John Feerick ’61, former dean of Fordham Law School, and his wife, Emalie, were among three families presented with Founder’s Awards at the Fifteenth Annual Fordham Founder’s Award Dinner on March 15. A record-breaking 1,100 attendees packed the Waldorf Astoria’s grand ballroom in Midtown for the event.
John, the Sidney C. Norris Professor in Public Service and founder of the School’s Feerick Center for Social Justice, said he and Emalie were accepting the award on behalf of their parents: his hailed from County Cork, Ireland, and instilled in their children the importance of education even though they did not have one; hers encouraged them to serve others.
John also thanked Emalie onstage, saying her “suggestions, ideas, and encouragement have been reflected in all of my writings, tributes, and speeches, and all my life’s work.” Emalie helped him write From Failing Hands: The Story of Presidential Succession (Fordham University Press, 1965). The book details his involvement in crafting the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The other awardees were Brian and Kathleen MacLean, and George and Marie Doty, the latter of whom was honored posthumously.
$2.6 million was raised for the Founder’s Undergraduate Scholarship Fund, the most ever, and 22 Founders Scholars were named, eight more than the previous year. Fordham College student Robyn Ayers, thanked attendees for making it possible for the scholars to get a Fordham education. She said that on the day she got the call informing her she would receive the scholarship she was shopping for a headset so she could Skype with her family in Kansas.
“I’m not one for public spectacles, but I don’t mind telling you that I sat down in the middle of Best Buy and started crying,” she said. “That phone call changed my life. Instead of having to drop out or sacrifice academic commitment for [working] multiple jobs, I was able to focus on becoming the most authentic version of myself.”
Even though Joseph M. McShane, SJ, president of Fordham, never attended the University, he said he felt as if he had gotten a full scholarship here. He said he absorbed the values of Fordham as a young boy from his father, who was a member of the Class of 1932.
“I challenge each of you to give a full scholarship to all whom you meet, the same way my father gave a full scholarship to all his sons. Explore. Discover. Take delight in God’s word. Transform the world with your goodness, and redeem it with your love. If you do that, you will indeed give all who you meet a full scholarship to Fordham,” he said.
