Friday Dinner Speaker: Martha Pomerantz, Partner, Portfolio Manager

Martha is a Partner and Portfolio Manager at Evercore Wealth Management and the manager of the firm’s Minneapolis office. She is a member of the firm’s Strategic Planning Committee and the firm’s investment decision-making body, the Asset Allocation Committee. Martha joined Evercore in 2011 with several partners to establish the firm’s Midwest office. She previously served as an investment principal and the co-chair of the Investment Committee at Lowry Hill, a wealth management firm in Minneapolis. She earlier worked as a securities analyst for Schroder Wertheim in New York. She received a B.A. from Northwestern University and an M.B.A. from the J.L. Kellogg School of Management. Martha serves on the board of trustees for Miss Porter’s School, a girls’ boarding school in Farmington, CT. She is the Chair of the Investment Committee for the school’s endowment and she also serves on the executive committee. Martha is a board member and the Treasurer of the Minnesota Women’s Economic Roundtable, a small invitation-only forum for women leaders to share insights on broad economic issues. She is also one of the Leaders Council Members for the Ultra High Net Worth Institute, an independent publisher and curator of exceptional thought leadership and content for UHNW families, family offices, their advisors and the industry

Friday Dinner Moderator: Beth Van Riper Miller, Business Owner, Consultant

Beth Van Riper Miller ’79, owner of and consultant with BVRM LLC, will moderate the conversation. Miller graduated from Bethany with a degree in mathematics and economics. She began her career on Wall Street in information technology at Morgan Stanley/Dean Witter. In 2007, Miller made a career change into education and became a middle school library media specialist in the Atlanta area. She retired in 2018 and now serves as a consultant in instructional technologies and educational services.

Saturday Closing Speaker: Maggie Smith, Author

Maggie Smith is the author of five award-winning books: Lamp of the Body, The Well Speaks of Its Own Poison, and Good Bones, named by the Washington Post as one of the Five Best Poetry Books of 2017, Keep Moving, and Goldenrod. The title poem of Good Bones was called the “Official Poem of 2016” by Public Radio International and has been translated into nearly a dozen languages. Smith’s poems have appeared in the New York Times, Tin House, The Believer, The Paris Review, Kenyon Review, Best American Poetry, and on the CBS primetime drama Madam Secretary. A Pushcart Prize winner, Smith has received fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Academy of American Poets, the Ohio Arts Council, and the Sustainable Arts Foundation.

Panelist: Melinda Elliott MD, FAAP, Chief Medical Officer
Dr. Melinda Elliott joined Prolacta Bioscience in 2016 as senior director, clinical education and professional development, and is currently our CMO. She serves as the voice of the patient, working to ensure that the needs of premature infants are being articulated and that relevant treatment and product opportunities are identified. She also continues to serve as a clinical neonatologist with the Pediatrix Medical Group. After holding professional and clinical positions at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Union Memorial Hospital, and Franklin Square Hospital Center, she joined the faculty at The Herman & Walter Samuelson Children’s Hospital at Sinai in Baltimore and the MEDNAX Medical Group. Dr. Elliott has committed her career to the care of vulnerable, premature infants and has researched the benefits of an Exclusive Human Milk Diet (EHMD) for extremely low birth weight premature infants in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). She has investigated breastfeeding practices of mothers of very low birth weight infants and her clinical research is published in academic journals. Dr. Elliott is an experienced neonatologist, educator, mentor, and leader in neonatal intensive care. Dr. Elliott earned her doctor of medicine degree from West Virginia University School of Medicine. A champion for babies since the inception of her medical career, she trained and taught extensively at the University of Florida including residency training in pediatrics, a faculty position as chief resident in pediatrics, and fellowship training in neonatal-perinatal medicine.

Panelist: Kelly Kowalski, CFA, Portfolio Manager

Kelly Kowalski, CFA is a Portfolio Manager at MassMutual and is based in Boston MA. In her current role, she makes investment and asset allocation decisions for a $40 billion portfolio of primarily fixed income securities in order to deliver economic value to policyholders and customers. As a member of the portfolio management team, Kelly also helps to drive MassMutual’s investment strategy through research and analysis of key macroeconomic themes and trends and serves as a subject matter expert across the company, including advising on capital market assumptions. She is responsible for authoring macroeconomic commentary for various stakeholders, including a quarterly market update that is distributed to MassMutual Financial Advisors and their clients. Among her other responsibilities are overseeing MassMutual’s largest strategic investments, Rothesay and Invesco. Prior to joining MassMutual in 2014, she spent two years at UBS Investment Bank as an Equity and Derivatives Strategist. Kelly holds a BA in Economics from Bethany College and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business. She currently resides in Newton MA with her husband, 1.5 year old daughter, and rescue dog.

Panelist: Lisa Callamaro, Coach Manager and Story/Storyteller Producer

Lisa Callamaro is the Owner of Story & Voice, which manages, coaches & produces stories and storytellers. She created Story & Voice after 30 years as an agent for screenwriters, directors, and novelists at her eponymous film and television agency. She has sold or her clients have been involved with hundreds of projects in television, film, and new media all over the world including LEGALLY BLONDE, BEACHES, EVENT HORIZON, MUTANT CHRONICLES, THE INTERNATIONAL, FRACTURED, MY DOG SKIP and THE MAN WITHOUT A FACE, as well as multiple long running TV series in Canada. Lisa is co-founder of the film program, HOLLYWOOD BY THE HORNS, at California State University Dominquez Hills where she also teaches her signature class, Finding Your Voice, Telling Your Story. Lisa is currently a scripted consultant for a social impact entertainment company and has led non-profits through a mission statement program that centers on instinct and a word forward approach. As a producer, Lisa is also in development on some features and television series under her own banner She is a TEDx speaker and spoke on how to use story to call people to action. Her passion is helping people learn how to tell and make meaning of the stories they want to tell in any form. Lisa tells her own stories as a photographer.

Panelist: Sally Dorwart, Retired Coach, Athletic Director, Cofounder of Fitness Programs

Sally Dorwart is returning to Bethany College, where she started her teaching career at the age of 22. During her five years at Bethany, Sally received tenure as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physical Education. She was appointed the first Women’s Athletic Director, helping to provide female teams and club sports a prominent and successful membership in the newly formed Pennwood West Conference. Sally has always had a pioneering and adventurous spirit. She is an Outward Bound alum, a member of West Virginia University’s first intercollegiate Volleyball Team, a cofounder of Second Wind Corporate Fitness Programs, and the first female coach inducted into the Athletic Hall of Fame at Bethany College. Currently Sally resides in Charleston, SC with her husband Quentin. Happily retired, she enjoys spending time at their cottage on the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia, Canada, traveling the US in their newly acquired 22’ travel trailer and working part time in an historic garden in downtown Charleston.

MC: Jena Martin, Professor, Researcher, Author

Jena Martin is a professor at West Virginia University College of Law. Her research is in the field of business and human rights, where she has written extensively on many issues, including the intersection of securities regulation with human rights impacts. She is the author of several articles on the subject, including “The End of the Beginning? A Comprehensive Examination of the U.N.’s Business and Human Rights Agenda” (Fordham Journal of Corporate and Financial Law), which earned her WVU Law’s Significant Scholarship Award and “Hiding in the Light: The Misuse of Disclosure to Advance the Business and Human Rights Agenda” (Columbia University Journal of Transnational Law). Professor Martin has also co-edited and co-authored a number of books in the field of securities regulation and business and human rights, including “The Business and Human Rights Landscape: Moving Forward, Looking Back” (Cambridge University Press); “When the Levees Break: Re-visioning Regulation of the Securities Markets” (Lexington Books), and “Dying to be Heard: Businesses’ Impact of Communities” (forthcoming Anthem Press). She has also presented her research at the United Nations. Professor Martin draws upon her extensive practice experience including her work as a senior counsel at the United States Securities & Exchange Commission’s Division of Enforcement and as a member of the RFK’s Center for Human Rights Global Advisory Team. Professor Martin earned an LL.M. from the University of Texas Law School in International Law. She received her J.D. from Howard University School of Law (cum laude) and her B.A. from McGill University.