Several Trojans were given honorary doctorates this month.

USC president C. L. Max Nikias received the Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa, at the graduation of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion on May 16.

Hebrew Union College has a unique partnership with USC, by which more than 600 USC undergraduate students each year explore Jewish studies with the college’s faculty in the Louchheim School of Judaic Studies.

Margaret Gatz, professor of psychology, gerontology and preventive medicine, was given an honorary doctorate from the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm on May 13.

Twenty-five years ago, Gatz and fellow reseachers in Sweden designed a study of dementia and nature versus nurture that involved identical and fraternal twins.

John Brooks Slaughter, who has a joint appointment at the USC Rossier School of Education and USC Viterbi School of Engineering, received an honorary Doctor of Science degree from Howard University at its Commencement on May 14. It was Slaughter’s 30th honorary degree.

USC President Emeritus Steven B. Sample and his wife, Kathryn Sample, were awarded honorary degrees by D’Youville College in Buffalo, N.Y.

John Seeley Brown, a visiting scholar and adviser to USC provost Elizabeth Garrett, received an honorary doctorate from the Illinois Institute of Technology.

Pendakur Wins Dissertation of the Year Award

Sumun Pendakur, director of USC’s Asian Pacific American Student Services, received a Doctor of Education from the USC Rossier School of Education along with a merit award for her dissertation.

At the school’s doctoral ceremony on May 12, Pendakur was presented with the Dissertation of the Year Award for “The Search for Transformative Agents: The Counter-Institutional Positioning of Faculty and Staff at an Elite University.”

Athletics’ Chair at USC Endowed by Two Alums

The Charles Griffin Cale Director of Athletics’ Chair at USC has been endowed in perpetuity by Chuck Cale ’66 and his wife Jessie ’74.

It is the largest endowment gift ever received by the USC athletic department.

Chuck Cale ’66, an attorney who earned a master’s degree from the USC School of Law, has held several prominent positions in the sports world.

He was the group vice president of sports for the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee, the director of the delegation for the U.S. Olympic team at the 1992 Barcelona Games, the co-chairman and chief executive officer of World Cup USA 1994, and a special assistant and member of the board of directors of the United States Olympic Committee.

Jessie Cale earned a bachelor’s degree from USC’s School of Journalism.

USC Graduate Honored in Elie Wiesel Essay Contest

Amy Schilit, a history major who graduated from the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences this month, won honorable mention in an essay contest conducted by the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity.

Schilit wrote an essay titled “Strangers in a Strange Land: The Ethics of the African Refugee Debate in Israel.”

Irmas Teaching Fellowship Established at USC Gould

The USC Gould School of Law has received funding to initiate the Audrey Irmas Clinical Teaching Fellowship, which will begin this summer.

The two-year fellowship offers the opportunity for clinical teaching in one or more of USC Gould’s clinical programs under the supervision of clinical faculty members with a concentration on cases or projects involving or affecting the rights of women and children.

The fellowship will focus on the Immigration Clinic, where students provide legal representation and advice to undocumented immigrants seeking asylum; the International Human Rights Clinic, where students seek justice on behalf of victims of human rights abuses; or the Post-Conviction Justice Project, where students provide legal representation to people who have been convicted of crimes and have exhausted their rights to a court-appointed attorney.

The fellowship is funded primarily by Audrey Irmas, a longtime supporter of USC and USC Gould. Four generations of her family have attended USC with four family members graduating from USC’s law school.

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