CLASS OF 2013 | 2016 | ISSUE 3
With the arrival of fall comes the realization that it’s already been three years since the Class of 2013 graduated from Wesleyan. During this time, we’ve traveled the world, earned an additional degree (or two), and settled into an exciting new chapter of our lives. Keep reading for a snippet of our adventures!
Jim Curley is the director of state relations at Boston University. He is also working towards an MBA at BU. He sees his fellow classmates Derek Lukin and Carmen Boscia in Boston. Amanda Simmons relocated to Philadelphia from NYC to study at Penn Law. She is joined by her partner, Adam Jaskol, who works as a management consultant and engages in casual sax(ophone). Amanda and Adam are hoping to reconnect with Wes friends, so reach out if you’re in Philly. Sarah Cassel finished her master’s in criminology at the University of Cambridge this summer. She wrote her dissertation on higher education in prison, and is working at the NYC Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice. Anna Swartz is still living in Brooklyn and is a staff writer at Mic, where a few coworkers are also Wes grads. From her office in One World Trade she can almost see all the way to Connecticut! Happy to say that she still sees Wesleyan friends at least once a week, if not more.
Kristen Salustro missed LA by a couple of thousand miles and wound up in Chicago, which is just fine by her. She is a writer for bswift, an Aetna company, and is working on her third novel. Her first two books, published under the name K.N. Salustro, were nominated for the Chanticleer Book Reviews Cygnus Awards for science fiction and speculative fiction. Sydney Lowe is also living in LA. After working as an associate producer at HBO in New York for three years, she joins the staff of HBO’s upcoming fall comedy, Insecure, as producer’s assistant to show creator, Issa Rae. Sydney continues to work as a photographer and creative producer on several video projects, documentaries, and branded content campaigns.
Despite tenacious efforts to avoid gainful employment in 2016, Evan Carmi ended up with a new job, joining Airbnb’s Portland engineering team. After failing to muster the courage to take Drawing 1 at Wes, he signed up for a local drawing class this fall. Zach Schonfeld delivered a Drunk Ted Talk on the subject of Nicolas Cage appreciation. He still works for Newsweek, and he hasn’t gotten stuck in an elevator since 2014. Julian Azaret moved to Melbourne, Australia, where he’s run into a few Wes alumni. He has been racing bikes, climbing mountains, and consulting in the SaaS industry all over Asia-Pacific. Things haven’t changed much in the last three years. Anyone passing through that part of the world should give him a holler!
After finishing her master’s in sustainable engineering from Rochester Institute of Technology, Alissa Santucci has been working at Xerox Corporation in the environmental, health, safety, and sustainability department. Alissa was promoted to environmental technology program manager and is excited for all of her new responsibilities which can help shape the environmental sustainability future of the company. Katie Havlovic writes in from D.C., where she transitioned from working for Congressman Beto O’Rourke to the Opportunity Finance Network, where she advocates for the interests of community development financial institutions throughout the United States. While she continues to explore the D.C. food truck scene, nothing can beat the falafel and grilled cheese trucks back at Wes.
Brooklyn is full of entrepreneurs! Noah Masur ’15 has started a humane pesticide business (very popular in Williamsburg), and William T. Davis has taken his experience in the coffee industry and now runs an online exotic coffee bean store on the deep net. Sora Akiyoshi ’14 and Chloe Rinehart ’14 began a volunteer outreach program that offers ultimate Frisbee classes for those in senior housing, and Peter Horton and Croy Salinas are still making sweet music together as they enjoy the start of their fourth year of happily living together. Mark Popinchalk enjoys keeping tabs on his friends, both in Brooklyn and afar, including Ethan Grund, who is starting his second year working on his comprehensive lake survey of Minnesota.
Matt Lichtash, much like Andrew Perlmutter is wont to do, is also working away, doing all things BKE. Aside from pursuing all forms of football except for the actual thing (fantasy, flag), Matt has also embarked on a new creative venture: a website dedicated to presenting information about climate change in concise posts containing three bullet points or fewer. The site, thecarboncapital.org, is easily digestible, shareable, and nonpartisan, and posts info to motivate anyone to take climate action.
Evan Okun (aka E. Oks) performed a solo show at the NYC’s Nuyorican Poets Cafe alongside Sam Friedman and other members of his Chicago collective. The show celebrated the release of his new single (soundcloud.com/eoks). The next morning, he flew back to Chicago to continue his work with Circles & Ciphers, a hip-hop infused restorative justice organization led by young people who are court-, gang-, and DCFS- involved.
As for myself, I wrapped up three years at Apple and transitioned to Fitbit to work in advanced product development. When I’m not searching for the latest and greatest technologies to apply to future Fitbit products, you’ll find me traveling, watercolor painting, and (still) eating my way through the wonderful city of San Francisco. Would love to reconnect with any Wes alums living in or traveling through this area!
Laura Yim | Lyim@wesleyan.edu