Associate Profiles
Laurie Conroy ’01
Rather than marking the conclusion of her studies, graduation became the beginning for Laurie Conroy ’01. “What I learned at Sarah Lawrence,” she says, “is something I continue to use every day. The college took someone like myself, who was very insecure back then, and turned out a fearless woman.” Since her graduation, she and her husband Brian, a chief operating officer for a Manhattan hedge fund, have adopted three children from Guatemala – two daughters, Ingrid, 6 and Virginia, 4, and a son Paden, 3.
“At Sarah Lawrence, I learned to put trepidation aside and forge ahead,” recalls Laurie, who was in her early 30s when she graduated and now focuses her full-time energies on being a mother. “College came at the perfect time in my life.”
She began giving as Associate shortly after graduation, because, as she says, “When you receive so much, you shouldn’t wait to give back.”
Andrea R. Fox ’77
A liberal arts degree wasn’t a requirement for Andrea R. Fox ’77, who was off to medical school when she graduated from Sarah Lawrence. But coming from an atypical pre-med background, she explains looking back, “gave me a very different – and valuable – perspective on my profession.”
“Being able to participate in the dance program, taking creative writing classes with June Jordan and Grace Paley, and discussing medical ethics with Ivan Nagy encouraged me to see the link between the humanities and medicine,” explains Andrea, now an Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. “As a result, I have continued to make unusual career choices, from doing a residency in social medicine to going into geriatric medicine and making house calls and community work a focus of my career.”
The compassionate geriatrician has been giving to SLC since she began earning money, becoming an Associate, she says, “as soon as I could.”
Donald Miller '75 and Lauren Radovsky Miller '76
"100 % Sarah Lawrence!" reads the photo's caption in the family album.
Pictured are Donald Miller '75 and Lauren Radovsky Miller '76, on the lawn in front of Westlands at her 10th reunion in 1986. With them: their daughter and future SLC student, Carolyn, '08, who was just four months old at the time; Donald's mother, Claire Strauss Miller '36, who was attending her 50th; and Donald's sister, Sheila Miller Bernson '71, who was attending her 15th reunion.
It's still 100 % percent Sarah Lawrence for Donald, a family practitioner in Andover, Mass., and Lauren, a community volunteer. "We decided a long time ago that our commitment to Sarah Lawrence would be life long," she says. "Sarah Lawrence is a small school with a relatively small endowment, and if it is to continue to provide the kind of education we received there, it needs the consistent support of people who actively care about this unique and special college."
Or as Donald explains their annual gift, "It offers me an opportunity to give back even a tiny bit of the priceless gifts that my family and I have been given by a Sarah Lawrence education."
Mira J. Spektor '50
Mira J. Spektor '50 still remembers how she first conquered stage fright, as a student singing at the President's House. She and then-President Harold Taylor's two pets, a Yorkshire terrier and an English sheepdog, became fast friends during that Christmas holiday performance, with the tiny Yorky watching out for his new pal from a stakeout under the piano she was playing. Mira, who went on to become a professional performer, has experienced other bouts of stage fright over the years, but she's never forgotten the lesson learned that day: how to focus on good friends close to you, and not imaginary dangers in the balcony!
That was one of many things she learned at Sarah Lawrence, says Mira, who went on to become a writer of songs, poems and music for theater, film and TV. She became an Associate when her daughter Charline also chose the college, and says: "I can't imagine not giving. It makes me still feel part of SLC."
