Board of Directors
- Mr. Reid Ashe
- Professor Jerome Friedman
- Kathryn Liede
- Dr. Robert Metcalfe
- Theresa M. Stone
- Sheila Widnall
- Ms. Ann Wolpert
Mr. Reid Ashe
CEO, Media General, Inc.
As chief operating officer of Media General, Inc., Reid Ashe supervises the company's three operating divisions, Publishing, Broadcasting and Interactive Media. Media General operates 26 network-affiliated television stations, which reach more than 30 percent of Southeast households. Interactive media services include more than 50 online enterprises.
He previously served as publisher of The Tampa ( Florida) Tribune, Media General's largest daily newspaper. Before that he held positions as publisher of The Wichita ( Kansas) Eagle, and as editor and publisher of The Jackson ( Tennessee) Sun.
Ashe began his career in journalism as assistant editor of Technology Review, the MIT alumni magazine. He subsequently worked as a reporter at The Washington (N.C.) Daily News and The Jackson Sun.
He graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with an S.B. in electrical engineering in 1971. He also completed the Harvard Business School Program for Management Development in 1978.
Professor Jerome Friedman
Institute Professor, MIT
Jerome Friedman was born in Chicago in 1930. He received his A.B., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Chicago in 1950, 1953, and 1956, respectively. After spending a year as a research associate at the University of Chicago, he went on to a three year appointment as a research associate at Stanford University. In 1960, he was hired at MIT as an Assistant Professor and was promoted to Professor in 1967. At MIT he has served as Director of the Laboratory for Nuclear Science and Head of the Physics Department. In 1991, he was appointed as Institute Professor. He is an experimental particle physicist whose research has included studies of particle structure and interactions with high energy electrons, neutrinos, and hadrons.
He received, jointly with Henry Kendall and Richard Taylor, the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1990 and the W.H.K. Panofsky Prize in 1989 for the experimental discovery of quarks. He also received the Alumni Medal of the University of Chicago. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
He has been a member of numerous advisory committees for the DOE and various laboratories, including the Cambridge Electron Accelerator, Princeton-Penn Accelerator, Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Fermilab, Wilson Laboratory, MIT-Bates Linear Accelerator, the Superconducting Super Collider, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. He also served as Vice-Chairman of the Board of the University Research Association and as a member of the Board of Physics and Astronomy of the National Research Council. He was President of the American Physical Society in 1999 and Chair of the Council of Scientific Society Presidents in 2001. He was also a member of the Scientific Policy Committee of CERN and is currently serving on the Council of the High Energy Accelerator Research Organization of Japan.
Kathryn Liede
Director of Alumni Relations, MIT
Kathryn Liede is the Director of Alumni Relations for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She oversees Clubs and Regional Programs, Alumni Education, Reunion and Class Programs, the Parents Association, and the Alumni Travel Program. Additionally, Kathryn is a member of the Faculty Steering Committee for MIT’s 150th Anniversary Celebration in 2011, and has previously been an active member of the Student Leadership Development Committee, CPW Advisory Committee, and the Student System VISION Study. During her eight-year tenure at MIT, Kathryn has served as the Associate Director of the Parents Association, Director of the Parents Association, Deputy Director of Alumni Relations, and was named to her current position in the spring of 2008. In an effort to further strengthen the Institute’s mission of global outreach, Kathryn traveled to India in 2007 with President Hockfield and faculty members. She has continued to represent MIT at alumni events throughout the United States and in Hong Kong, New Zealand, South Africa, and Europe.
Prior to her association with MIT, Kathryn spent ten years in fund raising and special events planning for non-profit organizations, including The Albany Institute of History & Art (a regional museum) and The Arthritis Foundation Massachusetts Chapter. She holds a BA from the State University of New York at Albany.
Dr. Robert Metcalfe
General Partner, Polaris Venture Partners
Dr. Robert M. ("Bob") Metcalfe is a general partner at Polaris Venture Partners in Waltham, MA, where he works with Boston-based information technology start-ups.
Metcalfe had three careers before becoming a venture capitalist on 1/1/1.
While an engineer-scientist (1965-1979), Metcalfe helped build the early Internet. In 1973, at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, he invented Ethernet, the international local-area networking standard on which he shares four patents.
While an entrepreneur-executive (1979-1990), Metcalfe founded 3Com Corporation, the billion-dollar networking company where at various times he was Chairman, CEO, division general manager, and vice president of engineering, marketing, and sales.
While a publisher-pundit (1990-2000), Metcalfe was CEO of IDG's InfoWorld Publishing Company (1992-1995). For eight years, he wrote an Internet column read weekly by 629,000 information technology professionals. He also wrote for American Spectator, Forbes, Technology Review, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Wired.
In 1995, Metcalfe was elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1996, he received the IEEE's Medal of Honor. In 1997, he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. And in 1999, he was elected fellow of the International Engineering Consortium.
Theresa M. Stone
Executive Vice President and Treasurer, MIT
Theresa M. Stone joined the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as executive vice president and treasurer in February 2007. She is responsible for MIT's capital programs, facilities, human resources, and information technology, and she serves as the Institute's chief financial officer and treasurer.
From 2001 to 2006, Ms. Stone served as chief financial officer and executive vice president of Jefferson-Pilot Corporation. Additionally, she was president of Jefferson-Pilot Communications Company, the company's radio, television, and sports broadcasting company, from 1997 to 2006.
Ms. Stone was executive vice president of the Chubb Corporation from 1995 to 1997 and president and CEO of Chubb Life Insurance from 1994 to 1997. Before joining Chubb, Ms. Stone was a principal with Morgan Stanley from 1976 to 1990.
Ms. Stone is a former chair of the board of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Investment Management Company, which manages the Institute's $8.5 billion endowment and $2.6 billion of pension funds. She continues to serve ex officio on the Investment Management Company board and as a member of the MIT Corporation and the MIT Executive Committee. She is also a director of Progress Energy Corporation, where she serves on the audit and finance committees.
Ms. Stone received a bachelor's degree in French literature from Wellesley College and an MS in management from MIT's Sloan School.Sheila Widnall
Institute Professor and Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics, MIT
Professor Widnall earned three degrees from MIT in aeronautics and astronautics and joined the faculty in 1964. She was appointed Abby Rockefeller Mauze Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics in 1986 and Institute Professor in 1998. She served as MIT's associate provost from 1992 to 1993.
As secretary of the Air Force from 1993 to 1997, Widnall was the first woman ever to head a military service. Responsible for a $62 billion budget, she oversaw the recruiting, training, and equipping of 800,000 men and women and cochaired the Department of Defense Task Force on Sexual Harassment and Discrimination.
Professor Widnall stepped down from her position as secretary of the Air Force on October 31, 1997, to return to her faculty position at MIT. A world-renowned engineer, she holds three patents and is widely known for her work in fluid dynamics, most notably for studies of aerodynamic noise, turbulence, and vortex flows.
In 2003, Professor Widnall was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame. She served on the Columbia Accident Investigation Board and is now vice president of the National Academy of Engineering.
Ms. Ann Wolpert
Director of Libraries, MIT
Ann Wolpert became Director of Libraries for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in January 1996. Recently, Wolpert also assumed oversight of Technology Review magazine. Wolpert's Institute responsibilities include membership on the Committee on Copyright and Patents, the Council on Educational Technology, the Campus Plan Steering Committee, the Deans' Committee, and the President's Academic Council. She chairs the Management Board of the MIT Press, serves on the Open Courseware Interim Management Board, and is Co-chair of the Internal Review Committee for Financial Systems Services and Information Systems.
Prior to joining MIT, Wolpert was Executive Director of Library and Information Services at the Harvard Business School. Her experience also includes management of the Information Center of Arthur D. Little, Inc., where she additionally engaged in consulting assignments. More recent consulting assignments have taken her to Adelphi University in New York, to the campuses of INCAE in Costa Rica and Nicaragua, and to the Malaysia University of Science and Technology, Selangor, Malaysia.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology