Young Alumni Award

The Young Alumni Award is presented annually to a member of the alumni community who graduated in the last 15 years and whose professional accomplishments, service to alma mater, or selfless and caring work to benefit society are distinctive.

2023 Recipient

Antoinette Klatzky '08

Since her time at Bucknell — during which she was recognized for leading campus-wide forums on diversity, equity and inclusion across the community — Antoinette Klatzky has co-created social enterprises, innovated on philanthropic strategy and hosted and produced activation of local, national and global movements. She currently serves as the vice president of programs and partnerships of the Eileen Fisher Foundation and on the boards of Presencing Institute, TIDES Network, Women's Funding Network and Westchester Community Foundation. In her role, she has established and maintained partnerships with key innovators around the world. She continues to regularly facilitate leadership programming and empowerment workshops — including a North American regional cohort of the League of Intrapreneurs, the GAIA Journey, a global movement of 15,000 changemakers during COVID-19 — and hosts the Women Together community for the Eileen Fisher Foundation. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Antoinette developed an emergency relief fund for employees affected by COVID-19. Prior to this, she led the development of Choose Handloom, a human rights initiative in the EILEEN FISHER supply chain. She also supported the launch of a recycled clothing initiative, now known as Eileen Fisher Renew.

During her time at Bucknell, Antoinette studied geography, international relations and Spanish and took advantage of Bucknell's abroad programs. She conducted undergraduate research with Professor Paul Susman, geography, on malnutrition in young children while contributing to the building of a health center in Ciudad Sandino, a community built after Hurricane Mitch outside of the capital of Managua, Nicaragua. In her junior year, Antoinette completed the international honors program, Rethinking Globalization, in which she traveled to Britain, Tanzania, India, New Zealand and Mexico studying anthropological field methods, economics, social movements and conservation ecology. Through the support of Bucknell professors including Emek Ucarer, international relations; Karen Morin, geography; Hilbourne Watson, professor emeritus of international relations; and others, Antoinette built on her global experience with a senior thesis on internal growth and external systems change.

Antoinette's studies were complemented by her extracurricular activities. She participated in Habitat for Humanity to rebuild homes after Hurricane Katrina, was a coxswain for Bucknell rowing, participated in the ski team, taught swimming as a trained water safety instructor and was a member of Chi Omega. She served as president of the South Asian Students Association and was an active member in the MultiCultural Organization of Presidents. With fellow students, Antoinette organized campus-wide forums to foster a space for community members to listen to each other, noticed where there was room for improvement, particularly for BIPOC students, and contributed to the 10-year strategic planning process for the University. These experiences provided a foundation for Antoinette to build on her deep care for community, her exploration of inner self-development and wider systems change, and the leadership experiences on which she established her career.

Following her time at Bucknell, Antoinette was recognized as a Person-to-Watch by the YWCA of White Plains, N.Y. and Central Westchester in their Salute to Women and Racial Justice. Antoinette proceeded to develop the first ever Stand Against Racism, Take Back the Night march and Lower Hudson Valley Social Forum in Westchester County, N.Y. She went on to build service learning programs at Sarah Lawrence College before starting a young women's leadership program with the ethical apparel designer, Eileen Fisher. By developing methodology and curriculum based on the EILEEN FISHER leadership practices, she trained over 1,000 young people over the decade that the leadership institute remained in operation. In the early phases, Antoinette supported the creation and launch of the social enterprise model of the Foundation, establishing a recycled clothing program to fund the institute.

Antoinette's work is underpinned by a number of core methodologies. She carries a certification in prototyping from MIT, and certifications in advanced facilitation from the Presencing Institute, where she also completed a two year MasterClass and became senior faculty on the MIT uLab. With the Presencing Institute, she has been a creator and host of the GAIA Journey, co-faculty on the Ecosystem Leadership Program and senior faculty for programs such as the UNDP's Leadership for Awareness-based Systems Transformation and a UN Action Learning Lab. She is an avid movement and embodiment enthusiast, a registered yoga teacher, a ‘Joker' in Augusto Boal's work of Theatre of the Oppressed, and a practitioner of Arawana Hayashi's Social Presencing Theater, Wendy Palmer's Leadership Embodiment and The Circle Way. Antoinette was a founding board member of Theater of the Oppressed New York City, served as the vice president of Planned Parenthood Hudson Peconic Action Fund and as chair of the Westchester Women's Agenda for over a decade. She continues to serve as an advisor to various networks on systemic and strategic action for racial equity and justice.

Young Alumni Award

Contact Details

The Center for Alumni & Family Engagement