Fordham IPED honored one of its alumni, Blain Cerney (Fordham IPED 2010) with the Swanstrom Baerwald Award for his work of more than a decade with Catholic Relief Services (CRS). He is currently the Senior Technical Advisor for CRS in El Ceremony, and has worked extensively in Latin America and the Caribbean.
The Swanstrom Baerwald Ceremony honors our alumni who have shown excellence in the service of faith through the promotion of international peace and development. The awardee this year is Blaine Cerney, has spent the last 14 years conducting international development work with Catholic Relief Services in Lesotho, Honduras, and El Salvador. Currently, Blain supports CRS operations and programing throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.
Distinguished guests joined the ceremony, including His Eminence Timothy Cardinal Dolan, the Archbishop of New York; His Eminence Archbishop Gabriele Caccia, Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations; Fordham Provost Dr. Dennis C. Jacobs; and Ms. Bridget Bucardo Rivera, Senior Technical Advisor for Capacity Strengthening in CRS and recipient of the 2022 Swanstrom Baerwald Award. The event was held at Keating 1st Auditorium of Fordham’s Rosehill Campus.
After the ceremony, the IPED program held the 2024 awarding of the Fr. John F. Hurley S.J. Commendation to Professor Jerome (“Jerry”) Zurek, PhD. Professor Jerry, who graduated from Fordham University in 1967, has been teaching for over 50+ years at Cabrini University. He was one of the team of instructors at Cabrini who initiated a comprehensive core curriculum centered on social justice.
