Featured Alumni

KEIR WHITSON

Keir Whitson, a 1991 APU graduate, is a founding member of Trade Pacific LLC, a Washington, DC-based international trade and consulting firm that specializes in U.S. unfair trade actions against China. After graduating from APU, Keir moved to Taipei, Taiwan to study Mandarin Chinese. In 1996, Keir earned a master's degree in China area studies from the University of Washington's Jackson School of International Studies. In 1997, he moved to Washington, DC to work for The Atlantic Council of the United States, a small foreign-policy think tank. From 1998-2001, Keir worked as an unfair trade investigator within the U.S. Department of Commerce and, in 2001, joined the international trade practice of the law firm White & Case LLP. At White & Case, he worked on a variety of unfair trade actions involving China and helped defend Vietnamese catfish producers in the first U.S. antidumping action ever filed against imports from Vietnam. Keir and his two attorney colleagues founded Trade Pacific PLLC in June 2004.

Keir married Susan Dryden in April 2003. Since 2001, Susan has served the Bush administration as a spokesperson within the Department of Justice, the FBI, and on the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign. Susan now works in the White House where she serves as Laura Bush's press secretary.

Keir and Susan divide their time between an apartment in Washington, DC and their home in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains.

DR. KARLEEN JACKSON

APU alumna, Dr. Karleen Jackson was appointed Commissioner of the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services on October 2005 by Governor Murkowski. Her primary leadership priority is to continue faithfully fulfilling the department's mission: "to promote and protect the health and well-being of Alaskans."

Commissioner Jackson recently spoke to the APU's President's Forum and discussed the topic that has been very prominent in the news lately - the potential for pandemic flu in Alaska and how to prepare for it. She also participated in a pandemic flu summit with U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, Michael Leavitt, and other state and federal officials. The duty of educating the Alaska public about the potential of a pandemic flu is only one of her duties as Commissioner for the Department of Health and Social Services.

Dr. Jackson holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree from Alaska Pacific University with a concentration in Psychology, a Master's Degree in Human Development and a Doctorate in Human Services from the Fielding Institute. Her lengthy career experience in Alaska includes Executive Director of Catholic Social Services in Anchorage from 1991 to 2003. Her first book, "Family Homelessness: More Than Simply a Lack of Housing," was published in 2000 as part of the Garland Studies series on Children of Poverty. A resident of Alaska since 1965, she is married with three adult children.

Segelhorst Hall

If you visit Alaska Pacific University this summer or fall, you'll notice something new rising on campus, just east of the Moseley Center. The dirt piles and concrete you'll see then are the humble beginnings of something BIG -- APU's new student housing facility to be named Segelhorst Hall.

When completed, Segelhorst Hall, will be an apartment-style student housing facility, named for the major contributors to the project, Mary Ellen and N.E. "Knobby" Segelhorst. Also funded in part by the Rasmuson Foundation and HUD, the facility will feature 6, four-bedroom fully equipped apartments and will house 24 students. The primary purpose of the new dorm is to provide additional on-campus housing options for our students, in particular those older students (Juniors and Seniors) for whom housing in the Atwood Center, our traditional dorm, is not appropriate or ideal.

The $2.2 million dollar building will be constructed on land in between the Moseley Center and the University Village apartments located at the end of University Drive. If all goes as planned construction will begin in early June and be completed by January 2007, just in time for students to move in before the beginning of the spring semester.

For decades, Knobby and Mary Segelhorst have provided significant support to APU, with their most generous gift being the $1 million they contributed to help make Segelhorst Hall a reality. While Knobby passed away in the winter of 2005, Mary has continued her family's dedication to education and APU, and tells us that she very much looks forward to seeing the completion of the new hall.

Our students do too.