Each year, the UMKC Alumni Association and the campus celebrate the outstanding achievements of UMKC graduates through the Alumni Awards Gala. The class of 2022 recipients were inducted on April 29.
Alumnus of the Year
Bryan Meyer (B.A. ’11, M.P.A. ’15, J.D. ‘15)
Bryan Meyer served in the Marine Corps for five years before coming to UMKC to earn his bachelor’s degree, JD and MPA. Following graduation in 2015, he then turned his attention to helping fellow veterans by helping to establish the Veterans Community Project (VCP) in Kansas City.
He now serves as the CEO of VCP, which is an innovative non-profit that provides housing for homeless veterans in the VCP Village. The Village setting also provides a sanctuary and emotional space needed for the Veteran. Here the VCP's Veteran Support Services thoroughly addresses the underlying causes of his or her homelessness and VCP's specially trained case managers work to achieve incremental, lasting results in the areas of health and wellness, education, employment, financial literacy, and the development of a personal support network. As CEO, Bryan is driven by service and is passionate about building an organization that is here to serve veterans and all of Kansas City.
Bryan is deeply committed to making sure that no veteran is left behind. Bryan and his staff have been able to engage a broad base of the community to rally behind the project. That engagement speaks to Bryan’s leadership and his unwavering dedication to get the job done. The work they have done here in Kansas City will be used as the national model to ensure our nation’s veterans have the services they need and the support they deserve.
UMKC 2022 Alumni Achievement Award Alumnus of the Year: Bryan Meyer - YouTube
Spotlight Award
Riddhiman Das (B.S. ’12, M.S. ‘19)
Riddhiman Das is co-founder and CEO of TripleBlind. TripleBlind’s patented breakthroughs in advanced mathematics, cryptography and AI arm organizations with the ability to share, leverage and monetize regulated data, including PII and PHI, and mission-critical enterprise data, such as tax returns and banking transactions. TripleBlind unlocks new revenue opportunities while enforcing GDPR, HIPAA and other privacy regulations.
Previously, Das worked in corporate venture capital and M&A for Ant Financial, a financial services arm of the Alibaba Group. In his role as head of international technology investments, Das was focused on deals in enabling technologies for Alipay worldwide including blockchain, artificial intelligence, security, IoT and computing. He also spearheaded the Ant Financial and Alibaba network in Israel, Silicon Valley and New York, helping bridge the gap between the Alibaba ecosystem and technology startups outside China.
Das came to Ant Financial through EyeVerify’s successful exit. At EyeVerify, he helped develop and commercialize a software-only, biometric method for verifying the identity of mobile users called ‘Eyeprints’, which is based on the unique vein patterns in the whites of a person’s eyes and has fingerprint-level accuracy.
He received the 2013 White House Champions of Change from President Barack Obama.
UMKC 2022 Alumni Achievement Award Alumni Spotlight Award: Riddhiman Das - YouTube
The Bill French Alumni Service Award
Ann Mesle (J.D. ‘72)
The Honorable Ann Mesle’s distinguished work for UMKC is the definition of service. She has served on the UMKC Law Foundation (President), as a UMKC Trustee, Martha Starr Education Fund (Co-Chair) and the Board of Diastole-Hospital Hill (Chair). She has received the UMKC Law Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award, its Alumni Achievement Award, and its Best Friend Award.
Judge Mesle’s leadership has been demonstrated on various UMKC boards and committees including the Capital Campaign and Stewardship and Events (Chair), UMKC Trustees Board and Executive Board, Athletic Foundation, UMKC Trustees Initiative-Law, Law Foundation Board, Law Foundation, and as a Law Foundation Emeritus Trustee. While on the UMKC Trustees Board she was involved in preparing for and responding for the “Time to get it right” report. She has been an advocate for the Law School within the university, including on issues regarding budgets.
She has served on the boards of innumerable civic organizations, including Health Care/Health Forward Foundation (Executive Committee), Missouri Institute for Justice (Chair), Truman Medical Center Risk Committee, Jackson County Children’s Service Fund (Vice Chair) and the Center for Conflict Resolution. Her service to the Kansas City bar is legendary.
UMKC 2022 Alumni Achievement Award Bill French Service Award: Ann Mesle - YouTube
Defying the Odds Award
Susan B. Wilson (M.B.A. ’05)
Susan B. Wilson, Ph.D. (MBA ’05) is a proud UMKC graduate whose professional accomplishments are a stellar reflection on the University. Susan attended the University of Pittsburgh and earned three degrees. She pushed past poverty, discouragement from professors, racism and discrimination to seek research opportunities and guidance needed to prepare her for application process for the school’s graduate psychology program. Susan was accepted to the clinical psychology program and matriculated through the very rigorous program as a single parent of two children.
Susan went on to complete her Ph.D. and secured a post-doctoral fellowship at the Menninger Foundation in Topeka. She moved to Kansas City in 1989 and went on to have a multifaceted career in healthcare administration, education and broadcasting. She served as a treating clinician for the Kansas City Chiefs and the National Football League (NFL), In 2005 Susan received her MBA at UMKC and in 2008 became the associate dean for diversity and community partnership at the UMKC School of Medicine. She was named vice chancellor for diversity and inclusion in 2014. During her tenure, she implemented a comprehensive, campus-wide plan for diversity and inclusion, built diversity and inclusion training programs, launched the Faculty Diversity Dialogues program and campus Diversity Advocates programs for students and employees. She retired from her role in January 2021, but has continued working with the School of Dentistry in a diversity and inclusion role.
UMKC 2022 Alumni Achievement Award Defying the Odds Award: Dr. Susan B. Wilson - YouTube
Legacy Family
North/Cheadle Family
Within the North/Cheadle family, there are nine family members spanning multiple generations. Don Cheadle, Sr. (MA, Psychology ’70) and his brother-in-law Basil North, Jr. (B.A. ’61, J.D.’71) started the path for other members to become Roos. Basil North’s daughters, Sheryl North, M.D. and Maria North Morgan, attended UMKC and graduated with degrees in Medicine and Law, respectively and their mother Arletha also attended. Basil's wife, Loretta North, also attended UMKC and taught in the UMKC School of Nursing and Health Studies. Other relatives also earned degrees from UMKC including: Glenn North, Jr. (MFA, Creative Writing ’20), Stasi Bobo–Ligon (BBA, Business Administration ’88), Dione Cheadle (BA, Elementary Education, ’89).
[Pictured l-r: Basil North, Jr. and Don Cheadle, Sr.]
UMKC 2022 Alumni Achievement Award Legacy Award: The North - Cheadle Family - YouTube
School Alumni Achievement Award Recipients
College of Arts and Sciences
Melissa Zarda (B.A. ’02, M.A. ‘07)
Melissa Zarda is a graduate of the College of Arts and Sciences with a BA ’02 in Studio Art and an MA ’07 Sociology. She led the cause to prevent people from being fired for their sexual orientation or gender identity. Melissa took up the cause after the death of her brother, Don, who was fired from his job for that very reason. With help from the ACLU, a N.Y. attorney and the co-director of the Stanford Law School Supreme Court Litigation Clinic, the case was argued in front of the Supreme Court. The ruling, with a 6 to 3 decision, declared it illegal under federal law to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity in the workplace.
Melissa owns and runs a successful small business and spends quite a bit of her spare time volunteering for local animal-welfare groups.
School of Biological and Chemical Sciences
Joseph Lambing (Ph.D. ‘90)
Dr. Joseph Lambing recently retired from Bristol Myers Squibb, formerly MyoKardia, where he was the Senior Vice President, Nonclinical and Pharmaceutical Development. Joe earned a B.S. in Chemistry from University of Missouri-Rolla and Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Following a post-doctoral fellowship at University of California, San Diego he worked for over 30 years in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, primarily focused on cardiovascular disease. He credits his time at UMKC in helping him develop his interest in analytical and peptide chemistry and gla proteins. During his career he guided numerous drug discovery programs from early leads through clinical development and contributed to multiple investigational new drug (IND) and new drug (NDA) applications for more than a dozen new chemical entities. During his career Joe built and managed several technical departments including drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics, toxicology, analytical and formulation development, process chemistry, manufacturing, quality control and quality assurance. He is the author of several patents and publications and was involved in building multiple successful biotechnology companies.
Henry W. Bloch School of Management
Mike Perry (B.B.A. ’89)
Mike Perry is president and chief executive officer of Hallmark Cards, Inc., a Kansas City, Mo.-based company known throughout the world for greeting cards and personal expression products sold in retail stores and online, as well as television programming through the properties of Crown Media Family Networks and Hallmark Hall of Fame productions. Perry began his career at Hallmark in 1989, serving in a variety of leadership positions within Hallmark’s core business units, customer management teams and new business development initiatives. In 2009, he was named president and CEO of Crayola and was named a corporate officer. Perry transitioned to become the president of Hallmark’s Global Greetings business in late 2015, leading all aspects of the greetings and personal expression business across the company’s global markets including product development, marketing, sales, finance, human resources and operations. He ascended to his current position in 2019.
School of Computing and Engineering
Jungwoo Ryoo (B.S. ’96, M.S. ’98)
Dr. Jungwoo Ryoo aspires to be a compassionate servant leader and currently serves as the head of the Division of Business, Engineering, and Information Sciences and Technology (BEIST) and Professor of IST at the Pennsylvania State University-Altoona. He was named Chancellor and Chief Academic Officer of Penn State DuBois and will begin on April 4, 2022. Dr. Ryoo is also a graduate/affiliate faculty member of the College of IST at Penn State-University Park. He was a technical editor for the institute of electrical and electronics engineers (IEEE) Communications Magazine and worked with IEEE and Software Engineering Institute (SEI) as a consultant. His research interests include information security and assurance, software engineering, computer networking, data science, innovative learning environments (ILEs). He is the author of numerous academic articles. He conducts extensive research in software security, cybersecurity, security management and auditing, software architectures, object-oriented software development, requirements engineering, and ILEs to promote justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion (JEDI) in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) higher education. Many of Dr. Ryoo’s research projects have been funded by state and federal government agencies. He received more than 1.5 million dollars in total external funding. He has substantial industry experience architecting and implementing secure, high-performance software solutions for large-scale network management systems. He received his B.S. and M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Missouri-Kansas City in 1996 and 1998, respectively, and Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Kansas in 2005.
Conservatory
Xi Wang (M.M. ’03)
Xi Wang’s music education started at the age of five. She received her B.M from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music before coming to the UMKC Conservatory in 2001. She went on to receive her D.M.A from Cornell University and is currently an Associated Professor at the Meadow School of Arts of Southern Methodist University, where she received the Rotunda Award for Outstanding Teaching. Xi Wang has been considered as one of the most active composers of her generation. Her music has been performed and commissioned by notable orchestras and ensembles such as the Philadelphia Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony, Shanghai Philharmonic and many more. She is the recipient of the coveted Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts Award, New Music USA, American Music Center and the MacDowell Colony residency as well as seven prizes from the American Society of Composers and the Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).
School of Dentistry
Brenda Bohaty (Ph.D. ’09)
Dr. Brenda Bohaty is Chair of the UMKC School of Dentistry’s Department of Pediatric Dentistry and concurrently the Director of the Residency Program in Pediatric Dentistry at the Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics in Kansas City, Missouri. During her nearly 35 years of service to the School, Dr. Bohaty has accomplished a long list of academic and research endeavors including her instrumental role in initiating and running the Dental Clinic at Operation Breakthrough. This program allows children who attend day care at Operation Breakthrough to receive comprehensive dental care at no cost to their care providers. An impactful experience for both the children in the community and dental students. Dr. Bohaty serves as one of the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry representatives on the Commission for Dental Accreditation Review Committee as a site visitor, she received a national appointment to serve as a member of the Review Committee member for the National Commission on Dental Specialties, she serves as Chair of the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry Graduate In-Service Examination Committee and as an expert consultant on the Council of Pre-Doctoral Education. She also serves on the Rinehart Foundation Board.
School of Dentistry - Dental Hygiene
Jo Ann Weatherwax (B.S.D.H. ’06, M.S. ’12)
Jo Ann Weatherwax serves as the founding Dental Program Director for the Volusia County Health Department in Daytona Beach, Florida and has dedicated her career to help solving the national issue of access to oral healthcare services. Jo Ann, the first dental hygienist to serve as a dental director at a county health department in Florida, developed a clinical program, added an additional clinic to serve the western area of Volusia County, and established a county-wide school sealant and oral health education program. Her dedication to the Health Department and safety net programs in Volusia County has resulted in the delivery of oral healthcare services to countless children and families. Along with her work in public health, Jo Ann has served in numerous leadership roles including most recently as the President of the Florida Dental Hygiene Association.
School of Education
Lucero Garibay (M.A. ‘16)
Lucero Garibay graduated from the UMKC School of Education with her Masters degree in Mental Health Counseling in 2016. Lucero is currently employed with Pilsen Wellness Center in Chicago, IL, where she has worked as a bilingual psychotherapist for the past couple of years. Lucero continues to provide bilingual psychotherapy services and has recently been promoted to her current role as Floor Supervisor. Pilsen Wellness Center has historically served predominantly Latino/a communities and has since expanded across the city and surrounding suburban communities. In her tenure at Pilsen Wellness Center, Lucero played a vital role in the development of a program working with Chicago Public Schools to provide off-site mental health services and additional support to teachers, school counselors, and social workers. As a bilingual and bicultural staff member, Lucero’s expertise rests on the ability to grasp the complexities of cultural and language barriers faced by under-served communities.
School of Law
J. Kent Emison (J.D. ’81)
Kent Emison, graduated from the School of Law in 1981 where as a law student he graduated with distinction and served as the Business Editor on the UMKC Law Review. He has dedicated his practice at the firm of Langdon and Emison in Lexington, Missouri to represent individuals and their family members in personal injury cases. Kent is a Fellow in the International Academy of Trial Lawyers, placing him in the top 1% of lawyers in the world. Among his noteworthy legal achievements, that led to the firm’s national reputation was Kent’s 9-0 favorable verdict at the US Supreme Court in the case of Baker v. General Motors Corporation.
As a proud alumnus and benefactor of the UMKC School of Law, he has sponsored many students from the law school to attend bar association conferences and seminars. Additionally, Kent and his firm regularly sponsor mock trial teams from UMKC so that students can learn trial skills firsthand. provide scholarships for several UMKC law students to attend the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys Annual Convention, and many other actions supporting law students.
School of Medicine
Lucky Atul Chopra (B.A. ’91, M.D. ’92)
Lucky Chopra, M.D. graduated from UMKC School of Medicine and did his Radiology Residency at the University of Texas Houston Medical School. His entrepreneurial career began while he was still in his final year of Radiology Residency. Working out of his garage, he purchased an old milk truck and converted it to carry a “barely portable” Radiology X-ray machine. He began contracting with local Houston nursing homes to provide imaging services without the patient having to travel.
Dr. Chopra began Advanced Diagnostics Healthcare. Here a team of Radiologists reads the mobile imaging and Ultrasound studies, and also provides full in-house Radiology Services. These services include X-ray, MRI (both Open and High Definition 1.5 Tesla), CT (64 Slice Vascular CT), Nuclear Medicine and Cardiac Stress Testing, Ultrasound, and Bone Scanning. In 2016 Dr. Chopra purchased a hospital in East Houston: Advanced Diagnostics East. This facility specializes primarily in Spinal and Orthopedic Surgical procedures.
School of Nursing and Health Studies
Leslie Luke (M.S.N. ’00)
Leslie Luke has long been an advocate for expanding the role of nurses in health care. She saw a need for offering more comprehensive care to the residents of her rural town of Maryville, Missouri, and came to UMKC for a Master of Science in Nursing to become a Family Nurse Practitioner and expand patient care in her area.
In 2006, she decided to open her own clinic, the Care Clinic, which is one of three health care practices in Maryville independent of Mosaic Hospital. Opening the clinic was quite an accomplishment, as the state of Missouri severely limits advanced nursing practice. As a nurse practitioner owned and led clinic, The Care Clinic offers a comprehensive level of care including: immunizations, wellness checks, well-woman exams, hormone replacement therapy, blood work, infant checkups and general treatments for rashes, colds, strep throat, depression, anxiety and more. Luke also gives back to the medical community and stays connected to her alma mater by mentoring UMKC nursing students. The broad scope of the Care Clinic, as well as the rural setting, provides UMKC students with essential experience for their nursing careers.
School of Pharmacy
Janelle Sabo (Pharm.D. ’00)
Dr. Janelle A. Sabo is a recognized leader in drug development, clinical research, and product delivery. Janelle is currently Vice President of Clinical Capabilities at Eli Lilly and Company. Her organization encompasses over 1400 employees across the globe delivering over 400 clinical trials. Clinical Capabilities is responsible for the delivery of clinical studies, including site engagement, trial capabilities, global scientific writing, clinical labs and systems, clinical trial material, ancillaries and related supply planning/delivery, clinical development systems, clinical research services, clinical innovation and digital health.
Janelle started her career in clinical development and has held key leadership roles across clinical development, chemistry manufacturing and controls, portfolio management and led drug development and brand teams from early discovery to launch. Most recently, Janelle led the COVID-19 Therapeutics Platform which delivered multiple neutralizing antibodies in under 12 months from discovery to market and utilized novel approaches for clinical and commercial delivery.