Keynote Speaker Bios
Russ Rose
From 5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. on April 19, 2012, the Powerful Women Paving the Way Conference will feature a kickoff dinner with keynote speaker Coach Russ Rose.
Record-breaking. History-making. Unprecedented. All of those words can be used to describe the tenure of Penn State women's volleyball head coach Russ Rose's career in Happy Valley. After 32 seasons leading the Nittany Lions, his name has become synonymous with the pride and tradition of the program. At the helm of arguably the most successful program in the country, Russ Rose continues to pass along the confidence and character he has gained during his career.
In 32 seasons at Penn State, Rose has collected wins at a staggering pace. Never having posted fewer than 22 wins in a season, he entered the 2011 season as the NCAA leader in career winning percentage, having won more than 86 percent of the matches he has coached at Penn State. He is just the third active Division I head coach to reach 1,000 career wins, having reached the milestone with an NCAA National Semifinal victory against Hawaii in 2009. A victory which earned the Nittany Lions a spot in the NCAA Championship match.
While he doesn't focus on personal accolades, Rose's accomplishments read like a laundry list of volleyball awards. In 2007 Rose was one of three coaches inducted into the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) Hall of Fame and was also named the AVCA Division I National Coach of the Year, the AVCA Mideast Region Coach of the Year and the Big Ten Coach of the Year by both the coaches and the media. He garnered all three awards again in 2008 in leading his team to its third NCAA title. In 2009, with another dominating performance in the Big Ten with a perfect 20-0 record, Rose was honored as the league's Coach of the Year. In response to the awards, Rose focused the praise back on his teams.
In his 32 seasons at Penn State, Rose's record is 1,033-164, an .863 winning percentage that places him first nationally among active coaches. His squads have secured 30 or more wins in a season 23 times and 36 or more victories seven times.
Rose's athletes have earned 62 First Team All-Big Ten honors in 20 years and have excelled off the court as well, earning 134 Academic All-Big Ten accolades.
Prior to entering the tough Big Ten Conference in 1991, Penn State experienced unprecedented success in the Atlantic 10 Conference, winning eight straight championships. In seven seasons of round-robin play, the Nittany Lions never lost a conference match, reeling off 49 consecutive wins. The 1990 season was Penn State's last in the Atlantic 10 Conference and Penn State finished sixth in the final 1990 Tachikara Coaches Poll, the program's highest final ranking ever at the time and the AVCA and Volleyball Monthly named three Nittany Lions All-Americans.
An 11-time nominee for National Coach of the Year, Rose garnered the Atlantic 10 Coach of the Year award in 1984, `85, `87, `88, `89 and `90.
An instructor in the USVBA coaches certification program, Rose has previously served as a national referee and evaluator and state director for volleyball for the Special Olympics.
In 2005, USA Volleyball named Rose one of their All-Time Great Coaches, making him the first Big Ten coach to ever receive the honor and putting him in the company of the best volleyball coaches in history, including previous Olympic coaches as well as many of their peers.
Rose was a member of the NCAA Division I Volleyball Committee for six years and the NCAA representative to the United States Volleyball Association Rules Committee.
An active clinician, Rose also coached professional men's volleyball in the Superior League in Puerto Rico in 1976 and has continued to do clinics on the island as well as in the United States.
A 1975 graduate of George Williams College, Rose was a member of the school's team that won the 1974 National Association for Intercollegiate Athletics national championship. He was the captain of the 1975 team that finished third in NAIA competition.
After graduation, Rose remained at George Williams for two years as a part-time coach, helping the women's team win two state titles and place sixth in national competition. He also assisted the men's team that won the national championship in 1977.
In 1978, he completed his master's degree at Nebraska, where he was the defensive coach for the Cornhusker women. While writing his thesis on volleyball statistics, he led the second team to a two-year varsity mark of 52-5.
A 2010 inductee into the National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, Rose married Lori Barberich, a former three-time All-American at Penn State, in 1986. They are the parents of four sons, Jonathan, Michael, Christopher and Nicholas.
Monica Haslip
From 9:00 a.m. until 10:00 a.m. the Powerful Women Paving the Way Conference will feature a breakfast with keynote speaker Monica Haslip.
Monica Haslip is Founder and Executive Director of the Little Black Pearl Workshop, Inc. in Chicago, Illinois. Monica's love affair with visual arts began while attending the Alabama School of Fine Arts. In pursuit of her passion, she moved to Atlanta, Georgia where she continued her studies at Atlanta College of Art. Monica’s exploration north to Chicago led her to Johnson Publishing Company where she worked in the photography department and from there her desire to expose people to the importance of positive images of African-Americans in our society landed her a position with Black Entertainment Television as Senior Marketing Manager for the Midwestern region.
However, Monica’s passion for art never ceased and her desire to highlight the importance of African-Americans in every aspect of life, especially in the arts, was very profound. Her mission resulted in the creation of Little Black Pearl Workshop. The organization, founded in 1994, is an innovative neighborhood arts program designed to expose children and youth to the vast contributions that African-Americans have made to the arts. The primary vision is to create an avenue for exposure to art and culture while teaching the profitable connection between art and business.
As Founder and Executive Director of Little Black Pearl, Monica has received recognition from a great number of individuals and organizations that include United States Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Essence Magazine (December 2002 & Special Collector’s Edition 2004/05), Black Enterprise Magazine (May 2008), Crain’s Business Magazine, African American Arts Alliance of Chicago. Monica has also received the prestigious recognition as one of the six 2004 Chicagoans of the Year by Chicago Magazine (January 2005 issue). She was honored as one of 30 Community Hero’s by LISC Chicago’s New Communities Program, awarded the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. 2009 “Woman of Power” award and the Xi Mu Zeta Chapter of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc. 2009 “Women of the Year.” In addition to the phenomenal leadership that Monica provides to the staff of Little Black Pearl, she contributes her time to boards and committees representing various important causes such as Board of Directors for the Greater Chicago Food Depository, where she serves as Chairman for the Missions and Programs Committee. In addition, Monica currently serves as Vice President of the Board of Directors for HyPa (Hyde Park Alliance for Arts and Culture), and in honor of Black History Month 2011, Monica Haslip was recognized as one of “TheGrio’s 100: History Makers In The Making.” Lastly, on April 4th, 2012, the White House honored Monica as one of twelve leaders recognized for their work to prevent youth violence within their communities as part of the National Forum on Youth Violence Prevention (the Forum).
Farnoosh Torabi
From 12:00 p.m. until 1:30 p.m. the Powerful Women Paving the Way Conference will feature a luncheon with keynote speaker Farnoosh Torabi. Opening remarks and the introduction will be provided by Katie Boscoe and Kate Beck of Kohl's.
Farnoosh Torabi is a personal finance expert, author and speaker. She is a frequent financial contributor to “The Today Show” and host of the most popular financial series on the web, "Financially Fit", which airs weekly on Yahoo!Finance. She's also the resident financial coach on a new web series entitled Remake America, where a team of experts help struggling families rebuild their lives in this critical election year. The show also airs on Yahoo!
Farnoosh was also the resident money guru on SOAPnet's Bank of Mom & Dad, where she helped young women pay down debt and regain their financial independence, as well as the resident financial expert on TLC's Real Simple. Real Life, where she taught busy moms and families to how to better manage their finances. Torabi's work and advice has been featured in Real Simple, Glamour, Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and USA Today. She is the author of two books: You're So Money: Live Rich Even When You're Not, and Psych Yourself Rich: Get the Mindset & Discipline You Need to Build Your Financial Life.
She is a 2002 finance and international studies graduate of the Smeal College of Business and a Schreyer Honors Scholar.
Ellen Gustafson
From 3:45 p.m. - 4:45 p.m., the Powerful Women Paving the Way Conference will feature the event's closing keynote speaker, Ellen Gustafson.
Ellen Gustafson is a sustainable food system activist, innovator and social entrepreneur. She is the Founder and Executive Director of the 30 Project, a new way to connect global hunger and obesity and crowd-source long-term food system change. The 30 Project is hosting and inspiring dinners around the world to promote a new dialogue and new solutions to a better food system.
She is also the Co-Founder of FEED Projects, LLC, a charitable company that creates consumer products which help FEED the world, and Co-Founder and former Executive Director of FEED's non-profit partner, the FEED Foundation. Under Ellen's leadership, FEED provided over 65 million school meals to children around the world - at no cost to them.
Previously, Ellen was a US Spokesperson for the U.N. World Food Program, a terrorism research reporter in the ABC News Investigative Unit and a research associate for the Military Fellows at the Council on Foreign Relations. She has a BA in International Politics from Columbia University and is pursuing a Master's Degree in Food Studies at New York University.
She has been featured, with FEED business partner Lauren Bush, as one of Fortune Magazine's 2009 Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs, Inc Magazine's 2010 30 Under 30, and has spoken at the Fortune Most Powerful Women's Conference. Amongst her many public speaking accomplishments, Ellen has given multiple TED talks, keynoted to the Italian Parliament, lectured at Harvard, NYU, Columbia University, The U.S. Naval Academy, Feeding America, and many more.
She serves on the Columbia University Alumni Board of Directors and the founding Board of Directors for a new Bronx charter school within the Success Charter Network.
