Alumni Association will recognize two alumni who have played key roles in the development of the W. P. Carey School of Business and a friend of ASU who has facilitated a key collaboration between ASU universities and colleges in Vietnam, as well as the 2010-11 chair of the organization’s board of directors.
The association will present its Alumni Service Award to Steve Evans '67 B.S., '68 M.B.A. and Geoffrey Edmunds '63 B.S. Rick Howarth, the general manager of Intel Products Vietnam, will receive the organization’s Alumni Appreciation Award. The immediate past chair of the Alumni Association’s board of directors, Chris Spinella '83 B.S., also will be honored.
Alumni Service Award: Steve Evans '67 B.S., '68 M.B.A.
Steve Evans, president of Evans Realty Associates, is being honored for his contributions to the W. P. Carey School of Business and ASU as a whole. Evans is a member of the Dean’s Council of 100 at the school, and co-chaired the funding campaign for the soon-to-be-built McCord Hall, a new state-of-the-art facility. He was a W. P. Carey Hall of Fame inductee in 1995 and received the school’s Distinguished Achievement Award in 2005.
He serves also as a trustee for the ASU Foundation for a New American University, is a member and former co-chair of the ASU President’s Club, and played a critical role in the development of SkySong – The ASU Scottsdale Innovation Center. Earlier this year, Evans was honored by the Arizona Board of Regents with the organization’s Award for Outstanding Service to Higher Education for his contributions to the university.
Evans founded the real estate investment trust Evans Withycombe in 1977. He served as executive vice president of Equity Residential, with which his firm merged, from 1998 to 2000, and continues to serve that company as a trustee and executive committee member.
Besides his involvement with the university, Evans is active with a number of nonprofit organizations in the Valley of the Sun, including the Arizona Family Housing Fund, the Trust for Public Land, the United Way Foundation and the Alexis de Tocqueville Society.
Alumni Service Award: Geoffrey Edmunds '63 B.S.
Geoffrey Edmunds, a builder of custom luxury homes, is being honored for his contributions to the W. P. Carey School of Business and the university as a whole. He is a member of the Dean’s Council of 100 at the school, and co-chaired the funding campaign for the McCord Hall. He was a W. P. Carey Hall of Fame inductee in 2008 and received the school’s Distinguished Achievement Award in 2001.
With his wife, Jane, he endowed the first faculty chair in the School of Accountancy within the business school and also established the Jane and Geoffrey Edmunds Endowment Scholarship. Beyond his contributions to the business school, he is a member and former co-chair of the ASU President’s Club, a trustee for the ASU Foundation for a New American University, and a member of the board of directors for the Sun Angel Foundation.
Edmunds began his career in the building industry while finishing his bachelor’s degree in accounting. He sold homes directly as a real estate agent, co-founded Murphree-Edmunds, Inc., a construction company that built custom homes, retail stores, apartments and hotels and founded Geoffrey H. Edmunds & Associates, Inc., a family owned company, in 1977. In addition to his involvement with ASU, Edmunds is a member of the Phoenix Economic Council, a director representing Arizona with the National Association of Home Builders and life director with the Homebuilders Association of Central Arizona.
Alumni Appreciation Award: Rick Howarth
Howarth is being honored for his role in collaborating with the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering to modernize engineering education in Vietnam. He is the general manager of Intel Products Vietnam, and has been charged with overseeing the construction and launch of an assembly and test facility in Ho Chi Minh City. He has partnered with ASU, USAID and the Vietnamese government to create the Higher Engineering Education Alliance Program (HEEAP), which works with the top technical universities and colleges within the country to improve the institutions’ engineering curricula and to help the programs support Vietnam’s growing high-technology sector. The initiative also aims to advance the prospects of women studying engineering in Vietnam. His facilitation of HEEAP has allowed ASU to serve as a model and mentor for Vietnamese schools that teach engineering.
Howarth, who has more than 25 years of experience in the technology industry, has resided in Vietnam with his family for the past four years. He serves on the board of directors for the American Chamber in Ho Chi Minh City and has been on the board for the Washington State MESA (Math, Engineering, Science Achievement) organization.
Past Chair's Award: Chris Spinella '83 B.S.
During his 2010-11 term as the chair of the Alumni Association’s board of directors, Spinella, who is CEO for the mobile communications software company Apriva, emphasized the importance of building relationships between the association and local businesses. He was instrumental in supporting the expansion of the association’s chapter, club and connections network to include 81 groups.
During Spinella’s tenure, the association’s annual Founders’ Day Awards Dinner had record-setting attendance and the organization launched Alumni Career Resources, a new initiative designed to connect alumni with the university’s vocational resources.
He also led efforts to augment financial support for current ASU students. In October 2010, he led the successful launch of the redesigned ASU collegiate plate, otherwise known as the “Sparky plate.” The introduction of the new all-gold plate boosted sales by more than 30 percent during his term as chair, and there are now more than 14,000 plates on Arizona roads. The plate provides tens of thousands of dollars each year to the association’s Medallion Scholarship program.
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