CLASS OF 2002 | 2018 | ISSUE 3
I hope you all had a wonderful 2018. As we ring out the year and look ahead to the next one, I wanted to bring you the latest updates from all our classmates.
More baby congratulations: Jamie Novogrod and his wife, Sarah Rienhoff, had twins (a boy and a girl) in September. Fife and Grace are happy and healthy and are best friends. They live with their dog, Ernie, in LA. James is the L.A. bureau chief for Vice News Tonight on HBO.
Kerry Wallach and Jess Firshein ’05 welcomed their second child, Rafael Jonathan Wallach, in late September. Zev (almost 3) is very excited to be a big brother. Kerry and Jess are based in Rockville, Md., and are enjoying consecutive parental leaves from their jobs at Gettysburg College (where Kerry is now tenured and chair of German studies) and Accenture (where Jess is a senior manager).
And Rachel Kriger is still babymaking. Her third child, Evan Ziv Kriger-Corso, was born Aug. 28 outside under the light of the moon in her backyard in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia.
Meanwhile, Suzy Gerstein and husband David welcomed their second child (but first daughter), Judith Rose Engelhardt on May 21. Judy joins her big brother, Harvey, who turns 6 in December. Suzy works as a makeup artist in NYC. She was fortunate enough to reconnect with Nicole Cohen, who works with Medela, and who generously helped Suzy with feeding options for her return into the workforce. Suzy says, “it doesn’t solve the work-life juggling act but sure makes it easier knowing fellow mamas have got your back.”
And Joel Nichols and his boyfriend, Ray Murphy, adopted again last year and are please to introduce their adorable, now 1-year-old, Jody. Their older kid just started kindergarten and is in the same class as Mary Peacock and Phil Gentry’s kid, too!
On the entertainment industry front: Michael Zimbalist has directed three feature documentaries released in 2018: Nossa Chape, about the rebuilding of the Chapecoense soccer club after a tragic airplane crash killed most of the team, which was released through Fox Sports; Momentum Generation, a Tribeca Film Festival Audience Award winner about the world’s most legendary surf crew, executive produced by Robert Redford; and Give Us This Day, following three police officers and three residents in East St. Louis, the city with the highest homicide rate in the country, executive produced by Vince Vaughn. They are also releasing their Fox series, Phenoms, about young footballers in the lead up to the 2018 World Cup, and a Netflix original documentary series they created.
Kevin Cornish was nominated for an Emmy for directing an interactive piece for 13 Reasons Why at Netflix.
From Kevin: “I didn’t win, but still seems like it’s worth mentioning.” Kevin is a prolific VR director and producer, working with brands and clients like Netflix, IBM, Google, Oculus, MTV, Discovery, and AT&T, and is the founder of Moth + Flame, a full service virtual reality agency.
Before her transition from nonprofit leader with The Future Project to filmmaker with The Gates Preserve, Sallomé Hralima delivered a talk at TEDxWesleyanU titled “Workplaces Suffocate Human Potential” four weeks after delivering her second child. She is married with two children living in Brooklyn and working on a documentary film about hip-hop journalists, called Shaping the Culture and set for release next fall.
Out here in California: Ryan Akers moved to Davis, Calif., with his wife, Betty, and two boys, ages 2 and 4. After seven years of filtering and brewing beer, he is now a stay-at-home-dad, while Betty is completing her residency in neurology. He is looking forward to his 15th annual ski trip with Dan Winokur and Paul Kim early next year.
Nicole Krauch Stone lives in the Bay Area with her 8-year-old son, Noah, and her husband, Philip, who is a computer software engineer which is “why she can afford to stay in the Bay Area!” Nicole teaches preschool three times a week and twice a week she teaches Qigong classes to adults. In her spare time, Nicole dances, romps in the wilderness, swims in bodies of water, and transcribes talks on meditation and spirituality.
And lastly: Edna Togba was promoted to chief development officer at Chicago Sinfonietta. She has been with the organization for three years.
Lauren Gottlieb Lockshin is living in NYC with her husband and two daughters and completing her PhD at Yale University in Jewish History. She is expecting a third daughter in late November/early December.
Sarah-Jane Ripa has fulfilled her lifelong dream of being able to both speak German all the time and live in Massachusetts by working for the Goethe-Institut Boston.
Justin Lacob | justinlacob@gmail.com