MICHAEL and ANN HANKIN met at Emory University and went on to share the same educational background, graduating from Emory in 1979 with both a BA and an MA along with Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude honors. They also graduated together from the University of Virginia School of Law with JDs in 1982.
Mike is president and chief executive officer of Brown Advisory, a position he has held since the firm became independent from Bankers Trust/Alex. Brown & Sons in 1998. Brown Advisory is a leading independent investment firm that offers a wide range of solutions to institutions, corporations, nonprofits, families, and individuals. The firm’s mission is to make a material and positive difference in the lives of clients by providing them first-rate investment performance, customized strategic advice, and the highest level of personalized service. Today, Brown Advisory has 340 employees and oversees more than $42 billion in assets for clients in all 50 states and 20 countries around the world.
Mike’s contributions to the community include serving as trustee and vice-chairman of Johns Hopkins Medicine and trustee of The Johns Hopkins University, the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab, and the Baltimore Community Foundation. In addition, his deep concern about the environment has been expressed through his roles as president of the Land Preservation Trust, trustee of the Center for Large Landscape Conservation, and chairman of the Waterfront Partnership of Baltimore, Inc., the lead organization in the effort to make Baltimore’s harbor “swimmable and fishable” by the year 2020.
Ann worked as an attorney at Piper & Marbury from 1982 to 1990 and then at U.S.F.& G. until 1992. Since then, Ann has been a devoted mother to her three children and dedicated partner to Mike while playing important leadership roles in the community. She was a leading force at The Bryn Mawr School, serving as chair of the largest capital campaign for a girls’ school in Baltimore, and then chair of the board for three years. Initially she declined serving as chair because she believed the role should be filled by an alumna, an issue that disappeared when the school then gave her an honorary degree. She has also served as a trustee of the Baltimore School for the Arts and Paul’s Place.
Apart from her family, Ann’s true love is music; she has sung as part of a choral group since her first year in college and today is an active member of the Canticle Singers, a women’s chorale.
Dr. JAMES BERGER is an internationally renowned scientist who has made profound contributions to our understanding of proteins that control fundamental DNA transactions – replication, recombination and topological transitions. His work informs, at a fundamental level, our understanding of cell division and cell survival. In the course of his studies he has elucidated the mechanisms of action of major classes of anti-cancer and antibiotic compounds. He is the author of over 130 publications in the most prestigious journals in molecular and structural biology, including Nature, Science, Cell, Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, PNAS, Nucleic Acids Research and Journal of Biological Chemistry.