CLASS OF 2008 | 2014 | ISSUE 2
You may have noticed that after more than five years of service, Caitlin O’Shaughnessy has retired from her position as Class Notes Secretary. I’m happy to be taking over for her. I recently relocated from NYC to Connecticut, buying a house with my husband, finishing grad school, and finally settling into my dream job as a nurse practitioner at a community health center. The health center caters to those who would not otherwise have access to primary care, and I have the privilege of treating newborns to seniors and everyone in between. Stop on by if you need affordable care!
Karla Hargrave received her MFA from San Francisco State University in theatre design in 2013 and works full time at the Brava Theater Center in SF. She has been in the Bay Area for five years now and spends her free time seeing as much of the bay on her bike as possible, occasionally going on adventures with Fiona Lundy.
Since graduation, Stephanie Fungsang has been living in Brooklyn, working as a dance artist and yoga instructor. She is now navigating a transition in career and life, including a move to Cambridge, Mass., in spring 2014 with Jeremy Finch ’09. She is thankful for all the experiences and people in NY, including roommates past and present: Lucy Bickerton and Stephanie Calvert in their first NYC home, a treehouse loft; Sarah Meier-Zimbler and Rosina Belcourt; Jess Jones, Shamiso Mtangi, Stephanie Roer, Mimi Bai ’09, and Briana Deutsch ’09, who helped create their beautiful home of the past four years in Ditmas Park. She has much gratitude and excitement for what may come ahead!
Sophia Kim is going back to school for nursing. She’s decided to go to Johns Hopkin’s accelerated BSN program that starts in May and will be moving to Baltimore soon.
Chayanee Ubol Chinthrajah writes: “2014 has been an exciting year so far… coming up on my two year-marriage anniversary, graduating with my Master’s in HR and starting a new job! Celebrated these milestones with a ring from my favorite Wes grad, Andrea Lipsky Karasz’s new jewelry line, Tilda Biehn. Check out her amazing line!!”
Max Schenkein is having a blast living in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, with his roommate Alex Trepp, eagerly awaiting the arrival of Josh Atwood, who is staying the weekend to celebrate Alex’s birthday, along with Natasha Nussberg.
Lauren Goldman moved from New York to the Bay Area in January to work with Organizing for Action. Since being on this coast, she’s seen Tara Moore, Amanda Gordon ’07, and Penelope Essoyan ’07. She was glad to miss the frigid NYC winter.
Joanna Kenty writes: “As of May, it’s Dr. Joanna Kenty! I’m receiving my doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania in Classics, after writing my dissertation on Cicero and Roman political rhetoric. Next year I’ll be back in New England, teaching at the University of New Hampshire.”
Marie Brophy spent the winter visiting family in Colorado, Boston, DC, and St. Louis, and ice climbing all around Colorado. She’s a rock climbing guide in Moab, Utah and had a Wes alum as a client last fall. When she’s not working, she can be found stuck to the side of a rock somewhere, putting her E&ES degree to good use, in a way!
Graham Douds passed the Calif. State Bar Exam. He is living and working as an attorney in San Francisco among friends and family.
Sandra Manzanares writes: “After spending the last year and a half dabbling editorially in different industries (from a flash sale site to a sneaker museum start-up), I recently started as marketing manager at Boston-based start-up, Placester, Inc., where I’m diving into the growing content marketing industry. I’m still volunteering, bringing tutoring and workshops to urban youth whenever possible at 826 Boston. Lashawn Springer, Melanie Nelson ’09, Caroline White, and Corrina Wainwright ’11 keep me company in Boston with our wonderful nights out (or in) that involve lots of laughter and wine! When not in Boston, I’m being housed in Rashida Richardson’s beautiful Brooklyn pad, eating ramen, and running into a million Wes people wherever I go.”
Brieze Keeley graduates from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai this May, after which she will begin her residency training in internal medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital in June. She’d love to connect with any Wes friends in Boston when she arrives!
Aaron Larner writes: “Last year I started working on a project to help healthcare organizations do a better job of communicating within their organization. With the new healthcare reform there are strong incentives for hospitals and ambulatory clinics to start using electronic medical records (which is awesome!), but most organizations are still figuring out how this change is going to help them. In the short term it’s a lot of work to get all of their physicians, nurses and IT staff up to speed with completely new technology, especially when they are used to scribbling everything down on paper. Having worked for a large electronic medical record software company I knew firsthand the frustrations that new users of electronic medical records were feeling. Along with two other friends in the healthcare IT industry, I put together BreadcrumbsQA, a platform for healthcare professionals to ask and answer questions about the best ways to use their electronic medical record software. Our vision is to help speed up adoption of electronic medical records so that the ecosystem can realize all of the benefits that this change will bring. It’s kind of like Quora but specifically aimed at healthcare professionals. In January we (finally) signed on our first customer, a healthcare IT consulting firm, and are now working to launch another pilot at large healthcare organization.”