Medaille College will hold its annual Commencement Ceremonies on Friday, May 15, 2009 at 1 p.m. and 7 p.m. at Kleinhans Music Hall in Buffalo.
As in past years, Medaille will hold two separate ceremonies to accommodate the College’s graduating class of nearly 1,200 degree recipients. These candidates will be eligible to receive master’s, bachelor’s and associate degrees through programs at campuses in Buffalo, Amherst and Rochester.
Erie County Executive Chris Collins will address graduate degree recipients at the afternoon Graduate Ceremony, and Thomas Herrera-Mishler, President and CEO of Buffalo Olmstead Parks, will speak to the undergraduate degree recipients at the evening Undergraduate Ceremony.
Chris Collins
As County Executive, Chris Collins is focused on his three Rs – reforming Erie County government, rebuilding the local economy, and ultimately, reducing taxes. Collins is committed to running Erie County like a business, making it more effective, efficient and responsive to hardworking taxpayers.
The residents of Erie County elected Chris Collins as the seventh Erie County Executive on November 6, 2007. A businessman with 35 years of private sector experience, Collins won with 64 percent of the vote.
For the last eight years, Collins has managed and is the sole investor of Cobblestone Enterprises LLC, a merchant bank that is focused on investing in local manufacturing companies. Since 1998, Cobblestone has invested in over 20 acquisitions that currently operate as ten separate platform companies. These companies currently have over 600 employees, including 500 in Western New York, with annual sales in excess of $80 million.
Before creating Cobblestone, Collins founded Niagara Falls based industrial gear manufacturer Nuttall Gear Corporation in 1983, purchasing the assets of the Westinghouse Gear Division. The County Executive began his professional career with Westinghouse Electric in 1972.
Collins has been active in the community, particularly with the Boy Scouts. He was chairman of the 2001 and 2005 National Jamboree Committee for the Greater Niagara Frontier Council Boy Scouts of America, and is serving as chairman for the 2010 Jamboree. The County Executive also served as chairman for the 2007 World Jamboree. Since 1999, Collins’ has volunteered his time as a mentor at the State University of New York at Buffalo (UB) Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership.
Collins received a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from North Carolina State University in 1972 and an MBA from the University of Alabama in 1975.
The County Executive is married and has three children and two grandchildren. He lives in Clarence, NY.
Thomas Herrera-Mishler, ASLA, MLA, RLA
Thomas Herrera-Mishler leads the Buffalo/Niagara region’s leading non-for-profit, membership-based organization, the Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy, as president and CEO. The Conservancy is responsible for the maintenance and operations of Buffalo’s beloved Olmsted Park and Parkway System.
Herrera-Mishler and his family moved to Buffalo from Wellesley, Massachusetts where he served as Executive Director of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. There, he was responsible for nearly doubling membership to 7000, helping restore the Society’s Olmsted-designed headquarter estate grounds, and creating major improvements to the Annual Flower show, the largest cultural event in the northeast.
Mexican-born, Herrera-Mishler obtained his Master of Landscape Architecture & Regional Planning, Urban Design Specialization from the University of Michigan in 1986. He earned his Bachelor of Arts in Spanish Language & Literature with a Minor in Business Administration from Eastern Michigan University in 1982.
It was while studying landscape architecture that Herrera-Mishler grew to admire Frederick Law Olmsted, the iconic designer of urban parks including Central Park in NYC and parks in major cities across the country.
Buffalo’s own Olmsted system was designed beginning in 1868 and sits on the Register of National Historic Places. Herrera-Mishler’s portfolio includes the master plan for the National Zoo and Botanical Garden of Costa Rica.
After serving as project landscape architect on various projects around the US and abroad, Herrera-Mishler moved into the non-profit sector in 1992, working as the community landscape architect for the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society in Philadelphia, and later as executive director of Philadelphia’s Awbury Arboretum & Historic Estate, executive director of the Toledo Botanical Garden and director of Arlie Gardens in Wilmington, N.C.
Herrera-Mishler is a determined gardener, occasional chef, and voracious reader.