Five alumni will return to UC San Diego on Nov. 5 carrying stories that moved through property, theater, investment and retail, and their ceremony will give the campus a first look at a new place built for returns. The 2026-27 Illustrious Alumni Awards are scheduled as the opening event in the Joan and Irwin Jacobs Celebration Center, part of Triton Center.
The honorees are Marc Brutten, Patricia Brutten, Debby Goosenberg Buchholz, Marina L. Marrelli and David N. Price. UC San Diego presents the award as one of its highest alumni distinctions. The group reflects different relationships to San Diego: businesses built here, arts institutions managed here, philanthropy directed through the region and careers whose scale reaches far beyond campus.
Marc Brutten, a 1979 Muir College graduate, founded and chairs Westcore Properties. The university credits him with more than 47 years in commercial and residential real estate and more than $15 billion in transactions across several companies. His campus work includes helping establish the UC San Diego Student Foundation and supporting a real-estate investment class, links that turn an alumni biography into opportunities current students can enter.
Patricia Brutten graduated from Warren College in 1983 and co-owns Lucky Jack Farms in Rancho Santa Fe. UC San Diego highlights her work with foster youth, underserved communities, education, mental health and environmental preservation, along with her support for the Alumni Awards Gala and the University Art Gallery. Her profile places civic spaces and equestrian enterprise beside two decades of local charitable work.
Debby Goosenberg Buchholz, a 1984 Muir graduate, is managing director of La Jolla Playhouse and president of the League of Resident Theatres. Her career connects contract rooms and rehearsal rooms: she previously served as counsel to the Kennedy Center and taught in the Smithsonian's program on legal problems in museum administration. At the Playhouse, administration is creative infrastructure, sustaining the labor and risk behind new work that may later move to Broadway.
Marina Marrelli, a 1982 Muir graduate, co-founded and leads GlobeFlex Capital. The university describes the firm as an early female-owned asset manager and says women continue to lead nearly every part of the organization. Marrelli also helped found initiatives that provide mentorship and economic opportunity to women and girls in Ghana. Price, a 2017 graduate of the School of Global Policy and Strategy, is chief executive of PriceSmart, a retailer employing about 13,000 people across its markets, according to UC San Diego.
The celebration center gives the event another subject. Buildings meant for alumni are expressions of institutional memory: they decide which achievements are displayed, where visitors enter and how graduates are invited back into campus life. UC San Diego says Triton Center and its new Alumni and Welcome Center will mark their ribbon-cutting that same weekend. The Nov. 5 awards will test the rooms with actual gathering before architecture settles into routine.
An alumni honor inevitably edits a long life into a few visible accomplishments. This year's five profiles emphasize leadership and impact, but their most durable connection to campus may be what remains accessible after the applause: classes, networks, mentorship, artistic work and spaces where another student can imagine a route forward. A new celebration center can hold recognition. Its deeper purpose will be making return useful.