Founders' Day

Diaz, a Lannan Literary Award winner, is highly recognized among her peers. She has been honored with the Princeton Hodder fellowship, prestigious residencies such as the PEN/Civitella Ranieri Foundation fellowship and was named one of 25 winners of the 2018 John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation fellowships, commonly known as MacArthur “genius” grants. She is described as a “magician with words.”

“Many of us have seen Natalie’s genius up close,” says Bryan Brayboy, President’s Professor and director of the Center for Indian Education at ASU. “It is powerful, profound and provocative. Her presence changes conversations for the better.”

Diaz is a powerful new poetic voice who artfully blends personal, political and cultural references in works that challenge belief systems underpinning American culture. Drawing upon her own experiences as a Mojave American, Akimel O’odham and Latina woman, she references recognized cultural and mythological touchstones to create a personal mythology that powerfully conveys the oppression and violence that continues to afflict indigenous Americans.

She wrote, curated and led an exhibit at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City titled “Words for Water: Stories and Songs of Strength by Native Women” that featured a collective of indigenous women poets, writers and musicians exploring the power of language, story and song in the fight for environmental and cultural justice.

Camacho’s passionate commitment to fostering diversity has had positive and lasting impacts on the STEM field, its researchers, academia and young students. Through her teaching, leadership and community service, Camacho works tirelessly to ensure that the next generation of students has access to the limitless opportunities and bright futures of a STEM education.

“She understands the impact she has on students, and the reverberations of her efforts,” says a commendation from the Sloan Scholars Mentoring Network. “Mentoring as one of only a few women of color faculty is incredibly difficult. Despite it all, she is unapologetic about trying to make STEM, and specifically math, more diverse.”

Among Camacho’s accolades are the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science Mentor Award. She is a member of the American Mathematical Society Council, at-large, and the Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics Committee on Science Policy. She serves on many national boards.

Says Camacho, “At ASU, I’m able to do service, and it goes somewhere. I’m able to see the impact of what I’m doing. Here, because there are so many forces working in the same direction, you can really change lives. The challenge is changing structures within our society that lead to systemic inequities.”

Gould earned a PhD in organic chemistry at the University of Manchester, England, in 1980. After postdoctoral research with N.J. Turro at Columbia University, he moved to the Eastman Kodak Company in Rochester, New York. There, he was a member of Corporate Research Laboratories, and the NSF Science and Technology Center for Photoinduced Charge Transfer at the University of Rochester.

In 1989 he moved to ASU, where his current research interests involve mainly collaborations with Everett Shock and Hilairy Hartnett in the areas of organic geochemistry and Earthinspired green organic chemistry. He also has research programs in understanding student performance in organic chemistry in terms of sociocognitive and sociocultural learning theories. Together with ASU’s Kurt VanLehn, Gould has NSF support to develop intelligent tutoring systems for organic chemistry learning.

Gould holds the title of President’s Professor at ASU and has been an ASU Professor of the Year. Together with ASU Professor Anne Jones, he has interests in modernizing the ways that chemistry is taught at the college level. With Jones, he recently established and launched the nation’s first online biochemistry degree.

Jones is best known for her work in bioelectrochemistry, defining the mechanisms of energy-relevant enzymes and pathways in microbes. She earned her PhD in inorganic chemistry from the University of Oxford in England as a Rhodes Scholar. She then worked as an Alexander von Humboldt fellow in Germany in biochemistry and a National Institutes of Health fellow at the University of Pennsylvania. After coming to ASU in 2007, she was the first researcher in Arizona to be awarded a U.S. Department of Energy Young Investigator Award. Her research has also been funded by the National Science Foundation, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, the Office of Naval Research and the W.M. Keck Foundation. She has also been the recipient of a special grant for teaching innovation in the chemical sciences from the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation.

At ASU, she teaches both in-class and online at all levels, from freshmen to graduate students. She is particularly interested in teaching innovations that bring modern, use-inspired scientific research ideas and practices into the science classroom. To this end, together with ASU Professor Ian Gould, she has been instrumental in the establishment of ASU’s online biochemistry degree, the first available in the nation.

Currently, Jones serves as associate director of academic affairs for the School of Molecular Sciences, spearheading additional initiatives, including development of an openaccess freshman chemistry course and redesign of the first-year chemistry and biochemistry majors coursework to improve retention.

Kurtz’s most recent enterprise began as an astonishing revelation following his move to the United Arab Emirates: “Who knew frozen vegetables would become a staple in my diet because it’s too expensive to buy fresh every day?” Then: “Most of the (Middle East) region’s strawberry consumption is flying in on airplanes from California. I can’t think of anything environmentally less-friendly.”

Thriving in a New York/San Franciscobased career as a private equity advisor, Kurtz was intent on “getting closer” to businesses he was investing in and doing something that would “change the world.” Today, after launching Pure Harvest in 2016, he is the “farmer” of one of the first hydroponic growing enterprises in the Middle East. The technology he and his team use has been demonstrated around the world in extreme climates, including Arizona, Texas, Northern Mexico and Australia, and in freezing climates like Russia, Finland and Norway.

Kurtz is also co-founder and director of Vence, a wearable technology solution for livestock management. Vence’s innovation virtualizes fencing and enables farmers to semiautomate rotational grazing and capture data to improve farm productivity and profitability.

His advice to young entrepreneurs? “Do it. It’s an exciting experience, and there is a lot of opportunity out there, plus resources to support you. Don’t do it alone — find partners who share your vision and work together to make it happen.”

Resnik is the founder and CEO of DRA Collective, an award-winning public relations, marketing and communications agency she launched in 1986. While building DRA into a respected, thriving enterprise, she launched and built sister nonprofits centered on autism research, education, evidence-based treatment and community and real estate development, with the goal of opening doors to more options for living, learning and leading.

In 1997, Resnik co-founded the Southwest Autism Research & Resource Center as a support group for mothers of children with autism. Today, SARRC is an internationally recognized nonprofit serving children, adults and families in partnership with physicians, educators, professionals and paraprofessionals. She founded First Place® AZ in 2012, a residential community developer for special populations, as well as a site for education, training and creative inspiration. She serves as president and CEO of First Place, which offers supportive housing and a residential transition program for adults with autism and other neuro-diversities. The first new residential property, First Place–Phoenix, opened in the summer of 2018.

“Autism affects individuals, families and communities everywhere,” says Resnik. “Individuals impacted by autism are major sources of inspiration as they navigate predictably unpredictable journeys, teaching us so many valuable lessons while demonstrating character, courage and perseverance. I’m awestruck by their family members, too, who address the often-winding road of right turns, left turns and u-turns with smarts, tenacity and grace.”

Her advice to budding professionals? “Seize opportunities to layer your passionate pursuits with what pays the bills, so you can do what you love for those you love the most.”

Almost 20 years ago, Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust awarded its first grant to ASU, building on a relationship that began during Virginia Piper’s lifetime. That grant to ASU’s Infant Child Research Programs supported specialized training for teachers of at-risk preschoolers and resulted in the creation of environments where all children could thrive. This outcome would have delighted Virginia Piper, a woman who came to believe she had a specific purpose in life — to live in service to others.

The Trust’s first gift to ASU did more than yield results. It marked the beginning of a long, fruitful relationship between two institutions that share deeply held core values.

Binding ASU and Piper Trust together is a profound commitment to take responsibility for the economic, cultural and social well-being of the communities we serve.

It is a true partnership. The Trust supports organizations that enrich health, well-being and opportunity for the people of Maricopa County, and concentrates its efforts in six areas: health care and medical research, children, older adults, arts and culture, education and religious organizations. ASU, in turn, focuses the creative energies of it students, faculty and staff on community-based programs in those areas.

The impact of this partnership is far-reaching: from the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing, a vibrant hub for writers, to the Piper Center for Personalized Diagnostics focusing on the prevention and early detection of disease, and from a universitywide effort to improve all aspects of health care delivery to the new Knowledge Exchange for Resilience, which will equip communities to overcome social and economic stress.

ASU is proud to name Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust as its Philanthropist of the Year.