2021 Honorees
Lifetime Achievement Award
Frank Forleo served the Talent Development Program at the University of Rhode Island from 1975 until retirement in 2016. Talent Development is a higher education opportunity program founded at URI in 1968 as a response to the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King. Frank began his work with Talent Development as a tutor and summer counselor. Later he served as an academic advisor and for twenty-five years prior to retirement, he was assistant director for Talent Development Admissions. Frank and his wife Sharon Forleo were associated with Talent Development and URI for over forty years. They shared the URI Diversity and Inclusivity Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019.
Eva Butler Scholar Award
Dr. Mack H. Scott III is a historian, educator, and enrolled member of the Narragansett Indian Tribe. His work focuses on the intersections of race and identity. He is currently working on a project that traces the Narragansett experience from colonial to modern and utilizes agency as a lens to view and understand the voices, stories, and perspectives of Indigenous peoples. Dr. Scott has published works illuminating African American, Native American, and Latin American peoples' lives and has worked as a coach, teacher, department head, and administrator throughout the United States. He is currently an Assistant Professor at Bard Early College in Washington D.C. and a contractor working with the Defense MIA/POW Accounting Agency.
Kaukont Philanthropic Award
The Rhode Island Foundation is the largest and most comprehensive funder of nonprofit organizations in Rhode Island. Working with generous and visionary donors, the Foundation raised $68 million and awarded a record $87 million in grants in 2020. Since its centennial five years ago, the Foundation has awarded more than $284 million in grants and has raised more than $328 million. Through leadership, fundraising and grant-making activities, often in partnership with individuals and organizations, the Foundation is helping Rhode Island reach its true potential.
Eleanor Dove Entrepreneurial Award
Having an Eastern Nations Trading Post was always a dream of mine, as a young boy, I always saw only Western ones. I felt that the items that our people here in the East made were every bit as beautiful as the items made in the West, plus we had wampum.
Seeing different family members selling handmade items as powwows gave me the inspiration to make different things myself. So I learned to bead, work with leather, carve red cedar, and of course wampum. I had the privilege of being able to watch and learn from numerous family elders. Uncle Harold Mars and Aunt Laura, Uncle George Watson and Aunt Ethel, Elder Russell Spears, and my mom Sarah Helen Caroline Fry Hazard, just to name a few, but there were many more.
I eventually got the guts to rent a table at Schemitzun and I believe that first year when I sold out on the third day of a four-day powwow I believed that people might actually like what I was making with wampum. So I sold at every Eastern powwow I could drive to around my day job for a few years, then in December of 2011, I invited my brother-in-law Craig Spears Sr. to try and open a store which we agreed would be called The Purple Shell.
My wife Patricia and my sister Avis spent approximately a month cleaning and setting up the little store on the corner of Route 1 and Route 216 in Charlestown. Approximately 8 years later, South County Tourism listed us as one of the must-see small businesses in the area and the little shop became a solid landmark in the area. It is known for being educational as well as carrying a good variety of Eastern Native Handmade items, but mostly for wampum.
In November of 2017, we joined the small businesses on the property of the Fantastic Umbrella Factory. By 2019, I had invited my apprentice Joshua Carter and his wife Kayla to join us in an even bigger space than we first had. Josh has an unbelievable talent with wampum and Kayla is warmly inviting to everyone that walks into the store. Avis has been with us since the first day, she is also warmly inviting and she also contributes to some of the wampum work. My wife Patricia has been with me when our little store was just a dream. She has experienced our ups and downs, she has worked as a janitor, jewelry maker, bookkeeper, and owner. Worked long hours after her day job and never complained once. She has been my rock that was needed to make this dream come true.
The Purple Shell has approximately 15 other artists that we have invited to showcase their work. I do believe we have a good selection of Eastern Native American handmade items to choose from. Knives, beads, blankets, pottery, pipes, photos, paintings, etc. At some point, years ago, the Creator assisted me with obtaining a talent that would assist in making beautiful wampum jewelry. I do not take this talent for granted, I just look up every now and then and say Thank You!
Tarzan Brown Champion Award
With more than 30 years of experience in public and private higher education, Dr. David M. Dooley became the University of Rhode Island's 11th president in July 2009.
Known for his collaborative leadership style that encourages entrepreneurial approaches to problem solving and program development, President Dooley fosters a community of discovery that involves all URI students, faculty and staff. He has reshaped the University's strategic direction, creating a set of broadly defined goals critical to the University's evolution.
In 2010, his Transformational Goals provided leadership with the overall guidelines for creating a new academic plan and mission focused on achievement and institutional effectiveness.In recognition of his leadership and support of diverse areas of research, President Dooley has been called upon to serve on several regional, national and international board and committees. These include his appointment as CEO co-chair for the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities' Board on Oceans, Atmosphere, and Climate (BOAC) for 2015-16; and his nomination for a second two-year term on the Homeland Security Academic Advisory Council (HSAAC).
Actively engaged in teaching and research throughout his academic career, in 2012 Dr. Dooley was named a Fellow of the Council of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) for his distinguished career of sustained discovery and innovation.
Redwing Arts & Culture Award
Dr. Joyce Louise Caldwell Stevos (Wunne Ahtuk, a citizen of the Pokanoket Nation, is a Rhode Island native, a graduate of Classical High School, and has earned a Bachelor and Masters degree from Rhode Island College and a doctorate from the University of Rhode Island/Rhode Island College Joint Program in Education. She is also an adjunct professor in Educational Studies at Rhode Island College.
As a teacher and supervisor of Social Studies in the Providence Public Schools, Dr. Stevos was a leader in implementing the study of Black History, the Holocaust, the Armenian Genocide, law-related education and cultural awareness.. She was the primary designer of the Government and Law Magnet at Central high School and the Teacher Academy at Mt. Pleasant High School. Dr. Stevos was the Director of Strategic Planning and Professional Development in the Providence Public Schools where she worked with teachers and administrators to begin and implement the first wave of educational reform in the District.
For 25 years, Dr. Stevos worked with different publishing companies in writing and critiquing history and civics texts for middle and high school students. After retiring from the Providence School Department Dr. Stevos worked as a consultant with Trinity Restoration, Inc to develop and incorporate the Trinity Academy for the Performing Arts Charter School that opened in 2009 for Providence students from grades 7-12. Dr. Stevos was president of the Board for 7 years.
In giving back to the community, Dr. Stevos has served as President of the Urban League of RI, was an incorporator and officer of the Rhode Island Black Heritage Society, and has served on the Boards of the Providence Public Library, the Providence Preservation Society, the Heritage Harbor Board and the Rhode Island Board of Education. She is a member and past Regent of the Narragansett-Cooke-Gaspee Chapter of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution, the Boards of the Heritage Hall of Fame the Heritage Harbor Foundation, the Rhode Island College Foundation Board of Trustees, and the Gamm Theatre.
Dr. Stevos has been recognized by many community groups for her contributions to education and the Rhode Island Community. In 1992 she was named a Milken National Educator from Rhode Island, in 2014 received the Classical Distinguished Alumni Award. In 2018, she received the UCAP All Kids Award and was recognized as a Woman of Vision by the Providence Chums. In 2019. she received the Living the Dream Award from the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr State Commission, the Charles B. Willard Achievement Award from the Rhode Island College Alumni Association, and a Humanitarian Award from Marquis Who’s Who. Last year she received the Honorary Chairs’ Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Humanities from the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities.