Karen Avenoso '88, a former student leader and education reporter for The Boston Globe, died Wednesday at her home in Westfield, N.J. after a year-long battle with Ewing's Sarcoma, a rare form of cancer. She was 31.
During her years at the College, Avenoso was recognized by administrators, faculty and students as a leader of the Dartmouth community who paved a unique path for both intellectualism and feminism at Dartmouth.
"She was ahead of her time, a visionary and an intellectual," said Dean of Residential Life Mary Turco, who knew Avenoso personally during Avenoso's undergraduate years.
At Dartmouth, Avenoso was a budding feminist and an avid writer -- she was the founder and moderator of the Women's Issues League and a staff columnist for The Dartmouth.
"Karen was someone who really understood and embraced both women's issues and intellectualism at a time when neither were as openly embraced," said Jack Steinberg '88, Avenoso's close friend and former colleague at The Dartmouth.
"She was the first person who really steeped me into feminism in a way that was non-threatening, but very emphatic," he said.
Avenoso graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from the College with a bachelors degree in English. A recipient of the Rhodes Scholarship, Avenoso also earned a master's degree in 19th Century English literature from Oxford University in 1991.
She was also actively involved with the Tucker Foundation's Big Brother Big Sister program and served as an undergraduate advisor during her sophomore year. During her senior year, Avenoso served as class president and a member of Palaeopitus.
Turco, an admissions officer at the time of Avenoso's matriculation, described Avenoso as "one of the most respected undergraduate leaders."
To this day, Turco still remembers Avenoso's speech during Class Day ceremonies.
"She spoke with courage and a vision of a Dartmouth more welcoming for all students, and she demanded that of the faculty and administration," Turco said.
When it came to her career, Avenoso maintained the high standards she had at Dartmouth. Steinberg described her as driven and goal-oriented. "It wasn't enough to just report on a topic -- she needed to research the topic in depth," he said.
The Boston Globe reported in her obituary yesterday, "She would hang out in a middle school bathroom, if that was the best way to find out what teenagers were thinking."
Avenoso worked for three years at The New York Daily News before joining The Boston Globe staff in 1995. She covered topics ranging from student violence to racial quotas at The Boston Globe. According to The Boston Globe, she was one of the several reporters nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 1997 for breaking a story about a brawl outside Boston Latin Academy.
Avenoso has also had free-lance articles published in many newspapers and magazines including The New York Times, Glamour and New Woman.
Last spring, The Dartmouth selected Avenoso to receive the Alumni Award for Distinguished Service in Journalism at the annual Spring Banquet in May, but Avenoso was diagnosed with cancer earlier in the month and declined the invitation.
Steinberg described her network of friends as "incredibly deep." When Avenoso was first diagnosed with Ewing's Sarcoma last year, friends raised over $15,000 to hire a researcher to explore treatment methods for the rare form of cancer.
"She really opened her heart to us as a friend," Steinberg said. "You can't help but do the same for her."
Avenoso described her battle with cancer in an article for The Boston Globe in July, 1997.
"It has been the hardest and loneliest experience I can imagine," Avenoso wrote. "A friend describes the disease as me being on a raft alone while the people who love me keep trying to pull me toward shore. But somehow, no matter how hard they tug, I never feel tethered."
Avenoso is survived by her husband Jonathan Sherman, her parents Ellen and Frank Avenoso, her brother Kenneth Avenoso and by her grandmothers, Lillian Stark and Forthy Shotsky.
