Mary Strother Named Assistant Dean for Development in College of Business

Contact: Media Specialist George Mauzy, (740) 597-1794 or mauzy@ohio.edu

ATHENS, Ohio (June 19, 2001) -- Ohio University's College of Business has hired Mary Strother as Assistant Dean for Development. She will coordinate all fund-raising efforts for the college while working with the college's alumni, donors and foundations. She began her duties June 11.

Strother comes to Athens after four and a half years in the managed healthcare industry with Aetna U.S. Healthcare in New Orleans, where she worked in corporate sales and marketing. Having been named District Rep of the Month and District Rep of the Quarter several times, she also was named Rep of the Year for 1998 and named to the national President's Council. She joined the company in January 1997 as a New Business Representative and remained in that position until being promoted to Broker Representative in September 1999.

She began her professional career in New Orleans in 1992 with First Commerce Corp. where she worked four years. She was promoted to Vice President and Marketing Manager of the Trust and Investments Division in April 1994 after initially being hired as a commercial lending analyst.

In the community, Strother has served as a member of the board of directors for the Contemporary Arts Center and Kappa Alpha Theta Alumnae. She has been involved in the Greater New Orleans National Organization for Women, American Cancer Society, Habitat for Humanity, United Way, Leukemia Society of America, American Heart Association and the American Diabetes Association.

Having spent most of her youth in Pascagoula, Miss., she earned a bacheloršs degree in international politics from the University of Mississippi in 1988 and an MBA from the University of New Orleans in 1992. She also has completed coursework toward a juris doctorate at the University of Mississippi School of Law.