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Meet the Foundation

Founded in 1939, the Sigma Chi Foundation is a charitable and educational tax-exempt organization, separate and independent from the Sigma Chi Fraternity, whose express purpose is to secure financial resources and provide faithful stewardship in support of Sigma Chi.

Through Sigma Chi's Transformational Leader platform and its legacy programming, such as the Krach Transformational Leaders Workshop and the Horizons Huntsman Leadership Summit, the Sigma Chi Foundation is preparing our young men to be the values-centered leaders of tomorrow.

The Sigma Chi Foundation Board of Governors

Jeff Muir | Georgia 1971 | Chairman

Jeff Muir is co-founder and chairman of Fulcrum Equity Partners and its predecessor firm Fulcrum Ventures. He is also a co-founder of Chatham Capital.

Brother Muir is an Order of Constantine Sig and Significant Sig. 

Michael Ursillo | Brown 1978 | Vice Chairman

Michael Ursillo is managing partner of Ursillo, Teitz & Ritch, where he specializes in municipal and business law.

Brother Ursillo served Sigma Chi as its 69th Grand Consul and has been recognized as an Order of Constantine Sig and Significant Sig. 

John Koskinen | Duke 1961 | Treasurer

John Koskinen served as 48th Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service. He is past Non-Executive Chairman of the Board of Freddie Mac and served as President of the U.S. Soccer Foundation.

Brother Koskinen is a Significant Sig. 

Mark Anderson | Illinois 1977

Mark Anderson is partner at Handler Thayer LLP. He served Sigma Chi Fraternity as Executive Director and is namesake for the Character-In-Action Leadership Award.

Brother Anderson is an Order of Constantine Sig and Significant Sig. 

Randy Coppersmith | South Florida 1979

Randy Coppersmith is Chairman and CEO of Cortland Advisors, LLC, chairman of Hollymar's Board of Directors and serves on the advisory boards of several companies.

Brother Coppersmith is a Significant Sig.

Jeff Gill | Southern California 1978 | Past Chairman

Jeff Gill serves as the Chairman, President & CEO of Sypris Solutions, a manufacturing and engineering services company serving the defense, transportation, communications and energy industries. Jeff has served on public, private, civic, university and educational boards. He holds degrees from the University of Southern California and Dartmouth College.

Brother Gill is a Significant Sig.

Michael Greenberg | Illinois Wesleyan 1982

Michael Greenberg is co-founder and owner of Interior Investments, Inc. He was 68th Grand Consul and is chairman of the Sigma Chi Leadership Institute.

Brother Greenberg is an Order of Constantine Sig and Significant Sig. 

Robert Joseph | Willamette 1957

Robert Joseph is an attorney at Schwabe, Williamson and Wyatt. He served the Fraternity as its 56th Grand Consul and, in 1988, helped organize Sigma Chi's Risk Management Foundation and served as its chairman for 10 years.

Brother Joseph is an Order of Constantine Sig and Significant Sig. 

James Kuykendall | OKLAHOMA STATE 1987

Jim Kuykendall joined the Foundation Board of Governors in 2023. He is the Vice President of Equipment World, a construction equipment company based in Oklahoma.

Brother Kuykendall is an Order of Constantine Sig. 

Jim Luce | Nevada-Las Vegas 1980

Jim Luce joined the Foundation Board of Governors with 40 years of experience as a successful sales and marketing executive in the pharmaceutical and hotel and resort industries. Presently the Principal of Danfield Insights, Inc., previously Executive Vice President – Sales, Marketing & Distribution at Amneal Pharmaceuticals, Executive Vice President – Retail Sales & Strategic Accounts at Bergen Brunswig Drug Company and Regional Vice President – Sales & Marketing for Marriott Hotels and Resorts, with whom he was affiliated at various resorts for more than two decades.

Brother Luce is a Significant Sig.

Joe Martin | Houston 1976

Joe Martin is retired President and COO of Freedom Innovations.

Brother Martin is an Order of Constantine Sig and Significant Sig. 

John Pasquantino | Nevada-Las Vegas 1984

John Pasquantino is Acting Deputy Controller and Deputy Associate Director within the White House Office of Management and Budget, where he has served under three Presidents.

Brother Pasquantino is a Significant Sig. 

John Peterson | Indiana 1955 | Past Chairman

John Peterson is retired chairman of City Securities Corporation. A former Chairman of the Foundation, he has served on the Foundation's board since 1987.

Brother Peterson is an Order of Constantine Sig and Significant Sig. 

Christopher Walters | Roanoke 2000

Chris Walters is Executive Vice President / Wealth Management with Janney, Montgomery, Scott LLC. where he leads the financial advisory practice of Walters Wealth Management. He is an engaged philanthropist in the Roanoke, VA community and also serves Sigma Chi in a variety of volunteer capacities.

Ex-Officio Members

John Price

OKLAHOMA STATE 1991

President and General Counsel

Michael Church

ILLINOIS 2005

Executive Director
sigma chi fraternity

Bob Wilson

fort hays 1981

73rd grand consul
sigma chi fraternity

Tim Sanderson

western 1985

72nd grand consul
sigma chi fraternity

John Akitt

Waterloo 1987

Chairman
Canadian Foundation

The Sigma Chi Foundation Staff

John Price | Oklahoma State 1991 | President and General Counsel

John joined the Sigma Chi Foundation in 2018 as its first director of legacy giving and was named vice president of operations in 2020. Upon arrival, he was responsible for planning and implementing the Foundation’s estate planning program, growing annual commitments to $4.1 million in just five years. In recent years, he has served as the secretary of the Foundation’s Board of Governors, managed the organization’s development strategies, and supervised its development officers and general operations teams based at J. Dwight Peterson International Fraternity Headquarters and across the United States.

Price was selected as president in Summer 2023 following an extensive national search led by Foundation Vice Chairman, Order of Constantine and Significant Sig Jeff Muir, GEORGIA 1971, and a committee of Foundation board members, a past Grand Consul and longtime retired Foundation executive.

Price graduated from Oklahoma State University in 1991 with a degree in history, received his J.D. from the University of Tulsa College of Law and is a member of the Oklahoma Bar Association. Prior to joining the Foundation, he served as associate general counsel for the Oklahoma State University Board of Regents.

He and Suzee, his wife of 29 years, currently reside in Stillwater, Oklahoma, and have four children. Both of their sons are Sigs.

Quentin, OKLAHOMA STATE 2018, is a nuclear engineer in South Carolina and MacGregor, OKLAHOMA STATE 2020, is financial analyst in Houston. Their eldest daughter, Payton, graduated from Oklahoma State in 2021 and is pursuing a doctor of physical therapy degree at Washington University in St. Louis, while their youngest daughter, Ellery, is in her senior year at Oklahoma State.

While frequenting International Fraternity Headquarters in Evanston, Illinois, Price will travel across the United States to support the Foundation’s mission to impact Sigma Chi’s many leadership and academic scholarship initiatives.

Should you have any questions on Fraternity or Foundation initiatives or how you might help secure Sigma Chi’s future, please feel free to contact John.

Phone Number: (847) 425-4476

Email John

Kevin Miller | Vice President of Finance

Kevin brings 15 years of leadership experience in a diverse array of non-profit organizations with demonstrated excellence in multi-division leadership, fiscal management, strategic planning, and team building. He is based in Sigma Chi's Evanston headquarters where, amongst his roles, he will oversee the Foundation’s financial, accounting and data reporting operations.

Most recently, he served as Vice President of Business Services and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) for Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary on the campus of Northwestern University in Evanston where he was responsible for strategic and operational oversight of a $15 million organization and a $130 million endowment.

Prior to that role, he served as CFO at Cara Chicago, an innovative non-profit that helps disadvantaged people build the skills and confidence to get and keep good jobs, and as Vice President of Finance and Operations for the former Accion Chicago (now Allies for Community Business).

A graduate of both DePaul Unviersity (B.S., finance) and DeVry Institute of Technology (B.S., information technology), he obtained his Master of Public Administration from the Illinois Institute of Technology.

He and wife, Emily, reside in Evanston with their two-year-old son, William.

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Support staff

Heidi Holley | Executive Assistant to the President / Scholarships Administrator

Heidi has supported the Foundation’s president and chief executive officer in her role as executive assistant since she was hired by the Foundation in December 2010. She works very closely with the Foundation’s Board of Governors and is responsible for managing and scheduling all Foundation Board meetings and calls.

In her role as the Foundation’s scholarship administrator, Heidi oversees and administers the Foundation’s scholarship program and through her efforts and hard work has helped to take the program from a hardcopy application to an online application program, now in its second version. Heidi is also the Foundation’s main point-of-contact for chapter funds managed by the Foundation.

Heidi is the proud mother of two adult sons and a native Chicagoan who happily resides in a suburb of Chicago.

Phone Number: (847) 425-4470

Email Heidi

Allison Amado | Donor Support Coordinator
Andrew Nepp | MINNESOTA 2015 | Senior Director of Salesforce and database administration

DEVELOPMENT — MAJOR GIFT EFFORTS

Jeff Burnside | WASHINGTON STATE 1980 | Director of Development

Significant Sig Jeff Burnside is a long-time television reporter. He is currently an independent journalist but has reported for multiple stations, including as senior investigative reporter at KOMO-TV in Seattle and WTVJ (NBC 6) in Miami. Burnside has won 10 Emmy Awards for his reporting and was recently a fellow with the University of Colorado, Boulder Scripps Environmental 

Journalism Faculty. Burnside has worked with the Washington State undergraduate chapter for many years, serving as the chapter advisor and the fundraising coordinator for rebuilding the chapter house. 

Jeff oversees major gift cultivation for the Pacific Northwest region, including the states of Washington, Oregon, Montana, Idaho, Wyoming and Northern California/ San Francisco Bay area.

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Jim Lawson | SAN DIEGO STATE 1985 | Director of Development

A California native residing in the Los Angeles area, Order of Constantine Sig Jim Lawson joined the Foundation staff in 2014 after a successful 30 year award-winning career in sales– mostly in the radio industry with ABC/Disney Radio, Salem Broadcasting– and also industrial and consumer product sales, joining Procter & Gamble out of college. He has a B.S. Degree in Marketing from San Diego State University where he was a 1985 graduate, involved in student government and was a member of the Delta Xi Chapter.

He has been a volunteer since his undergraduate days, including as Chapter Advisor for the Theta Lambda chapter at University of San Diego which he helped to found in 1984, and a ten year run as President for the Los Angeles Alumni Chapter. Jim worked on six chapter chartering/re-charterings over a 35-year span.

Brother Lawson was also a member of the Junior Chamber (Jaycees) service and leadership organization for 11 years, where he was named a JCI Senator, and served on the U.S. Jaycees’ 9-member national Training Task Force (TTF). While President of the Long Beach Jaycees, the chapter was awarded the Harold Marks Trophy for the #1 chapter in the nation (among 3,000 chapters), a first for CA. He is a proud dad to daughter, Shelby.

Jim Lawson provides major gift cultivation for the states of Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah and Southern California.

Phone Number: (847) 563-0230

Email Jim

Jay Philbrick | CENTRAL FLORIDA 1998 | Director of Development

Jay Philbrick is a graduate from the great University of Central Florida and was initiated at the Eta Pi Chapter in the fall of 1993. He joined the Foundation’s development team in 2016 and currently resides in the Charlotte, NC surrounding area.

Prior to joining the Sigma Chi Foundation, Jay spent his post-collegiate career in sales in Orlando, FL, with a focus on the legal industry, from services to software. During this time, he also returned to further his education, earning his MBA in 2006.

Jay is the proud father of two wonderful girls who are constantly keeping him on his toes and challenging him every day to get better. He and his wife Kim, a Kappa Delta from University of Florida, have been married since 2003. When Jay is not trying to figure out how to raise a teenager, he enjoys being outdoors in any capacity. Being a legacy, Sigma Chi has always had special place in Jay’s heart, and he is proud to have the opportunity to represent the Sigma Chi Foundation and it’s mission.

Jay oversees major gift cultivation for the Southeast region, including the states of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee.

Phone Number: (847) 440-6111

Email Jay

Aaron Richardson | TENNESSEE-MARTIN 2009 | Director of Development

Aaron oversees the Mid-Atlantic region of Delaware, Eastern Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C.

Email Aaron

DEVELOPMENT — ANNUAL FUND, MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS

Wes Holtsclaw | EAST TENNESSEE 2012 | Senior Director of Annual Programs & Communications

Wes Holtsclaw serves the Sigma Chi Foundation as Senior Director of Communications. Prior to this, he served as Director of Content and Associate Director of Communications.

In the midst of his eighth year with Sigma Chi, Wes’ role has included content creation and messaging for print and digital audiences, feature writing for The Magazine of Sigma Chi, host of The Sigma Chi Podcast and serving as the annual director and executive editor for the Sigma Chi Foundation’s Annual Report and Focus newsletters. Presently, he is helping cultivate and create communications and marketing efforts on behalf of the Foundation, including the newly branded quarterly Focus Magazine.

Wes arrived at Sigma Chi following a 13-year career in sports journalism, serving as Sports Editor for two publications in Tennessee. During this time, he covered the Tennessee Titans, University of Tennessee and East Tennessee State athletics, NASCAR and NHRA motorsports at Bristol Motor Speedway, and served as the lead beat writer and a color radio analyst for the Minnesota Twins’ Appalachian League affiliate in Elizabethton for 10 seasons. He was recipient of five Tennessee Press Association awards, including a first place award for Best Sports Coverage.

From 2008 to 2014, Wes was the lead vocalist for country music group, The Twang Bangers. The group recorded three nationally-released extended plays in Nashville and their home base of Johnson City, TN, and performed and headlined shows in eleven states. The group shared the bill with artists such as Chris Stapleton (Jompson Bros), Jon Pardi, Joe Diffie, Josh Turner, Trent Tomlinson, Shovels & Rope, Corey Smith, Sundy Best, Cowboy Troy and many more.

A 2004 initiate of the Zeta Omega chapter at East Tennessee State, he is a 2012 graduate in Public Relations and Bluegrass, Old Time and Country Music. He was awarded Most Outstanding Student in Public Relations honor from the school’s Department of Mass Communications. He presently resides in East Tennessee.

Phone Number: (847) 425-4472

Email Wes

HISTORY, MUSEUM & ARCHIVES

Noah Phelps, Ph.D. | NORTHWESTERN 2008 | Director, Information Management

Dr. Phelps joined the staff of the International Headquarters in 2005. Prior to coming to Sigma Chi, following 5 years as a web-application developer, he joined the staff of the Muskegon Country Historical Society in Michigan as the archivist in the Spring of 2003. Altogether, he now has more than 20 years as a Public Historian specializing in the care of historic artifacts and documents. Although his duties on the Foundation staff are many, his primary responsibility is as director of the Sigma Chi Foundation’s Department of Information Management. The department runs the Historical Initiative to catalogue, preserve, and digitized the Fraternity's history collections; acts as staff liaison with the Fraternity's History Commission and Monuments and Memorials Commission; and oversees the maintenance, repair, and upgrades of the J. Dwight Peterson International Headquarters and the Founding Site in Oxford, Ohio.  He is also the current (2020-Present) Monuments and Memorials Commission’s warden for the International Headquarters building.

In the course of his tenure at the International Headquarters, Noah has several significant accomplishments. In 2013-2014, he oversaw restoration of the International Headquarters building after a pipe burst damaging one-third of the building. The flood also damaged part of the museum which previously resided in the basement. The management of the Sigma Chi Fraternity and Foundation decided to move the museum out of the basement and Dr. Phelps joined the Foundation’s Museum Renovation committee directed by 63rd Grand Consul, Lee A. Beauchamp, Texas A&M-College Station 1975.  Working with Grand Historians Michael Codina, California San Diego 1993, William Fleming, Sam Houston 1964, Eric Hansen, Cincinnati 1989, and Douglas R. Carlson, Minnesota 1973, the committee planned and developed a new interpretive museum experience for its members. As the building manager, Noah also found a Sigma Chi Alumni exhibit builder and hired a general contractor, then oversaw the alterations of the headquarters building. A tour of the new Chuck and Kim Watson Museum of Sigma Chi can be viewed on the history pages on SigmaChi.org website.

For over ten years, Noah also designed, built, and maintained several web applications for both the Fraternity and Foundation.  These included the Fraternity’s Annual Report and Alumni Awards Nominations site, along with the Foundation’s website and Scholarship Application site. In 2020, Noah stepped away from these duties to devote full-time to the Sigma Chi Historical Initiative.

Noah holds a B.A. in History from the University of Cincinnati (1995), an M.A. in the Management of Historical Institutions (Public History) from Wright State University in Ohio (2000), and a Ph.D. in Urban History from Loyola University, Chicago (2017). His dissertation, “Transport for Early Modern London: London's Transportation Environment and the. Experience of Movement, 1500-1800″ is available on Loyola E-Commons.

Noah is a member of the Phi Alpha Theta: National History Honor Society (1999) and a member of the Sigma Chi Fraternity since 2008.

Phone Number: (847) 425-4420

Email Noah

Anne Schepers | Assistant Archivist

Anne joined the staff of the Sigma Chi Foundation’s Historical Initiative as a part-time, assistant archivist in 2011. When not working to preserve the history of the Fraternity, she spends her time as a successful real estate professional with Jameson Sotheby International Realty, an affiliate of the world-famous Sotheby Auction House in London. Prior to her switch to real estate, she spent 25 years with Rotary International.

As a member of the initiative, she has worked on chapter archives, The Magazine of Sigma Chi index project, and is currently compiling in-depth data on the over 900 military brothers who have given their lives in service to the United States and Canada.

Anne’s contributions extend outside the initiative as well. In 2014, when the Foundation’s department of Information Management was seeking a new handyman. She introduced her brother, Chris Mack, to the director of the department. Chris is now the first person Sigma Chi calls when a repair is needed at the International Headquarters building.

Phone Number: (847) 425-4482

Email Anne