Photo by Riley Sims Ph.D. ’23
Volunteers to Serve as Advocates, Advisers to University
Via Maryland Today / By Maryland Today Staff
Five business leaders with records of supporting their alma mater have been elected trustees of the University of Maryland College Park Foundation.
As members of the board of trustees, Pallavi Agarwal ’05, Stuart Bowers ’81, Ethan Brown M.P.M. ’97, Wendy R. Sanhai MBA ’09 and Walt Williams Jr. ’92 will help govern the investment and distribution of private gifts to UMD, serve as advocates for the institution and advise the university's president.
“This cohort of new trustees will join an esteemed group of Terps offering their time and expertise to ensure our foundation board can fulfill its fiduciary role and strategic goals in the years ahead,” said Jim Harris, vice president for university relations and president of the foundation. “I have no doubt they will be instrumental in elevating our sights in serving the University of Maryland and maximizing donor impact to the institution.”
This group of 50 influential volunteers also models and promotes philanthropic support for the university. The new members’ three-year terms will begin July 1.
“The foundation’s success is directly connected to the dedication and engagement of our trustees. This new group of committed Terps will help maintain and elevate our tradition of service, philanthropy and advocacy,” said board chair Craig Thompson ’92. “When I think about the limitless possibilities that exist at the university, I am reminded of the quote, ‘The best way to predict the future is to create it.’ Our future is much brighter with the addition of these leaders to the foundation board.”
Pallavi Agarwal ’05 is founder and CEO of Kander Consult, a global Salesforce consulting firm in Washington, D.C., that Inc. has ranked among the top 25% of fastest-growing companies. She previously was at Acumen Solutions, Pierce Washington, Deloitte and Accenture.
Agarwal was part of the Hinman CEOs program while majoring in marketing and business at UMD. She went on to earn an MBA from the University of California, Irvine and a certification in industrial and product design from Stanford.
She supports the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Greater Virginia, DC Admin Community Leader for Salesforce and Lean In D.C. At UMD, she is a member of the Robert H. Smith School of Business Undergraduate Advisory Board and established the Drs. Pushpa and Kamal Agarwal Foundation Maryland Promise Scholarship, honoring her parents; her father, Kamal, earned his master’s degree in management at Maryland. Her sisters, Iti ’08 and Parul ’99, are also Maryland alumnae.
D. Stuart Bowers ’81 is the retired president of Brokerage Solutions, SS&C Technologies, following a long career in IT/operations management in the brokerage industry. His other roles included president of DST Brokerage Solutions and partner at Finix Business Strategies; and managing director at Legg Mason, where he spent 27 years.
While a UMD student, Bowers majored in government and politics, was active in the fraternity Zeta Psi and the Student Government Association, served as an orientation adviser, and was inducted into the Omicron Delta Kappa national leadership honor society.
As an alum, he has been a trustee with the Zeta Psi Educational Foundation and member of the Alumni Association Board of Governors. An avid fan of Maryland’s football and basketball teams, he also was president of the Terrapin Club and has established an endowed fund in Athletics. Bowers also funds the David Lee Bowers Memorial Incentive Awards Scholarship, named in memory of his father, a Maryland alum. (His mother, Jane R. Lynn, is a Terp, too.)
Ethan Brown M.P.M. ’97 is the founder, president and CEO of Beyond Meat. His father, Peter Brown, served on the faculty of the University of Maryland while also founding the School of Public Policy and the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy.
Before founding Beyond Meat, Brown worked in the clean energy sector, including for hydrogen fuel cell company Ballard Power Systems, and on the restructuring of the nation's electric grid to support renewable power while at the National Governors Association. He’s been named to the Bloomberg 50 and one of Newsweek’s Top Innovators, and received, along with Beyond Meat, the United Nations’ Champion of the Earth award, the organization’s highest environmental accolade.
Brown has participated in UMD’s Maryland Industrial Partnerships program and is a member of the School of Public Policy’s Dean’s Advisory Board. He also serves on the board of the American Cancer Society’s CEOs Against Cancer (LA Chapter) as well as a part of the Henry Crown Fellows within the Aspen Global Leadership Network at the Aspen Institute. In addition to his degree from UMD, Brown has an MBA from Columbia University and a B.A. from Connecticut College.
Wendy R. Sanhai, Ph.D., MBA ’09 is a health care executive with 25-plus years in leadership positions across the federal government, private industry, nonprofit organizations and academia. She is a former senior scientific advisor, Office of the Commissioner in the Food and Drug Administration; senior director, global regulatory affairs at GlaxoSmithKline; director of public-private partnerships, Foundation of the National Institutes of Health; and specialist leader in strategy and analytics, Deloitte. Sanhai has dedicated her career to medical product development; health policy; and public and global health across multiple therapeutic areas, toward patient benefit. Sanhai is also an adjunct associate professor at the Duke University School of Medicine.
She is an executive in residence at the Robert H. Smith School of Business, where she serves as former chair, and member, of the school’s Advisory Board. She is a member of the Executive Committee for Medicines for Malaria Ventures and a member of the Burroughs Wellcome Fund Innovation in Regulatory Science Advisory Committee.
She earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry at the University of Florida and a doctorate in clinical biochemistry and structural biology at the University at Buffalo before earning her MBA at UMD.
Walter A. “Walt” Williams Jr. ’92 is a vice president and senior financial analyst with Merrill Lynch Wealth Management, but he is more popularly known for his previous career as “The Wizard” in 11 seasons with the NBA.
He majored in management and consumer studies at Maryland, where he earned All-American honors and was the No. 7 overall pick in the 1992 NBA draft. He played guard/forward for the Sacramento Kings, Miami Heat, Toronto Raptors, Portland Trail Blazers, Houston Rockets and Dallas Mavericks.
After retirement, Williams went on to a career in the financial services industry, working at UBS for over 13 years before joining Merrill Lynch in 2022. He’s a former CareFirst BC/BS board member.
At Maryland, he established the Walter A. Williams Sr. Fund to award scholarships in his father’s name; he also supports the Terrapin Club and donates to the NIL program, One Maryland Collective, to help support student athletes. He's also a men’s basketball sideline reporter for the Maryland Sports Radio Network.
He and wife, April M. Williams, have three sons.