Thomas Patrick McDermott

Tom McDermott, a former managing director of Ernst & Young, died on Jan. 25, 2009. He was a member of the AAS Council at the time of his death. He had retired after thirty-eight years with Ernst & Young, five as managing partner of the firm’s South America region in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He graduated from Fordham University in 1956 and served in the u.S. Army. Tom McDermott served on the boards of many nonprofit organizations and had a particular interest in business development in Latin America. In addition to being a board member of investors Financial Services Corp., he was an executive in residence at the Institute for Latin American Business at Babson College. He was a former trustee of LASPAU – Harvard University, founded in 1964 as the Latin American Scholarship program of American Universities. He also served on the boards of Accion International, Endeavor, Inc., Pioneer Institute, and Rostro de Cristo. He took an active and genuine interest in charitable work, corporate governance, and nonprofit management. A statement of appreciation from LASPAU recognized him as “an ambassador of good will among the Americas.”