Dean’s Advisory Board

Mark DiCristofaro (CGS ’06, COM ’08 ’09) is an Emmy-Nominated film and television producer based out of Los Angeles, CA and a member of the Producer’s Guild of America.  Recent Producing credits include HBO’s Documentary Film “WIG”, Netflix’ “THE WHO WAS? SHOW”, Viceland’s “WHAT WOULD DIPLO DO?”, “GREAT MINDS WITH DAN HARMON”, Fox Sports Films’ Documentary “LEGENDS NEVER DIE: THE SANDLOT STORY”, and Paramount Network’s “LIP SYNC BATTLE”.  Additionally, Mark produced the 2015 feature film THE ESCORT, which debuted at the 2015 Los Angeles Film Festival and acquired a North American distribution deal with The Orchard prior to its world premiere, and was recently acquired by HULU for streaming.  In 2016, MTV acquired the rights to develop THE ESCORT into a TV Show, tapping Mark serve as an Executive Producer on the project. In 2018, Mark produced BRAMPTON’S OWN, which acquired a North America distribution deal with Dark Star Pictures ahead of its world premiere at the 2018 Nashville Film Festival.  This past spring, NETFLIX acquired exclusive streaming rights.

Mark studied at Boston University’s College of General Studies, College of Communication.  He served on Boston University’s Alumni Council 2012-2019, and joined The College of General Studies Dean’s Advisory Board in 2018.

Michael Gould, often referred to as one of the most accomplished and recognized leaders in American retailing, became Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Bloomingdale’s in November 1991 and served in that capacity for over 22 years.  His tenure saw the greatest period of transformation and growth in the store’s history, expanding from 16 units located mainly in the east, to a broad national brand presence with 37 stores in 18 major markets from coast to coast, the debut of 12 Bloomingdale’s, The Outlet Store locations, and the launch of bloomingdales.com.  In 2010, Gould led the brand in its first global expansion into Dubai.

Mr. Gould received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Columbia University in 1966 and continued there to earn a master’s degree from the Graduate School of Business.  It was a summer internship program during his MBA studies that afforded Gould his first retail experience.  A brief summer stint at Abraham and Straus in New York was enough to inspire him to seek a retail career; and in 1968 Gould entered that store’s Executive Training Squad as an assistant buyer in decorative home furnishings.  He soon became the company’s youngest merchandise vice president.

In 1978, Mr. Gould was named a Senior Vice President of J.W. Robinson’s in Los Angeles.  Within two years he was appointed Executive Vice President of merchandising and sales promotion.  In 1981, he became J.W. Robinson’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.  Subsequently, he also became a member of the Board of Directors of its parent company, Associated Dry Goods.  In 1986, he was tapped as President and Chief Operating Officer of Giorgio Beverly Hills.  When Avon Products purchased that company in 1987, he was named President and Chief Executive Officer, and remained there until joining Bloomingdale’s.

Mr.Gould serves on a number of boards, including the Board of Trustees of Lenox Hill Hospital; the Board of Overseers of Columbia University Graduate School of Business; the Board of Governors of The American Jewish Committee; the Board of Trustees of Urban Edge Properties; the Board of Directors, David Yurman Enterprises; the Board of Trustees of The Rand Corporation; Advisory board of KidZania and Board of South Coast Plaza.

Over the years, Mr. Gould has received numerous awards for distinguished service from many organizations, universities and industry associations, along with a variety of cultural and philanthropic groups.  While he remains personally and professionally committed to these activities, his children always come first; and, as such, he is intensely proud of being recognized by the Father’s Day and Mother’s Day Council as the 1999 National Father of the Year. 

As an expert in capital structures and corporate strategy and Senior Managing Member of Veyron Global, Michael Ippolito brings over 30 years of experience in providing advisory services to preeminent global corporations on optimizing their tangible and intangible assets, improving the impacts on their balance sheet and income statement while unlocking significant capital. By blending consulting, capital structures, and real estate expertise, he partners directly with the C-Suite to enable companies to make better decisions on where to locate, own and occupy assets, and how to fund these assets to drive results and savings, generate capital to pay down debt, or reinvest back into the business. He has overseen over 1,400 transactions worth $15 Billion in total transaction value. Mr. Ippolito was most recently recognized as a Transformative Leader by CEO Forum and Forbes online in 2020 and 2021.

Nancy Harwood Katz, originally from Highland Park, Ill., is a 1983 graduate of Boston University School of Communications and College of General Studies. She worked as a personnel recruiter in NYC from 1984-1990, when she and her husband Danny, moved their young family to the SF Bay Area and she began work at a career coach. Nancy specializes in helping align individuals with their strengths, talents and interests, as well develop authentic interviewing skills. In 2005 Nancy took a break from coaching to pursue a lifelong dream, and opened her own clothing boutique, Diva, in Walnut Creek CA. She owned and operated Diva for 5 years while her kids were in their high school years. Nancy continues to be involved in creative entrepreneurial projects, currently designing jewelry with her sister and running Rare Bird Jewelry, while she coaches. She and her husband Danny, a retired hedge fund manager, enjoy giving back supporting organizations they feel passionate about, especially their alma maters, Boston University and Duke University. They are the proud parents of Justin (CGS’09, Boston University’11) and Liza (Duke University, Class of 2014) Both kids live in NYC and work in the tech industry. She is the founder of Life Designs, which helps young adults align with their authentic strengths and create a path to professional success and empowerment.

Linda Sloane Kay is the past Vice Chair of the Board of Directors of Century Bank and Century Bancorp, Inc.  It was the largest family controlled bank in New England. She also served for a decade on the Boston University’s Board of Overseers. She is a Magna Cum Laude graduate of Boston University and a graduate of the ABA Stonier Graduate School of Banking.

Peter Kravitz was in the class of 1968 at CGS, 1970 at Boston University College of Arts and Sciences and 1973 at Boston University School of Law. He also received a L.L.M. from Georgetown University Law Center in 1976. While at CGS, Peter served as a delegate at large to the BU Student Senate in 1966-67 and as president of the CGS Student Senate in 1967-68. After graduating from Boston University School of Law, Peter served as law clerk to the Honorable Perry Barber on the Connecticut Supreme Court, then moved to Washington, D.C. where he practiced banking law as a senior attorney with the FDIC and later in private practice. Peter then became a federal lobbyist, retiring in 2013 as director of Congressional affairs at the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

Jonathon is a 1991 graduate of Boston University Questrom School of Business. He is the president and CEO of Turner Acceptance Corp. located in Skokie, IL. Jonathon serves on various boards, American Financial Services Association, National Auto Finance Association and the Independent Finance Association of IL. Jonathon also serves on the Dean’s Advisory Board of the College of General Studies at Boston University. Jonathon enjoys giving back supporting multiple sclerosis research; Kaleidoscope, a child welfare agency in Chicago; Boston University; and the AFSA Education Foundation with focus on financial literacy education. Jonathon lives in Highland Park, IL with his wife Rachel of 23 plus years. They are the proud parents of 3 amazing children, Dylan (University of Boulder CO- Sophomore), Bryce (Drexel University-Freshman) and Becca (Highland Park High School-Freshman).

Kalama Lui-Kwan is a Partner at Troutman Pepper Hamilton Sanders LLP, a law firm with more than 20 offices across the U.S.  Kalama is one of the preeminent post-closing dispute specialists in the country.  He litigates complex commercial matters involving business torts and contract claims arising from mergers and acquisitions of privately held companies.  Kalama also advises business-to-consumer companies when they are confronted with challenges that create potentially significant financial and reputational risk, including class actions, mass actions, and other complex lawsuits. Since 2021, Kalama has co-chaired the Unfair Competition Subcommittee of the ABA Litigation Section’s Consumer Litigation Committee.

Kalama serves as the managing partner of his firm’s San Francisco office and is a member of the firm’s Partner Compensation Committee.  He also serves on the CGS Dean’s Advisory Board at Boston University and on the board of OneGoal Bay Area, a postsecondary access and success organization that works with schools and districts to transform postsecondary advising and support.

Jeff Manheimer is the founder and CEO of Tripping.com, the world’s top search engine for vacation rentals. Under his leadership, Tripping.com became the market leader before it was acquired by a German company in 2019. Prior to the acquisition, Jeff helped lead the company’s Series C financing and has raised over $55 million from investors in Silicon Valley, Asia, and Europe. Jeff started his travel career 15 years ago with Hyatt Hotels where he held roles both on property and in the corporate office. In addition to that, he has held senior roles at Expedia and Travelzoo. Jeff graduated from Boston University, is an aviation enthusiast and loves Pho when traveling to Vietnam. He was also the recipient of the San Francisco Citizenship Award for stopping a store robbery and a contributing author to the book, “At Home and Around the World, Your Definitive Guide to the Vacation Rental Industry”.  In addition to that, he has spoken on numerous panels, given keynotes talks in Asia on various hospitality trends and has been published in multiple news articles and travel research reports (Skift & Phocusright). Currently, Jeff leads strategic partnerships for a technology company in NYC called Envizzo.com.

Chris Memoli is a Senior Vice President and Senior Director of the Community Development Finance Department at Santander Bank and is responsible for deploying up to $1 billion per year in equity and debt capital primarily to finance multifamily affordable housing and small business development.  Chris began his work in community development in 1997 creating one of the first qualified mortgage-backed securities enabling banks to garner investment test credit under the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA).    He later created and managed CRA focused trading desks both at Advest, Inc. and Sandler O’Neill & Partners, LP; taking a holistic approach, he assisted banks with their community development initiatives and actively traded CRA qualified securities, whole loans, and tax credit equity financings.

Chris then went to HSBC and managed their community development equity portfolio and established newly formed risk assessment guidelines to enhance the risk profile of the overall portfolio.  He also improved HSBC’s OCC CRA Investment Test rating from “Needs to Improve” to “Outstanding”.

At Capital One Bank, Chris led and managed the strategy for secondary purchases and sales for the Bank’s tax credit equity investments and permanent multifamily affordable loan portfolio.  Additionally, he created and developed the Alternative Investment platform to include community development loan funds, private equity, preferred stock and multifamily mortgage-backed securities.

Prior to his work in community development, Chris was in the Latin-American emerging markets as a portfolio manager and bond trader for corporate and sovereign debt as well as underlying bond option structures and mortgage-backed securities.

Chris is a CGS grad in class of 1990 and received his BSBA in Finance from Questrom, class of 1992.

Randolph L. Miller is the president of Produce Row Property Management Company and previously served as the chairman of The Moore Company. Miller’s former industry activities include chairman of National Independent Distributor Association; chairman of Distributor Councils for Sony, Pioneer, Quasar; and chairman of Distributor Section of National Computer Association (COMPTIA). He is also the recipient of numerous awards including: Port of Portland Compass Award, Portland Business Alliance President’s Award, City of Portland Spirit of Portland Award, ADA Father of the Year Award, and Boston University’s College of General Studies Distinguished Alumni Award. Miller received a BS in Business Administration from Boston University and received an MS in Economics/Political Science from Portland State University. He serves on many business, civic, and non-profit boards including Boston University’s College of General Studies Dean’s Advisory Board and is closely affiliated with the BU Initiative on Cities.

Steven Shachat has over 35 years of experience in trading and managing municipal bonds across the yield curve and credit spectrum.   He is currently a Senior Portfolio Manager at Cohanzick Management where he created and oversees the municipal bond separately managed account platform.  He is also in charge of all municipal bond investing for SMA accounts, sub-advised and in-house mutual funds.

Previously, Mr. Shachat was a Managing Director and Senior Portfolio Manager at Alpine Mutual Funds for 14 years where he managed over $2 billion in assets.  At Alpine, he built and managed three different municipal bond funds while being responsible for the entire fixed income operation.  He won over two dozen industry awards for top-ranked performance in the ultra short and municipal money market categories.

Prior to his tenure with Alpine, Mr. Shachat was Senior Vice President and Senior Portfolio Manager with Evergreen Mutual Funds for 13 years where he launched and managed their municipal bond mutual funds.  He managed over $7 billion in total assets with responsibility for seven municipal money market funds, two short-intermediate municipal bond funds and the fixed-income portion of the Evergreen Foundation Fund.  Mr. Shachat won multiple performance awards for top-ranked performance in the short-intermediate and municipal money market categories.

In addition to serving on Boston University’s College of General Studies Dean’s Advisory Board, Steven is also a board member of CITYarts in New York City and Share the Harvest in East Hampton, NY.

The New York Times has called Peter Shankman “a rockstar who knows everything about social media and then some.” He is a 5x best selling author, entrepreneur and corporate keynote speaker, focusing on customer service and the new and emerging customer economy.

He is recognized worldwide for radically new ways of thinking about the customer experience, social media, PR, marketing, advertising, and ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.)

In addition to his passion for helping people and companies find success, some of Peter’s highlights also include:

• Founder of HARO – Help A Reporter Out, which became the standard for thousands of journalists looking for sources prior to being acquired three years after launch
• The ShankMinds Breakthrough Network, which is an elite, online mastermind of thought leaders, business experts, and change makers
• Faster than Normal – The Internet’s #1 podcast on ADHD, focusing on the superpowers and gifts of having a “faster than normal brain”

Peter has been a worldwide influencer for companies ranging from Huawei to Specialized Bicycles, from New York Health and Racquet Club to Sprint.

Finally, Peter is a father, a 2x ironman triathlete, a class B licensed skydiver, and an avid Peloton rider. He’s based in NYC with his daughter and 19-year-old cat, both of whom refuse him access to the couch.

David Torres graduated Boston University in 2013 with a BA in Sociology from the school of Arts and Sciences as well as a BS in Communication from the College of Communication, after attending the College of General Studies in 2011. David is currently a Segment lead of Emerging Markets at HubSpot (NYSE: HUBS) where he founded the Latin America office in Bogota, Colombia, in 2018 and has led the growth of the market for the previous seven years.

David enjoys giving back to the immigrant community as he, himself, was an immigrant to the states, as well as supporting local unions. In his free time, David enjoys attempting to learn to play the guitar, as well as training and competing in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.  David and his fiancé , Chelsea (also a proud Boston University CAS/CGS alumna) reside in Somerville, MA.

Matt Trevithick is the founder and CEO of Blank Slate Technologies, a tech firm focused on reducing forgetting through adaptive learning tools. From 2013 to 2017, he was the co-founder and managing partner of SREO Consulting, an Istanbul-based monitoring and evaluation firm which provides humanitarian impact assessments for NGOs, UN agencies and governments funding relief programming across the region. He speaks Farsi, has a silver medal from the Head of the Charles Regatta, and his first book, An Undesirable Element: An Afghan Memoir, was published with an introduction by Ambassador Ryan Crocker. He was the 2014 recipient of the Distinguished Young Alumni Award from Boston University.

Gary Villella attended CGS and Boston University Questrom School of Business where he received a BSBA in 1971. He earned his MBA from St Mary’s College of California in 1991. While at BU, Gary served as an RA during the 1969-70 and 1970-71 school years and was president of his social fraternity.

Villella retired after 41 years in the defense, computer, medical and aerospace industries. His roles encompassed all aspects of human resources including strategic planning, succession planning, executive development, turnarounds, acquisitions and labor relations for multi countries and multi sites. Gary was a European expat for 5 years with business responsibilities in Indonesia, Eastern Europe, Canada and the US.

Upon retirement, he volunteered as a mentor for SCORE in Vancouver, WA where he last served as vice chair of the chapter.

Gary and his wife reside in Gig Harbor, WA. He now enjoys various outdoor activities, reading and fly fishing.

Christopher Wade attended Boston University’s College of General Studies and the College of Arts and Sciences, where he received a BA in Political Science. He also earned his MA in Public Administration from American International College. Wade is the President of DMV MEGA Booths and MEGA Moment Entertainment in Washington, DC, a premier in-person and virtual social activation and event company. He founded the Cynthia H. Wade Foundation in Orlando, FL, which awards scholarships to disadvantaged high school seniors attending to pursue post-secondary education. He is also the owner of Dat’ Southern Boy Food Services catering company and a member of Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity. Wade lives with his wife, Minty and has three children: Savannah, Christopher II, and Maverick.

Ed Westerman is principal of Westerman Consulting, an independent consultancy firm providing logistics and business operations services. Westerman has fifty years of experience in distribution, logistics, off-shore sourcing and liaison, cost reduction, problem solving and general management. He specializes in managing warehousing, transportation and business operations for small and mid-market companies. Prior to starting his own firm, Westerman was vice president of operations for three New England-based, national consumer products distribution companies.

Westerman attended Boston University’s College of General Studies and the College of Communication, where he received a B.S. in public relations. He has served on several nonprofit boards over the years, including the Creative Club of Boston, the Boston University College of General Studies Alumni Board, the Boston University CGS Dean’s Advisory Council, the Boston University Alumni Executive Board and, currently, co-chair of the Board of the Find The Cause Breast Cancer Foundation, an organization raising money and awareness to fight environmental causes of breast cancer. He is also a Navy veteran.

Westerman lives in Hudson, Massachusetts with his wife of forty-four years, Arline, and has one son, Micah, a Washington, D.C. charter school vice-principal. Westerman enjoys gardening, reading, music and occasionally skiing and jogging.