Date: December 2, 2024
Slowly, 2024 is coming to an end. And today we honor and celebrate the remarkable service of Vice President Linda Dienno. Linda is retiring at the end of this month after 12 years at Virginia Theological Seminary. We will miss her. During her tenure, she played a significant role in raising $63 million in VTS’ Bicentennial Campaign – the most successful capital campaign in the history of the school. She organized a stellar series of events over four-days to honor our Bicentenary. Linda secured the gifts that led to the Costan lectures, the first-ever DMin scholarship, the Berryman Family Chair for Children’s Spirituality and Nurture, and gifts that led to the amazing St. Nicholas exhibition in the Welcome Center and an endowment for the St. Nicholas Center for Faith and Justice. She led an excellent team in Institutional Advancement and was an important voice on the leadership team.
Along with her professional success, she embarked on a Masters while serving in this role. She has a Master of Science in Nonprofit Leadership with a concentration in philanthropy and resource development from Denver University. She is the first Vice President to have a graduate degree in this area. It was illustrative of Linda’s commitment to education. She was determined on a personal level to be “cutting edge” and therefore became deeply committed to teaching others. This commitment was most clear in the recent highly successful Philanthropy Symposium, which attracted significant interest.
Linda was completely committed to the mission of Virginia Theological Seminary. She believed in the training of congregational leadership. She was an advocate for all of VTS’ departments and programs and appreciated the importance of Lifelong Learning, TryTank Research Institute, the Center for Anglican Communion Studies, the African American Episcopal Historical Collection, and the St. Nicholas Center for Faith and Justice. She was (and still is) a devout Episcopalian who appreciated as a parishioner the training that VTS provided. She succeeded in her work of raising resources for VTS because she believed in VTS.
We wish Linda and Jeff all the best in their retirement. And remember Linda, “once you are part of VTS, you are always part of VTS.” Do please stay in touch.
The Very Rev. Ian S. Markham, Ph.D.
Dean and President of Virginia Theological Seminary and the President of The General Theological Seminary