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Saturday, June 30, 2012

WOMEN'S FORUM NY 2nd Annual ELLY Awards

reporter: Miguel Dominguez

Doris P. Meister, President of the Women's Forum of New York with Gayle King, Co-Host of CBS This Morning and Moderator for the ELLY Awards, and Beverly Beaudoin, President of the Education Fund of The Women's Forum of New York

On Friday, May 18 at The Plaza Hotel in New York City, The Women’s Forum of New York presented the 2nd Annual Elly Awards Luncheon benefitting The Education Fund of The Women’s Forum of New York. The awards, named for The Women’s Forum founder Elinor Guggenheimer, will honor outstanding women leaders. Arianna Huffington and Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel were the honorees.

ELLY Awards Presenter Kathy Couric with
ELLY Awards Honoree Arianna Huffington and Gayle King

The Education Fund is an educational and charitable arm of The Women’s Forum of New York.

Since 1987, the Fund has helped mature women pursue educational goals and enhance their capacities to provide productive and supportive service to their communities. The Award recognizes extraordinary and often heroic effort in overcoming adversity and the most daunting of odds in restructuring lives for success.

Grants are awarded to women over the age of 35 who, after suffering great adversity and an interruption in their education, are now pursuing undergraduate college degrees. Students in this population are often single parents, economically disadvantaged and struggling with the rising costs of a college education. Over the past 25 years, 130 women have been honored by The Education Fund.

ELLY Awards Honoree Arianna Huffington

Honoree Arianna Huffington is president and editor-in-chief of the Huffington Post Media Group as well as a nationally syndicated columnist, frequent television commentator and author of thirteen books. In May 2006, she changed the media landscape in far-reaching, lasting ways when she launched The Huffington Post, a news and blog site that quickly became one of the most widely read, linked to and frequently cited media brands on the Internet. Earlier this year, she further extended the brand’s reach by launching Le Huffington Post in France. Twice, in both 2005 and 2011, she has been named to the Time 100, the magazine’s annual list of the world’s most influential people. She serves on several not-for-profit boards, including the Committee to Protect Journalists, the Center for Public Integrity and EL PAIS. Originally from Greece, she moved to England as a teenager and graduated from Cambridge University with an M.A. in economics, having served as president of the Cambridge Union, the school’s famed debating club.


Doris P. Meister with ELLY Awards Honoree Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel and Janice Reals Ellig, past WFNY president

Honoree Dr. Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel has brought unparalleled involvement to the arts, architecture, design and public policy through roles that have brought her from the writer's desk to The White House. As the first Director of Cultural Affairs for NYC, she was responsible for bringing the Metropolitan Opera to Central Park and the first outdoor sculpture exhibition to Bryant Park. The first woman to serve as Vice Chair of the US Commission of Fine Arts in its 109 year history, where she served for more than a decade, she is currently the Vice Chair of the New York State Council on the Arts. Other noted positions include Commissioner of the American Battle Monuments Commission, a founding director of the Trust for the National Mall, a founding director of the Highline, and an appointment to the board of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum Commission. Recently named Advisor to the Port Authority for Public Art and Architecture at the World Trade Center, she is the author of 20 books on art, architecture and public policy, and the curator of eight traveling museum exhibits. As Chair of the Historic Landmarks Preservation Center, she created, had approved and underwrote the distinctive Historic District Street Signs that are installed in 107 Historic Districts in NYC, and was the founder/creator of the Cultural Medallion program that is installed in all 5 boroughs--both programs have been adopted throughout the U.S.
Past presidents of WFNY Judith D. Fryer and Dede Thompson Bartlett
Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel and President of the Metropolitan Museum of Art Emily Rafferty

Emily Rafferty is President of The Metropolitan Museum of Art,  where she supervises an administrative staff of some 2,000 full- and part-time employees and serves ex officio on its Board of Trustees. She joined the Met more 35 years ago, working her way up through the ranks in the Development Department, and later serving as a vice president and senior vice president before her election to the presidency in 2005. Emily serves as Chairwoman of NYC & Company, the City’s tourism and marketing agency, and as a member of the Board of Directors of the National September 11 Memorial & Museum.

WF Board of Directors: Liz Neumark; Dara Richardson-Heron, MD; Catherine Keating; Tracy T. Travis;
Amy Butte Liebowitz, Lisa Dennison; Kathryn Swintek; Jane Chmielinski and Carolyn Carter
Gayle King and ELLY Awards Legendary Chair Lucy Jarvis
Gayle King with WFNY Education Fund Fellows Tanya Halsey, Rhoda Smith, Liliete Lopez with companion, and Lai Kam S. Chua
Elly Awards Co-Chairs Jane Chesnutt and Carolyn Carter flank WPIX Anchor Tamsen Fadal 
Doris P. Meister, ELLY Awards Presenter Kathy Couric, Arianna Huffington and Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel, Gayle King, Beverly Beaudoin, and Emily Rafferty
Doris P. Meister, Suri Kasirer, NYS Senator Liz Kreuger, Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel and Karen Keogh
Doris P. Meister with Jane and Randy Guggenheimer, Judith D. Fryer and Dede Thompson Bartlett
Lisa Dennison and Liz Neumark
WFNY Member Cheryl Wills, NY1 News Journalist
WFNY Member Loreen Arbus, President and Executive Producer of Loreen Arbus Productions

ELLY Awards Moderator Gayle King is co-host of “CBS This Morning” as well as editor-at-large of O, The Oprah Magazine. She began her career as a journalist in television, spending 18 years as a news anchor at WFSB-TV in Hartford. Prior to joining “CBS This Morning,” she hosted “The Gayle King Show” on OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network; the program also was broadcast on XM Satellite Radio. The recipient of three EMMYs, Ms. King has twice been honored by American Women in Radio & Television, and in 2010 was named one of New York Women in Communications’ Matrix Award honorees.

Gayle King publicizing the ELLYs to the Media
For more information about The Women’s Forum of New York or its Education Fund go to: http://www.womensforumny.org/womensforumny/

To see more photos of this event, click here

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