Alumni

Carthage College presented awards to three distinguished alumni May 22 during the New Alumni Convocation. Each year Carthage alumni are asked to submit their nominations for the Distinguished Alumni Awards. Winners are selected by the Alumni Council.

The 2009 winners are Randall Sisulak, Distinguished Alumni Service Award; Thomas L. Vignieri, Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award; and Anne (Beckstrand) Dudycha, Distinguished Alumni Service Award. 

 

Randall Sisulak
Distinguished Alumni Service Award

Randall SisulakRandall Sisulak, '71, of Crownsville, Md., is a senior research analyst employed by the U.S. Department of Defense. He is stationed at Fort Meade, Md. Due to the sensitive nature of his position, many of his accomplishments cannot be fully described.

Before coming to Carthage, Mr. Sisulak grew up in the Chicago suburb of Riverside, Ill. He followed his brother, Thomas Sisulak, '69, to the College. Randall helped establish the Carthage soccer team and served as its captain. He also wrestled and played tennis for the Red Men, was an officer of Delta Omega Nu fraternity, served in student government, and was a residence hall advisor. He qualified for the Dean’s list, and was a member of the honorary math fraternity Phi Mu Epsilon.

After graduating with a degree in mathematics, Mr. Sisulak served in the U.S Army for five years active duty, and served 25 years in the Army Reserve, military intelligence branch. He retired with the rank of lieutenant colonel. He also did graduate study in meteorology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Mr. Sisulak's most noteworthy volunteer effort is his support of the Muscular Dystrophy Association. He helped organize an annual benefit golf tournament, the Claxton Classic. The event has been held since 1982, and is the second oldest golf event in Maryland. He has been active in several other fundraisers for MDA.

Mr. Sisulak has served on the Community Improvement Council of Crownsville since 1990. He serves on the board of Calvary United Church, and has coached several youth sports teams in Maryland.

He is also a director of International Explorations, an education, research and discovery company based in Ashland, Wis.

Mr. Sisulak and his wife, Mary, have three children: Rachael; Erich, '04; and Christopher, '07.

 

Thomas L. Vignieri
Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award

Tom VignieriThomas L. Vignieri, '83, of Cambridge, Mass., is a composer and classical music producer. He is the music director of From the Top, an NPR and Emmy-nominated PBS program that celebrates America's best young classical musicians. The television series is taped at Carnegie Hall in New York, and the radio show is heard on nearly 250 stations nationwide with more than 700,000 weekly listeners, ranking it among the top programs on public radio.

The Kenosha native graduated with a bachelor of arts in music. He also studied at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside and Boston University before serving as director of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute, a program for talented young musicians held in conjunction with the Boston Symphony's Tanglewood Music Center in western Massachusetts.

Mr. Vignieri went on to serve as artistic administrator of the Handel and Haydn Society, a professional chorus and period instrument ensemble in Boston. Founded as a choral society in 1815, it is among the oldest performing arts organizations in the country.

As a composer his works have been performed and broadcast across North America and abroad. His trio for tenor, oboe and piano titled My Mother on an Evening in Late Summer was given its New York premiere at Lincoln Center, and his choral work The Torch of Love was featured in a private performance at Handel House Museum in London in the very room where Handel worked and composed.

His piece Hodie Christus natus est for chorus, organ and baritone soloist was specially commissioned for the 2005 Handel and Haydn Society recording All is Bright, which debuted at No. 8 on the Billboard classical charts. It was recently performed at the Kennedy Center and was featured on a national Christmas Day broadcast in Canada by CBC Radio.

Mr. Vignieri's works were also performed at Carthage in 2008 at the Alumni Recital and the Christmas Festival.

His most recent work, Fanfare of Voices, was commissioned by the Handel and Haydn Society to celebrate the 250th anniversary year of George Frideric Handel and was premiered at Symphony Hall in Boston.

 

Anne (Beckstrand) Dudycha
Distinguished Alumni Service Award

Anne DudychaAnne (Beckstrand) Dudycha, '56, of Racine, Wis., will receive a Distinguished Alumni Service Award. Her award salutes Carthage's long relationships with the Beckstrand family and Trinity Lutheran Church, of Rockford, Ill. Her father, the Rev. O. Garfield Beckstrand, '17, and her brother, Rev. O. Garfield Beckstrand II, '42, both served as pastors of the church, which in 1965 commemorated its 70th anniversary with a major contribution toward construction of the president’s residence, which is named Trinity House in honor of the congregation.

Siblings Margaret (Beckstrand) Roth, '43, and Armour Beckstrand, '51, and Mrs. Dudycha's mother, Agnes (Anderson) Beckstrand, '16, were also Carthaginians.

After earning her bachelor's degree in English, Mrs. Dudycha worked as a teacher in Minnesota. She earned a master's degree in special education from the University of Minnesota in 1982, where she was elected to Phi Kappa Phi, an honorary fraternity. She taught an adolescent therapy unit at the Golden Valley Health Center in Minneapolis, and taught emotionally disturbed/behaviorally disordered middle school students and coordinated special education programs in the Robbinsdale (Minn.) school district. She is a past president of Minnesota Educators for Emotionally Disturbed, and served as a part-time lecturer at teacher preparation classes at Carthage from 1996 to 2002.

Since retiring, Mrs. Dudycha has been an active member of Holy Communion Lutheran Church, a board member for the Choral Arts Society of Southeastern Wisconsin, and a box office volunteer for the Racine Theatre Guild. She delivers meals for the Meals on Wheels program, and was recognized as a one-gallon donor to the Blood Center of Southeastern Wisconsin. She twice chaired the Initiative for Educational Equity Committee of the American Association of University Women in the Racine area.

Mrs. Dudycha has served Carthage as an Alumni Ambassador from 1995 to 2007, and as a Torchbearer at her church.

She has three grown daughters, Carole Johnson, Deanna Kennedy and Sheila Johnson; three grandchildren; and a great-granddaughter.