Karabelle Pizzigati, a lifelong and prominent advocate of education, died June 12 in Kensington after a two-year battle with cancer. She was 65.
Dr. Pizzigati's resume, which includes several state and national education posts, demonstrates her nearly undivided devotion to the cause of children, youth and education. Just before her death she had started her second term as a member of the Board of Trustees of the University of Maryland College Park Foundations Inc.
She was known for her proficiency at running meetings, which rarely wasted time or started late.
"She knew the right thing to say to move agendas along and get things done," her husband, Sam Pizzigati, said.
She treated everyone similarly and with respect, said those who knew her, which aided her ability to negotiate and lobby for new policies.
"She brightened up every room that she walked into," Mr. Pizzigati said. "People recognized her for her competence, which is why she ended up in so many leadership roles. People appreciated her capacity for caring and compassion. She treated everyone with utmost dignity."
Born in New York City, Dr. Pizzigati grew up in Harlem. She attended Cornell University on a full scholarship and graduated in 1971. She went on at Cornell to complete master's and doctorate degrees in child development and family studies.
After her studies, she began working as a developmental research psychologist at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda. She became a fellow for the American Association for the Advancement of Science Congressional Science program, which piqued her interest in public policy.
Between 1990 and 1993, Dr. Pizzigati served as staff director of the U.S. House Select Committee for Children, Youth and Families, where she focused on issues that included children's mental health, foster care, adolescent pregnancy and youth employment.
Over the next seven years, she led national lobbying campaigns advocating for the protection and support of abused and abandoned children while working as the public policy director for the Child Welfare League of America.
In 2001, she became a member of the Maryland State Board of Education, where she served two terms. During her tenure, Maryland schools were repeatedly ranked by Education Week as among the best in the nation. In 2008, Dr. Pizzigati served as president of the National Association of State Boards of Education, where she focused on early childhood education.
Between 2009 and 2013, Dr. Pizzigati served as the national chair of the organization Parents as Teachers. In recent years, she took on consulting roles for Catholic Charities USA and other nonprofits.
Although Dr. Pizzigati attended a small high school in New York without a sports program and grew up attending more symphonies than sporting events, she became an avid Maryland Terrapins basketball fan over the last several years, Mr. Pizzigati said.
She became president of the Maryland Terrapin Club Scholarship Fund, and held season tickets to both the men's and women's home basketball games. She befriended some of the players on the women's team, and enjoyed talking sports with people who knew a good bit about basketball.
"Terps were adopted for her," state Sen. Paul G. Pinsky said. "She was personable and outgoing. In the last 10 or 20 years she's become very much a Terp supporter in men's basketball and women's basketball."
Mr. Pizzigati is a journalist and author who writes about labor. Besides her husband, Dr. Pizzigati is survived by her son, Nick, a professional translator in Mexico.
Dr. Pizzigati was preceded in death by her oldest son, Tony, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology science graduate, who died in a car accident in 1995 in California. She worked with the Tides Foundation to create the Antonio Pizzigati Prize for Software in the Public Interest, which honors computer programmers who made outstanding contributions for social change.
A funeral mass for Dr. Pizzigati will be held at 11 a.m. Monday at the Holy Cross Church in Garrett Park. Visitation will start at 10:30 a.m.