CLASS OF 1990 | 2020 | ISSUE 1
Hi, all! Happy New Year! We start with Al Viegas, whose eldest daughter, Alessandra ’20, will be graduating this May with a double major in American studies and English. Alessandra is an aspiring playwright. Al’s youngest applied to Wes and a few other NESCACs and “we will know her outcome by April, and of course I am hoping she can continue the legacy as a member of the Class of ’24 . . . crossing our fingers.”
Lawrence Jackson launched the Billie Holiday Project for Liberation Arts at Johns Hopkins, where he is Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of English and History. The BHPLA is conceived to share the resources of the university with Baltimore’s neighborhoods, steward African American archives, and to open up authentic pathways of mutual creativity that help to alleviate the historic socio-economic inequity of the city. Lawrence would love to have Wes classmates from around the region participate; they can also tag donations for BHPLA to JHU, where Elena Weathers ’91 is an officer. On Sept. 12, “we will have our second annual free concert in homage to Billie Holiday in Lafayette Square in Sandtown (always the first Saturday after Labor Day). I won a Guggenheim award in 2019 and am working this year on a book about returning to Baltimore, where I live with my oldest son Nathaniel who is now 15. I am also writing and making digital map presentations about Holiday, Frederick Douglass, and race and American western films.”
Edward Ungvarsky’s wife Olivia Smith ’92 founded Bridges PCS, a public charter school in Washington, D.C., whose mission is inclusive education for children with and without special needs. Bridges is a go-to elementary school for parents whose children have high-level special needs and for parents whose children speak English as a second language. Bridges’ charter was just renewed for another 15 years. “I shared a meal with fellow RA and now frequent marathoner Mark Hsieh when he was in town from Taiwan, our first time together in too many years. Our daughters, Nola and Lena, are teenagers, with the triumphs and trials of teenagers. We were all campaigning for friend Michael Bennet ’87, Hon.’12 in New Hampshire in February.”
Becky Lloyd DesRoches ’90, MA’90, lives in Lexington, Mass., with her husband and two boys, though her eldest is a freshman studying music technology at Carnegie Melon University. Becky loves her job as an assistant professor of psychology at Regis College and works with Heidi Webster. Becky sings in a number of groups. She’s a frequent soloist with the Lexington Pops choir and will tour NYC this spring with the Regis glee club. As at Wes, Becky fills her days with academics, sports, and music. Becky is hoping to release a CD of original music this spring.
After many years of practicing technology law and consulting at big firms, Adam Cohen has launched his own firm, Digital Discipline LLC, providing integrated legal and technical services in cybersecurity, data privacy, information governance, and electronic discovery. He “hopes it will be successful enough to pay tuition for his two kids currently at expensive private universities (not Wesleyan).”
Sarah Townsend, psychotherapist, teacher, and author of Setting the Wire: A Memoir of Postpartum Psychosis, was recently featured in an interview with NPR. Sarah shares her visceral experience of psychosis after the birth of a child. Listen to it at kpfa.org.
Jessica Mann Gutteridge has been appointed artistic managing director of the Chutzpah! Festival and the Norman Rothstein Theatre, which are operated by the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. Jessica is looking forward to bringing exciting performing arts programming to the festival and hopefully seeing old friends as she travels on her search. She is serving on the board of the Vancouver International Burlesque Festival, “which is as glittery and fun as it sounds. Last year I participated in the Cultural Leadership Program at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, working with arts leaders from across North America, in what I like to think of as Hogwarts for artists.” Jessica would love for Wes folk passing through Vancouver to say hi.
Finally, congratulations to Nora Wade (now Wade-Schultz) who wrote in with news that she got married on Aug. 22!
Vanessa Montag Brosgol | vanessa.brosgol@yahoo.com