2023 Alumni Award Winners

A native of Augusta, Georgia, Professor Donaldson received his undergraduate degree in History and African-American Studies from Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT and his Ph.D. in American History from Emory University where he served on the staff of the Martin Luther King Jr. Papers Project. Previously, he held the Thurgood Marshall Fellowship at Dartmouth College and the Susan Biddle Ford Fellowship at the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research at Harvard University.

A scholar of southern history and African American life and culture in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Dr. Donaldson’s research and writings explore African American intellectual thought, print culture, education and religion. Additionally, he has served as a consultant for museum exhibitions, archival collections, oral history initiatives, documentary films, and historic preservation projects, including the renovation of the Booker T. Washington High School in downtown Columbia. In 2008, the Historic Columbia Foundation awarded Dr. Donaldson and his students the Helen Kohn Hennig Prize for their documentary project on the Ward One community in downtown Columbia. Professor Donaldson received a Michael J. Mungo Undergraduate Teaching Award (2010); the John N. Gardner Inspirational Faculty Award (2015); and the Martin Luther King, Jr. Social Justice Award (2016). From 2010-2016, he served as the Faculty Principal of Preston Residential College. After nine years of service, he was named a trustee emeritus of Wesleyan University in 2015. Dr. Donaldson holds the James E. and Emily E. Clyburn Chair of Public Service and Civic Engagement.

Currently, Professor Donaldson leads the Center for Civil Rights History and Research, housed in the Hollings Special Collections Library. He also serves as the lead scholar for Columbia SC 63: Our Story Matters, a documentary history initiative that chronicles the struggle for civil rights and social justice in Columbia. Presently, Donaldson is completing a monograph entitled “‘In Our Own Defense’: New Negro Intellectuals in the Jim Crow South.” The project critiques the varied and often competing rhetorical, ideological, and political strategies black intellectuals in Georgia employed as they battled white supremacy and negotiated African Americans’ precarious “place” in both the South and the nation. He is also conducting research on a biography of William Jefferson White, a political activist, Baptist minister and journalist, who founded Morehouse College in 1867.

COL (Ret) Keith June hails from Bonneau, South Carolina. A 1986 graduate of the University of South Carolina, he was commissioned in the US Army Signal Corps in 1986.

Keith spent over 30 years serving our nation in the Army. His military career took him around the world with assignments in Germany, Panama and multiple deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti, Kuwait and Bosnia.

He also served on the Joint Staff, the Army Staff and completed a special assignment with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

COL (Ret) June’s notable military assignments include Signal officer in the 325 Airborne Infantry Regiment (AIR), company command in the famed 82^nd Airborne Division, Operations officer in the 82^nd Signal Battalion, Command of the 54^th Signal Battalion in Iraq, XVIIIth Airborne Corps G-6, and Senior Communications officer, CJ-6, for NATO and US Forces in Afghanistan. Keith also served as the J-6 for Joint Task Force Haiti in 2010.

A Master rated parachutist, COL (Ret) June was awarded 3 Bronze Stars and the Humanitarian Service Award for his service in Iraq, Afghanistan and Haiti. COL June is also the recipient of the Legion of Merit and the Defense Superior Service Award.

COL (Ret) June joined the Army as he was deeply inspired by the service of his grandfather, Walker Curtis, a WWII Veteran. Mr. Curtis served in WWII and returned home where he continued to serve his community. Mr. Curtis, using skills he learned as an Army Engineer, built the community church.

In 2020, during the COVID crisis, Keith served as the Chair for the Veterans Alumni Council (VAC) for the University of South Carolina. Despite the challenges posed by COVID, Keith looked for ways to continue to connect and engage with Veterans to include developing programs such as virtual events which highlighted the contributions of Servicemembers and Veterans. Additionally, during this period, with the tremendous assistance of other Veterans and Veterans organizations, the VAC was able to fully endow the Salute to Service Scholarship. The Salute to Service scholarship is already having a great impact on the Veterans and Gamecock Community.

COL (Ret) June also serves on the board of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund (VVMF). VVMF is the organization that built and maintains the Vietnam Wall. A Soldier for life, proud South Carolinian, immensely proud Gamecock and American with a strong belief in the values of our nation, Keith has given back to church, community and nation. Keith is also a proud Life Member of the USC Alumni Association.

David M. Beasley served as the Executive Director of the United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP) from 2017 until 2023. The WFP is the largest international humanitarian organization and delivers food assistance and other aid to nearly 100 million people a year in dozens of countries. Beasley’s leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic won accolades for saving millions of lives as more people around the world were forced into poverty. He also helped boost private and governmental funding for the aid program by billions of dollars by spanning deep political divides. 

Before coming to WFP, Beasley spent a decade working with high-profile leaders and on-the-ground program managers in more than 100 countries, directing projects designed to foster peace, reconciliation and economic progress. He travelled to as many as 30 countries a year, organizing, leading or participating in conferences and missions in Kosovo, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia and Yemen, among others. His work has allowed him to develop deep relationships with leaders around the world.

 As Governor of South Carolina from 1995 to 1999, Beasley guided the state during years of economic transformation, helping to reshape the state’s economy into a healthy, diverse and robust market. The work led to one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, with a dramatic increase in private sector capital investment.  Beasley was the first Governor in South Carolina to make a public push for the removal of the Confederate battle flag from the state capitol dome, a move that earned him the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award.  He was first elected to public office at the age of 21 as a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives. Beasley and his wife Mary Wood have four children and three grandchildren. A native of Lamar, South Carolina, he earned a bachelor’s degree from USC in 1979 and graduated from USC’s School of Law in 1983.

Jeff Charney is one of the nation’s most heralded, creative CMO’s as well a relevant and disruptive voice in today’s marketing community. As CMO of Progressive Insurance, the nation’s 3^rd largest media spender, he and his team developed two of the nation’s top brand icons including the iconic salesclerk (“Flo”), the ‘we all become our parents’ parental-life coach, “Dr. Rick.” Earlier, as CMO at Aflac, he was in charge of the iconic —”Aflac Duck” — currently the nation’s longest running marketing icon. 

A two-time “CMO of the Year,” (from both Ad Age and AdWeek) and winner of more than 100 national/international awards, he left corporate America at the top of his game last year with Progressive to start an “invite only” nationwide game changing marketing collective called MKHSTRY. As founder and CEO, Jeff and MKHSTRY follow a scarcity business model working only with the bravest founders, brands, and individuals to disrupt existing business models to indeed –Make History—similar to that of code cracking companies like, Uber, OpenAI, Spotify, Tesla, Airbnb, etc. 

Before Progressive and Aflac, he was CMO multi-media retailer, QVC, CMO at Homestore.com, parent company of Realtor.com and other real estate aggregators. At all of his companies, Jeff was a pioneer in developing large, in-house creative agencies and media buying firms before it was trendy to do so. For much more about Jeff’s breakthrough marketing, go to https://www.jeffcharney.com/.

Hailed by The New York Times as a “vibrant soprano…with a secure, appealing sound and eye-opening volume,” Rebecca Krynski Cox opens the 23-24 season with Dayton Opera as Rosalinde (selections from Die Fledermaus). This spring, Ms. Cox returns to Florida Grand Opera for her role debut as Mimì in Puccini’s La Bohème, and joins the USC Symphony Orchestra as the soprano soloist for Brahms’ A German Requiem. As a member of the Fest Ensemble at the Luzerner Theater in Switzerland from 2016-2021, roles performed include Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Elisabetta (Maria Stuarda), Alice Ford (Falstaff), Gretchen (Faust-Szenen), Raja (Dschungel -world premiere), and Tatyana (Eugene Onegin). In the spring of 2021, Ms. Cox covered Erste Dame in Die Zauberflöte at Theater Basel and stepped in with six hours’ notice to sing Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte at the Luzerner Theater. In the winter of 2022, Ms. Cox made her Florida Grand Opera debut as Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire and made debuts with Indianapolis Opera singing Julie Jordan in Carousel and with Dayton Opera in their “Epic Opera” concert. During the 22-23 season, Ms. Cox debuted the title role in Beethoven’s Fidelio with Opera Company of Middlebury, joined Charleston Opera Theater as Donna Anna in Don Giovanni, returned to Dayton Opera to sing the Mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors, as well as to Indianapolis Opera as Pamina in Die Zauberflöte. Previous notable performances include Violetta (La traviata) with Kentucky Opera, Cynthia (Two boys – workshop) with The Metropolitan Opera, and Micaëla (Carmen) with El Paso Opera.

Ms. Cox graduated cum laude from the University of South Carolina with a Bachelor of Music, and completed her Master of Music and Performance Certificate at the Manhattan School of Music. She also completed training programs as a Young Artist with The Santa Fe Opera, Minnesota Opera, and Des Moines Metro Opera.

Judge J. Michelle Childs was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in July 2022. She holds her undergraduate degree in Management from the University of South Florida Honors College, a law degree from the University of South Carolina School of Law, a Masters in Personnel and Employment Relations from the University of South Carolina’s Darla Moore School of Business, a Masters of Judicial Studies from Duke University School of Law, and an Honorary Doctorate Degree in Public Service from the University of South Carolina.

Judge Childs is active with various local, state, and national bar organizations, as well as community organizations. She is the President of the Federal Judges Association, a former Chair of the American Bar Association’s Judicial Division, and a former Secretary of the American Bar Association’s Labor and Employment Law Section. She currently serves on the American Bar Association’s Administrative Law Council. She serves as a fellow with the American Bar Association’s Litigation Section and its Committee on the American Judicial System. Judge Childs is also a member of the American Law Institute, having served as an Advisor to the Restatement (Third) of Employment Law, and is currently a member of its Council. Judge Childs also serves on the 2023 Bolch Judicial Institute (BJI) Advisory Board. She joins the class of 2022 Rodel Judicial Fellows.