The 2024 AAWC Alumni Award Recipients
The AAWC honored the following alumni for their accomplishments during an annual awards ceremony held on June 1.
Tift Award: Julia Solleveld Osborne ’64
The Tift Award is given to an alumna/us who has demonstrated exemplary efforts to promote the continuing growth of Wilson College.
Julia Solleveld Osborne ’64 has found many ways to give back to Wilson. As an alumna, she served as class president and treasurer and has been a past officer of the Connecticut Wilson College Club. To assist Wilson’s new student recruitment efforts, she has hosted gatherings of prospective students, organized bus trips for them to visit campus, and wrote countless notes to newly admitted students. And, to support Wilson’s future endeavors, she established the Julia Solleveld Osborne ’64 Endowed Scholarship fund; served on the We Rise campaign steering committee; the We Rise Odds and Evens subcommittee; and, inspired her classmates to give the first six-figure class gift to the College in 2014, which the class of 1964 continues to support with philanthropic gifts.
Osborne said, “I am accepting this award on behalf of my entire class and for all those people at the College who inspired me…supported me, giving me the data, and documentation I needed to reach out and get more for the College.”
Outstanding Young Alumna Award: Ligmie Preval ’09
This award honors an alumna/us who has attended the school within the last 20 years and who has brought honor to her/ himself and to Wilson College through her/his intellectual and professional growth and contributions to her/his communities through professional and/or volunteer activities.
Ligmie Preval ’09 dreamed of working for a high-tech company, but as a single mother, this posed challenges as she tried to juggle parenthood, a job, and classes at a community college. When she applied for a spot in Wilson’s Single Parent Scholar Program, then called the Women with Children Program, things changed. This program gave her the opportunity to be a full-time student while spending more time with her daughter, Sunaii. She said, “Wilson was a place that accepted us as one of its own and enveloped us.”
Preval graduated from Wilson with a Bachelor of Science degree in computer science and a mathematics minor, and then earned a master’s in instructional technology and media from Columbia University. She worked as a strategic and organizational design professional for over 18 years and is currently the director of UX Research Operations for Fidelity Investments in Boston.
Distinguished Alumna Award: Linda Krach ’74
Presented to an alumna/us who has had a distinguished professional/volunteer career and who has shown continuing service, interest, and support in the growth and quality of Wilson College for a minimum of five years.
Linda E. Krach, M.D. ’74 was a first-generation student at Wilson College, where she became a member of Phi Beta Kappa and graduated magna cum laude in three years with a bachelor’s degree in biology. She earned a Doctor of Medicine degree from Hahnemann University (now Drexel University School of Medicine) and board certification in physical medicine and rehabilitation (PM&R), with a pediatric rehabilitation medicine sub-specialty. She became an esteemed clinician, and her contributions to the field of PM&R, particularly with those diagnosed with spina bifida and cerebral palsy, have been significant. She earned recognition by leading rehabilitation institutions, residency programs, and research teams, and, in 2021, she received the Gabriella E. Molnar-Swafford Pediatric PM&R Lifetime Achievement Award from the Foundation for PM&R.
She joined the Wilson College Board of Trustees in 2018 and said she considers Wilson a special place where she always received support. “Wilson was the first place outside of my family where I was treated as someone intelligent, with something to offer the world.”
Distinguished Adult Degree Program (ADP) Award: Robert Ziobrowski ’02
Presented to an alumna/us who has had a distinguished professional/volunteer career and who has shown continuing service, interest, and support in the growth and quality of Wilson College for a minimum of five years.
Robert “Bob” Ziobrowski ’02 is a Chambersburg native and the son of the late Lois Bergbom ’66. He first took courses at Wilson in 1971 after a brief stint at Brown University but discontinued his education to start his career. He returned to Wilson as an adult student and earned a bachelor’s degree in business and economics in 2002. Ziobrowski expressed his passion for lifelong learning and his community when he said, “I love what I do, and I love helping other people, and I love Wilson College.”
He has been a real estate appraiser in Chambersburg for over 30 years and has served as one of three Franklin County Commissioners since 2008, winning his fifth term in 2023. His experience includes working for the Franklin County Industrial Development Corporation and Letterkenny Industrial Development Authority. He served two terms on the Chambersburg Area School District Board of Directors, with the last two years as president, and nine years on the Chambersburg Hospital Board of Directors, with the last year as chairman.
