CLASS OF 1978 | 2021–2022 | WINTER ISSUE
Marc Abrams is in his 20th year at the Oregon Department of Justice, where he heads the employment litigation team. He was asked this year to lead a team of attorneys at the Department of Justice to defend Oregon Governor Brown’s executive orders protecting against COVID, which were under legal challenge by private schools, churches, and tattoo parlors. “It’s been a particularly fascinating year . . . I did a number of oral arguments in federal court on Zoom, in tie, jacket, cargo shorts and bare feet.”
Andrea Gabor is Bloomberg Chair of Business Journalism at Baruch College of the City University of New York. Her chapter “Media Capture and the Corporate Education-Reform Philanthropies” is currently being published in the book Media Capture: How Money, Digital Platforms and Governments Control the News (Columbia University Press). Andrea has previously authored the book After the Education Wars: How Smart Schools Upend the Business of Reform, published in 2018.
John Rose and his family have been spending most of their time in northwestern Connecticut since “retreating there from NYC in March of 2020.” John is a senior partner at Boston Consulting Group, and “had the unique opportunity over the last 15 months to support New York State in its response to COVID” from the standpoint of setting up industry guidelines and vaccination programs. John’s daughter is in the class of 2023 at College of William and Mary, his son in the class of 2023 at Wesleyan. His wife Elizabeth recently ended her service as deputy chancellor for operations at the NYC Department of Education, and is now chief financial officer for an educational non-profit agency.
Ralph Rotman has been recognized by the Boston office of Northwestern Mutual, where he has been for 43 years, by being inducted into the company’s elite membership, the Forum Group. Ralph’s daughter, Cassie, has joined him in the business.
Julie Scolnik reports that Koehler Books has published a memoir she had been working on for decades—Paris Blue—a “fairy-tale memoir,” which begins in Paris in the late 1970s, reflecting her musical career, “love at first sight,” and eventual heartbreak. Wesleyan has its place in this book, which has received a favorable review from author John Irving.
Carl Taylor wishes everyone good health and well-being from West Hartford, Connecticut, where he continues to live with his wife and son. He reports that the winter was spent caring for her following surgical treatment for a ruptured colon, from which she has recovered well “thanks to a great surgeon, very good care, and strong Russian genes from a couple of generations past. She is back to gardening, her prime hobby in good weather. Nurses and healthcare workers do not get paid enough (good man Carl)!” At a recent visit to Maine they celebrated her allowance for lobster rolls at Red’s Eats, and then took in the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens in Boothbay. Carl has just completed his 38th year coaching youth lacrosse in his hometown, where “three players were children of some of my former players, the father of one serving as his assistant coach.” He continues to serve as a superior court judge in New Britain, Connecticut, “periodically dealing with children, grandchildren, and in one case, the great-grandchildren of people that I dealt with as an assistant state’s attorney in New Britain. No, I’m getting old!”