Awards
Dean's Award
Dean's Award
Rachel Brown
As the chief events officer of the Student Association (SA), Rachel has gone above and beyond her elected position to ensure that existing events are inclusive. Among the changes she made this year were moving the annual EC Newport Ball to Boston to substantially lower the cost of attendance, creating family-friendly events like the Spangler Night Live Super Bowl Watch Party (with fellow Dean’s Award winner Billy) and Oscar Night, and working closely with Operations on the Student Life Taskforce.
These events have had an important impact on the HBS community and address an important campus pain point—socio-economic inclusion. Creating a way for students to have fun, meet other students, and network without the need to purchase a plane ticket makes all the difference for those with less discretionary income. These events are also inclusive to partners and families and unite first year Required Curriculum (RC) and second year Elective Curriculum (EC) students, and provide opportunities for the two to meet and engage; this is important, as EC mentorship and guidance is both helpful and comforting during the intense RC year. Rachel consistently drove an ongoing collaborative conversation with the administration about student events space access, economics, and key policies.
Rachel will be returning to Deloitte Consulting’s Chicago office this fall as a senior consultant. This summer she is working with Billy and another Dean’s Award winner, Ben, as MBA summer interns for HBS Student and Academic Services (SAS) to help design and prepare for COVID-19 life in the fall.Connor Cash
Nominated together as SA co-presidents, Connor Cash and Gaby Goldstein worked together to assemble and support a leadership team that was more aligned, effective, and collaborative than ever, and handled exceptional challenges and opportunities admirably, including the HBS community’s grief following the death of a classmate, the coronavirus pandemic, and socioeconomic inclusion.
Connor worked with the SA and the administration to set examples of model behavior and was the voice of student concern in a very challenging year. He has demonstrated how quiet leaders can be agents of change. Gaby exemplifies that model behavior, making her equally deserving of the Dean’s Award. As the women’s representative of her section last year she created an inclusive environment, and as co-president has made inclusivity the mission of the SA. With Connor, she has encouraged the leadership team to start numerous incentives, going above and beyond their positions to make them a reality.
When assembling the SA Leadership Team, Gaby and Connor actively decided to seek out individuals who exuded a deeply rooted interest in the SA and were equally in tune with both the student body experience and the pillars they laid out as their platform. Early on, they made it clear that one of their goals was to make the student experience more inclusive to all. Too often in their first year they saw missed opportunities to lower socioeconomic barriers, and are grateful that the SA Leadership team agreed and worked tirelessly to find solutions.Robbie Dixon
As head senator, Robbie reconceived the relationship between the Senate and broader SA organization, adjusting the by-laws to give the Senate greater ability to execute the SA’s mission. He encouraged senators to think deeply about large issues that impact the student experience and created lasting pathways for community-building.
Under Robbie’s leadership, the senate published a fall newsletter highlighting key accomplishments and worked very closely with other student leaders in the SA. The Senate Clubs, Capital Planning, and Budget & Oversight Committees worked hand in hand with their counterparts in the SA to ensure that various initiatives were accomplished, including launching the first ever HBS Clubs Summit, reimagining what physical spaces look like on campus, and ensuring that part of each year’s operating budget will continue to be earmarked for inclusivity initiatives, which was a major SA priority.
Robbie was also recognized for his work with his fellow Dean’s Award winners to relocate the Newport Ball and replace the annual Charity Auctions with HBS Got Talent, a virtual community talent show and fundraiser for COVID-19, both of which increased socioeconomic inclusion and required a massive cultural shift. He also participated in difficult social distancing decisions in the weeks leading up to these events.Holly Fetter
Holly embodies the spirit of the Dean’s Award with her deep concern for social equality. As the co-chair of the Diversity and Inclusion Council, she led an effort to understand what prevents marginalized students from feeling fully included in order to improve HBS programs and practices. As the co-president of the Social Enterprise Club, she organized a fall retreat and helped create a community of students committed to social impact at HBS.
As the co-chair of the Socioeconomic and Inclusion Task Force (SITF), her work with classmate and fellow Dean’s Award winner Alexxis laid the groundwork for future students to fully participate in the MBA experience regardless of their socioeconomic background. The task force collected data on the state of socioeconomic diversity at HBS and issued a report with recommended solutions to key challenges. Holly will be joining the asset stewardship team at State Street Global Advisors.Gaby Goldstein
Nominated together as SA co-presidents, Connor Cash and Gaby Goldstein worked together to assemble and support a leadership team that was more aligned, effective, and collaborative than ever, and handled exceptional challenges and opportunities admirably, including the HBS community’s grief following the death of a classmate, the coronavirus pandemic, and socioeconomic inclusion.
Connor worked with the SA and the administration to set examples of model behavior and was the voice of student concern in a very challenging year. He has demonstrated how quiet leaders can be agents of change. Gaby exemplifies that model behavior, making her equally deserving of the Dean’s Award. As the women’s representative of her section last year she created an inclusive environment, and as co-president has made inclusivity the mission of the SA. With Connor, she has encouraged the leadership team to start numerous incentives, going above and beyond their positions to make them a reality.
When assembling the SA Leadership Team, Gaby and Connor actively decided to seek out individuals who exuded a deeply rooted interest in the SA and were equally in tune with both the student body experience and the pillars they laid out as their platform. Early on, they made it clear that one of their goals was to make the student experience more inclusive to all. Too often in their first year they saw missed opportunities to lower socioeconomic barriers, and are grateful that the SA Leadership team agreed and worked tirelessly to find solutions.Alexxis Isaac
Alexxis, the SA Diversity and Inclusion co-chair, helped spearhead two important activities on campus this year: SITF, with fellow Dean’s Award winner Holly, and a Perspectives series with fellow Dean’s Award winner Melanie. The initial fall Perspectives event brought together staff, faculty, and students in a new type of community-wide conversation about listening and respecting those with different views. The spring Perspectives event was cancelled, but the work begun by Alexxis will continue for years to come.
Alexxis will be a leadership fellow working in a one-year role as advisor to Mayor Martin J. Walsh in the Boston Mayor's Office.Melanie Sperling
Melanie, the SA chief community officer, has been singled out as a role model for the class. She went above and beyond in guiding and supporting the Community Values Representatives Program, creating the first “CV Representative Handbook,” and by creating events for her classmates such as an RC wellness challenge and HBS Got Talent. Melanie, along with Alexxis Isaac, envisioned and delivered the Perspectives event in Klarman Auditorium, which engaged faculty, students, and staff in a new form of communication and sharing. This event pushed the entire community to open their minds, share their own political perspectives, and be open to differing opinions. Perspectives will now be held each semester in the upcoming school year. Along with Robbie Dixon, Melanie also served as the Class Day co-chair, running the student speaker selection process, faculty teaching award process, and working with staff to re-envision commencement and class day in virtual form, a much heavier lift than the already substantial class day committee leadership role usually entails.
In July Melanie will start as the chief of staff at the One Love Foundation, the nation’s leader in relationship health education. The organization focuses on primary prevention education to save lives and change the statistics and social norms around relationship abuse, investing in the relationship health of the next generation.Ben Sullivan
Ben is the chief operating officer and chief financial officer of SA, and has leveraged his positions to form a strong partnership with the Student Senate to realize the SA mission of inclusion. A core member of the SA executive leadership team, Ben defines servant leadership. Also a section president in this time of unprecedented challenge and complexity, Ben served in all of these roles above the level expected of any single individual. He partnered with many others to deftly handle major challenges and cultural shifts in a year when managing finances was not business as usual due to changes in SA and the coronavirus crisis.
Ben will be returning to McKinsey Consulting’s Atlanta office as a senior business analyst.Billy Tabrizi
Part of the SA executive leadership team that has moved the needle in so many ways, Billy stands out for his initiatives that have already made a lasting impact on the HBS community. His campaign to open more space for students on campus, his collaborative approach to working with faculty and staff, his behind-the-scenes work with club leadership to rethink the club experience, his work with Ben and Rachel to make social events more inclusive, and his virtual breakfast and lunch community events in recent weeks are just some of the ways in which he has changed the HBS community. The SA team overall was an incredibly successful and motivated group. Their weekly meetings were energizing for all of them, though the issues they grappled with were not easy. They had tough conversations with each other and ultimately made each other better—and became closer—as a result.
Billy is also one of the co-founders of Dear Harby, an Instagram account that has over 2,500 followers at HBS—faculty, students, and staff—and has been a source of much-needed humor and morale in a difficult year. Billy will be returning to Chicago to work full-time for PricewaterhouseCoopers in its consulting practice.