Meet members of our Executive Committee

Rick Becker (2007-present) - Current position: Chair of Program Committee

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Retired member of the Senior Foreign Service of the United States. Born in St. Louis, MO and raised in California, Rick earned a B.A. in history from UC-Berkeley and a Ph.D. in international relations from Claremont Graduate School. He attended the University of Michigan and Georgetown University for post-graduate studies, and held faculty positions at the Universities of New Mexico and Wisconsin before joining the State Department in 1974. During his 30-year Foreign Service career, Rick worked in political and economic affairs and served in senior management positions at U.S. embassies in Romania, Brazil, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Panama, as well as in Washington, D.C. Rick is the recipient of numerous awards and commendations from the State Department, the U.S. Army (for service as foreign affairs adviser to the chief of staff), law enforcement agencies, and overseas business, labor and civic groups. His foreign languages include Romanian, Portuguese, and Spanish. A Davis resident since 2005, Rick is active in UCD-Extension's Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, where he has taught courses on foreign aid and World War II, and in the Davis Tennis Club. For I-House, he has chaired the program committee, organized conferences on China and Brazil, and directed the Great Decisions discussion series. He and his wife Peggy, also an I-House activist, have two daughters and two grandchildren, all residing in Northern California.

Sean Duggan (2006-present) - Current position: Immediate Past President

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Sean is a graduate in chemistry of the Universities of London (King's: BSc 1960) and Chicago (PhD 1973). From 1960 to 1963 he taught science and mathematics at Bishop Herman College, Kpando, Ghana; he was also a part-time adult education teacher for the Institute of Public Education of the University of Ghana. He came to the United States as a graduate student and lived for a year at the Chicago International House. Later, he was a Senior Research Chemist in the Central Research Department of the Monsanto Company in St Louis. Back in London in the 1970s, he taught for a year at Wimbledon College; served as a branch secretary in the Ealing North Constituency Labour Party, which he represented on the Brent Community Health Council and the Ealing Community Relations Council; and was a delegate to the National Association of Community Relations Councils. In Chicago in the 1980s and 90s he volunteered at the Crossroads International Student Center (which he served as Board Member and Treasurer); Hyde Park Cooperative Homes (Board Member and President); and Jyoti Childen's Development Foundation (of which he was a Board Member for more than ten years). He also chaired the University of Chicago High School Parents' Association.

Seán was born in an English village to more or less Irish parents. He has spent most of his adult life in Foreign Parts (notably the United States) has lived in three countries and visited another thirty. His wife, Andrea Bjorklund, teaches in the UC Davis law school. He has two adult daughters, one in Boston and the other in Chicago. Their mother, the late Diana Woo, was a neonatologist who taught at the University of Chicago medical school. Seán and Andrea have lived in Davis since 2003, and he joined the board in 2006.

Calvin Handy (2006-present) - Current position: President

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UC Davis Chief of Police, Emeritus; Senior Public Safety Consultant. He received a B.A. in Public Administration from the University of San Francisco (1989) and is a graduate of the FBI National Academy (U. of Virginia, 1992). He started his career in law enforcement at UC Berkeley in 1974 after serving in the US Air Force in Alaska and England during the Vietnam War era. At UC Berkeley, Calvin served many specialist roles in the police department, and he worked extensively on outreach and professional standards for the campus and in the surrounding communities.

In 1986 he was appointed to a Management Fellowship in the Chancellors Office at UC Berkeley. During his fellowship he initiated a community-based program, the Southside Community Coalition, to revitalize the blighted area south of the Berkeley campus. In 1987 he co-chaired a campus task force to investigate graduation rates for at-risk students, and his report led to extracurricular improvements for freshmen students. He served on the board of the National Campus Crime Prevention at Towson State University beginning in 1988. From 1993-2005 Calvin served as Chief of Police at UC Davis. In 1997 he visited several cities in Japan for two weeks as a lecturer and guest of the National Police Agency of Japan. In 2000 he was appointed Coordinator of Police Services for the nine campuses of the University of California. In 2005 UC Davis established the Calvin E. Handy Leadership Award in recognition of individuals and organizations that actively support public safety and security on the campus.

Calvin grew up in Shreveport, Louisiana, where he trained to be a high school music teacher. His high school won the state music championships in 1965, and he spent two summers in the University of Michigan’s Summer Session Band Clinics prior to that time. He was offered several full music scholarships when he graduated from high school. Calvin met his wife Catherine in London, England. Catherine is active in her book club, knitting, home renovation, and several charitable interests. Calvin and Catherine have two children, Matthew who works in the home mortgage industry in San Diego, and Arabella who is a programmer/analyst at UC San Francisco. Arabella is enrolled in the University of Pittsburg Art School studying interior design and considering a new career path. The Handy family likes to travel, and they have visited England, Ireland, Spain, France, Japan, Hawaii, and many sites in the US. Calvin is leader and the tenor sax player in the Davis Jazz Combo – he will be auditing music classes this spring. He came on the board in January 2006.

Eileen Leung (2007-present) - Current position: Secretary

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Details coming soon.

Marilyn Schiffman (2009-present) - Current position: Vice-president

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Marilyn was privileged to grow up in the Napa Valley while it was still a quiet, rural area. She graduated from St. Helena High School in 1969.

After graduating from UC Davis with a degree in Psychology (B.A., 1973) she did graduate studies in the departments of Speech Sciences and Linguistics at Stanford University, where she met her husband, Peter, who was studying Geology.

She worked for the Stanford University Library System after leaving graduate school. At that time, the Stanford Libraries were in the midst of computerizing the collection. She was privileged to participate in this process, beginning a career-long interest in the use of computers to increase efficiency and enhance access to information.

In 1978, when Peter received a National Research Council post-doctoral fellowship at NASA Space Center in Houston Marilyn decided to obtain a graduate degree in Accounting from the University of Houston, Clear Lake City. She obtained an MS in Accounting and passed the CPA Exam in 1980.

After living in Riverside for three years where she worked in Public Accounting, she and her husband and young daughter moved to Davis in 1983 when her husband joined the Department of Geology at UCD.

Instead of working in public accounting, she decided to pursue a strong interest in the power of databases in business. That interest, combined with knowledge of financial systems enabled her to eventually become Director of Graduate Student Support in the Office of Graduate Studies before retiring after working at UCD for 17 years. During her career at UC Davis, she designed and was responsible for the development of a multi-departmental event tracking system, as well as a graduate component to the campus' Student Information System.

Marilyn and Peter , along with their miniature Australian Shepherd, Fergus, were privileged to live for two years (2006-2008) in Edinburgh, Scotland when Peter was faculty director for UC's Education Abroad Program. They have traveled extensively, and plan to do much more after Peter's retirement. Their dog is the proud holder of a French pet passport that will enable him to travel to Europe with them for extended vacations.

She and Peter were among the first people to purchase a house in Aggie Village where the University Arboretum serves as their extended backyard.

Their daughter is grown and pursuing a career in photojournalism.

Elisabeth Sherwin (April 2008-present) - Current position: Executive Director

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Formerly a staff writer at The Davis Enterprise newspaper. She received her B.A. degree from Hiram College, Ohio (1971), in European civilization (she spent her junior year abroad in Madrid) and an M.S. degree from Northwestern University (1981) in journalism. She worked as a copy editor at the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, the San Francisco Examiner and the Sacramento Bee before joining The Davis Enterprise as a reporter in 1984. She covered UC Davis as a beat reporter for nearly a decade and covered Yolo County government. She earned several journalism awards and also wrote a weekly column on books and writers for many years. She was the treasurer and secretary of the Uman-Davis Sister City Organization, and has traveled to Ukraine, Georgia and Armenia. She also has traveled in Europe, China and India. She hosts in her home Eastern European scholars who visit Davis in connection with programs offered by the U.S. State Department and California State University, Sacramento. She also is a board member of Sahaya International, a non-profit based in Davis that supports AIDS education efforts in Southern India.

Elisabeth grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and during high school lived in England for two years with her family. She joined the board in October 2005 and as a staff member in April 2008.

Koen Van Rompay (2007-present) - Current position: Chair of the Development Committee.

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Born in 1965, Koen is a Full Research Virologist at UCD. He received his DVM (Doctor in Veterinary Medicine) degree in 1989 from the University of Gent (Belgium). Thanks to a fellowship from the Belgian American Educational Foundation, Koen came then to UCD and received a PhD in Comparative Pathology in 1994. For the past 20 years, Koen has been working as a HIV/AIDS researcher at the California National Primate Research Center (UCD), with focus on pediatric AIDS and HIV drugs. He is a member of several committees that supervise human clinical trials on HIV drugs. His honors include the 1989 Emile Columbien Prize, and the 2006 Alumnus of the Year Award from the University of Antwerp, Belgium.

During his spare time, Koen manages Sahaya International, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization which is 100% volunteer-based, and of which he is the founder and the secretary/treasurer. Sahaya International (www.sahaya.org) supports programs in several developing countries with focus on women and children. The main programs are in India (including construction of schools, orphan sponsorship programs, HIV programs, women self-help groups), and Kenya (HIV peer education for deaf youth; orphan and school programs). Support for Sahaya’s activities comes from the general public (including many Davis residents) and grant agencies (including World Bank and Elton John AIDS Foundation).

Koen grew up near Antwerp Belgium, has 2 sisters and 1 brother. As a child his passion was always animals. Before he started Sahaya, he was a fervent ceramicist. Through the orphan sponsorship program of Sahaya International, he has 14 children in India.