Donna Shalala '62 made news yet again when, as former Secretary of Health and Human Services, she was appointed by President Bush in March 2007 to co-chair a bipartisan committee looking into an inadequate system providing health care and rehabilitation services to America's wounded veterans. Together with former U.S. Senator Bob Dole, she headed the President's Commission on Care for America's Wounded Warriors. The Dole-Shalala final report was released on July 25; it made six major recommendations for modernizing and improving the structure of veterans' benefits programs, which the president accepted and immediately began to implement. Speaking to the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs in September, Donna emphasized that the recommendations "do not require massive new programs or a flurry of new legislation."

Since 2001, Donna has been professor of political science and president of the University of Miami, with more than 25 years' experience as a scholar, teacher and administrator in her resume. Most notably among her academic and political appointments, she served as president of Hunter College of CUNY (1980-1987) and chancellor of the University of Wisconsin (1987-1993); in 1993, President Clinton appointed her U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, a post which she held for eight years. Fellow Western alums will remember that upon graduation, she joined the Peace Corps and volunteered in Iran from 1962 to 1964. Donna served on the Western College board of trustees in the early 1970s and received the WCAA Alumnae Service Award in 1992.

Oregon Public Radio reporter Colin Fogarty '94 added one more award to a long list when he took first place in the Best Feature Story category at the Oregon Associated Press Broadcast Awards in April 2007. The story concerned the Sandy River in Oregon's Clackamas County near Portland changing course after a major storm. Although he doesn't usually cover the environment -- his main focus is politics -- a story about "how nature makes its way, whether we're there or not" gave him the opportunity to "not only get out into the wilds of Oregon, but to tell a story about how nature shapes us sometimes, where usually it's the other way around." At the same time, he placed third in Best Breaking News for his report on the Supreme Court's decision upholding Oregon's assisted suicide law. Listen to Colin's Sandy River story (click on "part one"). 

While at Western, Colin worked at WMUB, Miami's radio station. He credits that experience with the success he has enjoyed as a radio journalist. In a recent e-mail to WMUB station manager Cleve Callison regarding funding cuts for the PBS station, he wrote: "I got my start in public radio at WMUB. I started as a board op and worked my way up to music host and reporter there. I remember keenly bolting across the quad, tape deck in tow, to ask then Vice President Al Gore a question during the '92 campaign. ... Frankly, without my experience at WMUB, I would not be where I am today. That's where I discovered my calling, being a public radio reporter." Colin is married to Stephanie Wiant '92. They live in Portland and are the parents of a 5-year-old and 1-year-old twins.