News

February 22, 2018

Albany Law School Announces 2018 Stoneman Award Honorees

Albany Law School announced today that Cristine Cioffi, Class of 1978, and the Honorable Joanne Winslow, Class of 1986, will join Emory University School of Law Professor Martha Albertson Fineman in receiving Kate Stoneman Awards at the law school’s annual Kate Stoneman Day on Tuesday, March 27, 2018.

Albany Law School’s prestigious Stoneman Awards are presented to individuals who have demonstrated a commitment to actively seeking change and expanding opportunities for women within the legal profession. The awards are presented in honor of Kate Stoneman, the first woman admitted to practice law in New York State and the first female graduate of Albany Law School in 1898.

Kate Stoneman Day is free and open to the public. The program will begin at 5 p.m. in the 1928 Building, Dean Alexander Moot Courtroom (Room 421), at 80 New Scotland Avenue in Albany.

Previous Stoneman Award honorees include U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, State Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, former New York Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye—who delivered the inaugural keynote in 1994—and other leaders in the private sector, public service, and academia.

About the 2018 award winners:

• Martha Albertson Fineman, Robert W. Woodruff Professor of Law at Emory University and a leading authority on vulnerability theory and feminist jurisprudence, was previously announced as the Kate Stoneman Day keynote speaker. She will receive the Miriam M. Netter ’72 Stoneman Award. Click here to read more about Professor Fineman.

• Cristine Cioffi ’78 is a name and founding partner of Cioffi Slezak Wildgrube P.C. in Schenectady, New York, where she practices primarily in estate planning and administration and elder law. She also is currently chair-elect of the Trusts and Estates Section of the New York State Bar Association, the largest section in the association with over 5,000 members.

  Cioffi is a past president of the New York Bar Foundation, the charitable branch of the State Bar, which under her leadership expanded the female membership of its board while striving to achieve overall diversity reflective of today’s legal community. As president, Cioffi initiated the development of a strategic plan and led fundraising efforts for flood victims of Superstorm Sandy, among other initiatives to improve the lives of those in need of legal assistance, including victims of domestic violence and human trafficking. She is a past chair of the Board of Trustees of Ellis Medicine and is also a trustee and founding member of the Foundation for Ellis Medicine. In addition, Cioffi is a former Schenectady County Legislator and has served on the Board of Directors of many Capital District not-for-profit organizations.

  Cioffi is a graduate of Middlebury College and Albany Law School, Class of 1978. She began her legal career as an associate attorney at Higgins, Roberts, Beyerl & Coan in Schenectady, and became the firm’s first woman shareholder in 1984. In 1990 she joined Lewis Kaehler Bates Angle Jones & Cioffi as a partner. She founded her law firm in 1995.

  Cioffi has received numerous community awards, including the 2014 Lawyer of the Year Award from the Schenectady County Bar Association; the Susan B. Anthony Award from the Schenectady County League of Women Voters; and the Mohawk Pathways Girl Scout Council’s Woman of Achievement. In 2016, her firm, Cioffi Slezak Wildgrube, received the Susan Rosenthal Women in Business Award from the YWCA of Northeastern New York.

• Hon. Joanne Winslow ’86 is an Associate Justice of the New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division, Fourth Department, to which she was designated by Governor Andrew Cuomo ’82 in May 2017. Throughout her career she has shown a commitment to diversity initiatives through mentorship, outreach, and education.

  Justice Winslow was elected as a Justice of the Supreme Court for the Seventh Judicial District in 2008. She was assigned to the Matrimonial Part until 2011, when she assumed an assignment to the Criminal Part. Prior to her election to the bench, Justice Winslow spent over two decades as an Assistant District Attorney with Monroe County, where she started as a trial attorney in the local and felony courts. In 1993 she was named Deputy Chief of the Local Courts Bureau. Thereafter, she was promoted to Chief of the Elder Abuse Bureau, Deputy Chief of the Major Felony Bureau, and finally Chief of the Major Felony Bureau. In some instances, she was the first woman to hold the position.

  Through her community outreach and work with the Monroe County Bar Association (MCBA), MCBA Academy of Law, the Greater Rochester Association for Women Attorneys (GRAWA), and the GRAWA CLE Committee, Justice Winslow has emphasized the need for greater diversity—including the advancement of women—within the legal profession. She has served formally and informally as a mentor and role model to others within GRAWA, guiding and assisting other female attorneys in their career advancement. At the District Attorney’s Office she was described as a mentor to the younger attorneys, especially female litigators, and earned a reputation as a hands-on leader. Justice Winslow currently serves as co-chair of the Richard C. Failla LGBTQ Commission, to which she was named a member by Chief Judge Janet DiFiore in 2016.

  Justice Winslow’s accolades include the GRAWA Champion of Diversity Award (2017) and the Monroe County Outstanding Jurist Award (2016). She is a graduate of Springfield College and Albany Law School, Class of 1986.

For more information on Kate Stoneman, ongoing award nominations, and Albany Law School’s annual Kate Stoneman Day, visit www.katestoneman.org.