2015 Distinguished Alumni Award Recipient – Mary Jilek ’06 

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

The Viterbo University Alumni Association presented the Distinguished Alumni Awards during Viterbo Days, Saturday, Oct. 10, 2015. The award is presented to alumni who display Viterbo’s mission of faithful service and ethical leadership in their everyday lives. These alumni embody Viterbo’s core values of contemplation, hospitality, integrity, stewardship, and service. Mary Jilek was honored with the Young Alumni Award. She was unable to attend the presentation, but sent this video from her home in Amman, Jordan.

Mary Jilek video link
Watch a video of Mary Jilek '06.
Mary Jilek is the regional strategy support coordinator for the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in Amman, Jordan. Jilek works with staff throughout the region to develop strategies to best help the millions of people in need of assistance inside and around Syria. Jilek grew up in River Falls, and received a bachelor’s degree in education from Viterbo. She began her career teaching English and international studies at Immaculate Heart College in Kagoshima, Japan.
 
After three and a half years in Japan, she moved to New York to pursue a master’s degree in international educational development from Columbia University. Her thesis research took her to Uganda where she worked at an HIV clinic designing and assessing education and household water treatment programs.
 
While in Uganda, Jilek came across Citrine Agency, a small community-based organization in Kampala’s Bukasa slum. She began supporting the organization in their pursuit to expand their educational programming, which then consisted of classes meeting under a tree every Saturday.
 

Today, Citrine Agency runs Destiny School, providing many children in the community education and hope for their futures. Jilek continues to support and advise the organization on program and curriculum development, fundraising, and external relations. Jilek serves on the Board of Trustees for Global Community Charter School in Harlem, N.Y., and the Board of Directors for Peace and Resilience through Youth Development and Engagement, a peace education organization based in New York.

According to a nominator, “Jilek exhibits a great concern for the intellectually as well as the economically poor, especially children. She embraces the role of servant, emptying herself of her own needs, wants, and self-importance for the sake of being deprived. Her simple lifestyle is very basic to her supporting beliefs.”