WILMINGTON — Wilmington College’s Board of Trustees welcomed a quartet of new members during its fall meeting in October. They include alumnus Edmund Besong, Delores Hargrove-Young, Ellen H. Hiatt and alumna Lucy Y. Steinitz.
President Trevor Bates said the new members are already making a positive impact upon the College’s governing body.
“These new trustees are a diverse group with impressive backgrounds and life experiences,” he said. “I am confident their wise counsel will greatly benefit Wilmington College as it continues to RISE.”
Edmund Besong is a licensed CPA and attorney, an educator, a philanthropist and entrepreneur based in New York City. He, along with his wife, Kate, and brother Leroy, are all members of the Class of 2013, while his father, Manfred is a 1978 graduate.
Besong oversees Besong & Associates corporate and tax law firm, Edbesong custom clothing line and the Besongsmile non-profit organization. Also, he has been an adjunct/visiting professor of accounting at WC since 2018.
Delores Hargrove-Young is vice chair for d.e. Fox & Associates and serves as a key strategic leader, ambassador and adviser responsible for driving the structure that facilitates the success of the organization’s strategic initiatives through established and emerging partnerships.
Before stepping into this role, she was President & COO of XLC Services, LLC, a single-source provider of manufacturing services, warehouse management solutions, distribution services, and R&D services.
Ellen H. Hiatt is a native of Wilmington was born and raised in Wilmington Friends Meeting, where the influence of Wilmington College was deeply felt and experienced by four Hiatt generations of Wilmington College alumni.
After graduating from Carleton College and Yale Divinity School, she became a minister ordained In the United Church of Christ in 1981. She pastored local congregations before serving as chaplain in several institutional settings, retiring in 2019 from Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. Ellen reconnected with her Quaker roots through St. Louis Friends Meeting and is active in Friends Committee on National Legislation St. Louis Advocacy Team.
Lucy Y. Steinitz describes herself as a “New Yorker by birth and personality,” who gained a foundational education. deep sense of self and profound appreciation for Quaker values while attending Wilmington College through her graduation in 1972.
She went on the earn a Ph.D. in social work and spent the next 20 years in domestic social policy and non-profit management, most of the time as executive director of Jewish Family Services of Central Maryland. Steinitz co-founded Catholic AIDS Action in Namibia and spent three years working under USAID Ethiopia before she and her family returned to the United States. She now works for Catholic Relief Services on issues of social justice and peacebuilding.
