Class Notes | 2000s

Hi, fellow 2009s. Here are a couple of updates on our classmates. Ray Ward and Lucas Hoeffel both launched new media ventures, Opalite Media and Lucas Hoeffel Photography, each focused on digital media production. They’ve kickstarted several photography/film collaborations while Ray lives in Boston and Lucas in NYC.

Mike Repplier writes, “I tell the stories of people in extraordinary circumstances as a producer for the primetime newsmagazine 20/20 on ABC News. As a booking producer, I manage the people whose stories we tell and am often the first line of reporting. I won my first Emmy Award for my work on a town hall special with President Obama on race and law enforcement. Most recently I helped produce an exclusive interview with Tammie Jo Shults, the hero Southwest pilot who landed her plane after an engine explosion and saved 148 people on board.”

Thanks for your submissions and please keep them coming!

Alejandro Alvarado | ale.alvarado12@gmail.com

Sara Guernsey graduated with her MFA from the producer’s program at UCLA in June and works at ABC Studios in the comedy development department.

Kate Gibbel graduated from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop in May. She will be teaching poetry and traveling in New Zealand in January. Will you be there? Want to meet up? Or give some recommendations?

LaDarius Drew is teaching history, coaching football, is the director of Black Student Union (BSU), and the director of student activities at The Gunnery in Washington, Conn. In May, he took the BSU kids to the Ebony Singers concert and they had a great time. Meanwhile, he planned and hosted his first event as student activities director, and it went well.

Peter Cornillie was commissioned to do a beer and food pairing for a restaurant in Detroit.

While not at her day job as an administrator for multiple dance organizations and artists, Nora Thompson is working as a choreographer and movement consultant for two Wesleyan-related projects: If Sand Were Stone, a new musical created by Carly Feinman ’16 and Cassie Willson ’17 and produced by Cynthia Tong ’14, which is making its off Broadway premiere at the New York Musical Festival in July; and Reflux, a new play written by Carly Feinman ’16 and directed by Miranda Haymon ’16, which is premiering at the Broadway Bound Theatre Festival in August.

Tim Gallivan is teaching math and DJing on the side.

Rebecca Caspar-Johnson finished her first year at Columbia Law School and will be spending the summer in Harare, Zimbabwe, interning in environmental law.

Silvia Diaz-Roa is a project manager for a tech startup-type law firm. It’s pretty cool because they are working on how law will change with technology. This fall she starts grad school at Yale, so she will be back in Connecticut.

Adin Vaewsorn will be attending the Master’s Entry Program at the University of California San Francisco School of Nursing to become a psychiatric/mental health nurse practitioner.

Grace Nix is petting pit bulls in New Orleans on the set of Pit Bulls and Parolees and making clown-y intramural theater with a bunch of sweet clowns. #wrestlemania

Steve Susaña-Castillo will be attending the Yale School of Public Health under the department of epidemiology of microbial diseases this fall.

Orelia Jonathan will be moving to Boston next year and starting a PhD in education at Harvard University.

Jenna Starr | jstarr@wesleyan.edu

Our five-year Reunion is almost upon us and we can’t wait to catch up with our classmates on Foss Hill! Read on to hear what some of us have been up to:

Nicholas Orvis and Andrea Ruiz-Lopez met during their first few weeks at Wesleyan and have been together—romantically and usually geographically—ever since. This past fall, they finally got married in in the Catskills. They live in NYC now, where Andrea is a fourth-grade teacher and Nick commutes into New Jersey, where he’s the resident dramaturg at a small theater company. They will forever be grateful to the mandatory sexual harassment presentation at which they met. Go Wes!

When Marina Reza is not working at The Jed Foundation, a suicide prevention nonprofit geared towards college students, she’s practicing Angel Olsen covers and scouting spicy food with Anthony Portillo ’12. She has a few poems in the newest issue of Bone Bouquet. Zach Schonfeld met 30 goats in one day when he visited a goat farm in Vermont. He is a senior writer at Newsweek and has been getting super into Steely Dan lately for some reason. Syed Ali is attending the Master in Urban Planning program at Harvard University. He’s hoping to learn how to grow cities in a way in which everyone can access better health and wealth outcomes.

Brooklyn is busy. Croy Salinas can’t believe it’s been over two years since he brought home Maisey. Watching her grow into her skin is a joy and he is always amazed when she eats with her big bites. Will Davis is approaching the end of his quest to order a coffee from every coffee shop in the borough, and is reaching out to authorities to see if it can be counted as a world record. Sue Banks and Natalie Roubichaud ’14 have been taking pottery lessons, and while Natalie is enjoying superb bowls, Sue has moved on to other designs. Mark Popinchalk and Noah Masur ’15 have helped renovate a small local theater and were able to host a private viewing of Moana for their friends. James Walkup ’12, Chloe Reinhart ’14, and Sora Akiyoshi ’14 were seen with custom light bulbs. While dim, some were refreshing. Peter Horton is translating El Niño lyrics to Japanese.

Ashleigh Corvi and Tori Redding are getting married this August in Newport, R.I.! Kelsey Muller will be joining them as a bridesmaid. Kristen Salustro is publishing her third novel and the closer to her sci-fi trilogy. She was promoted to senior writer on the creative team at her company. She writes all kinds of copy for their main enrollment tool along with entertaining, educational video scripts, and now knows way more about Medicare as a 27-year-old than she ever thought she would as a 65-year-old. Spoiler alert: Medicare is not fun. But she loves her job.

As always, thanks to my classmates for writing in. Can’t wait to see you all at R&C!

Laura Yim | Lyim@wesleyan.edu 

Hi, fellow ’09ers. Hope everyone is well in the new year. We’ve gathered some notes from your classmates below:

Jess Eliot Myhre celebrated the first birthday of her baby, Monk Eliot Ousley, on Jan. 22. He’s fat, happy, and a genius.

Sophie Reagan lives in D.C. with her husband and dog. She works at Deloitte “trying to help the government one well-aligned PowerPoint deck at a time. We capped off a great summer of Wes weddings, celebrating Sophia Dumaine, Jodie Rubenstein, and Stephanie Pfeiffer ’08.”

Avital Fischer is a resident in pediatrics at Duke in Durham, N.C.

Joe Newman is now senior legal counsel at Ubisoft. He writes, “Anyone looking for a video game contact in the Bay Area can drop me a line!”

Brittany Delany writes, “Cheers to 2018! Resolutions: Build dance pieces. Connect with creatives through my work at La Quinta Arts Foundation and California Desert Arts Council. Sarah Ashkin ’11 and I performed a new duet for The New Feminist Gaze, an art show co-curated by Simeon Den Gallery and Wyld Womx.

Finally, former football teammates Spencer Platt and Peter Overman both welcomed baby boys in December, Nolan Platt and Ollie Overman. “Hopefully someday they will lift together.”

Alejandro Alvarado | ale.alvarado12@gmail.com

Stephanie Pfeiffer and Michael Stinetorf had so much fun celebrating their marriage vows with multigenerational Wes friends and family in Montana in July 2017, including Steve Pfeiffer ’69, Vic Pfeiffer ’71, Jil Zilligen ’90 and Chris Schedler ’90, Victoria Metz ’99, Emily Pfeiffer-Russell ’05, Alex Pfeiffer Reynolds ’06, Reinhardt Schuhmann ’06 and Sage Norman, Katie Fabac, Rosina Belcourt, Kate Zyskowski, Rachel Firestone, Jessica Jones, Liat Olenick, Jordyn Lexton, Sarah Meier-Zimbler, Sophie Reagan ’09, Kaya Ceci ’13, and Andrew Pfeiffer ’13!

Caroline Raclin writes, “2017 was a crazy year! I’ve been managing emergency health programs in Yemen, Iraq, and South Sudan with the International Rescue Committee. I also moved my ’home base’ to Stuttgart, Germany, so if anyone is ever traveling around southern Germany, let me know!”

Louis Langlois and Peter Mitchell James went fishing on the San Joaquin delta outside of San Francisco four days before Christmas. They didn’t catch anything. Lucas Carrico ’09, Michael Walker, Daisy Holman ’07, Ramona Holman-Walker (future class of ’25), Josh Ente and Eddie Klein attended Louis Langlois’ Annual Hanukah Latke Party in San Francisco. Mike started a grease fire, and Eddie took part in his first music jam session accompanied by Lucas on the tenor sax.

Karla Hargrave is working with soundscape ecologist Bernie Krause to expand the worldwide network of soundscape ecologists who contribute hard data to wilderness conservation efforts and to strengthen society’s awareness of the importance of the sounds of the natural world. She completed solo pilot expeditions in Chile’s Patagonia and Colombia’s Amazon Rainforest to establish sites for ongoing studies.

Alicia Collen Zeidan | acollen@wesleyan.edu

2007 ARCHIVES | HOME
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Hello classmates! Megan (Kretz) Harrington here to give you the latest news. From career advancements to new family additions, we’ve been busy.

Kara Schnoes writes, “Kim Davies recently married a great guy named Jesse Blitzstein. The wedding was held in Philadelphia last September. And Julia Mergendoller had her first little one, Aviv Gilbyrd, in November.”

Cortney (Tetrault) Duncan welcomed a baby boy, Blake Alexander Duncan, on Nov. 27. She is still working at the Kent School.

Kathleen Day shares news of more potential alumni. She had a daughter, Natalie, born in 2016. She is a project manager for Preservation of Affordable Housing, Inc., a nonprofit affordable housing developer based. She writes, “I am enormously fortunate that my partner takes care of our daughter full-time.”

Kathleen adds, “We caught up with Janine (Criscuolo) and Ben Sax and their adorable daughter Zoë over the summer during their visit from Los Angeles. Liam McAlpine and his husband, Sam Gulino, also visited from Philadelphia.”

Matthew Brownstein writes, “I live in NYC with my wife, Hillary, and my 1¹/₂ year old son, Felix. I taught for eight years in middle and high school levels and now I am in the world of administration. I am an assistant principal at an elementary school in Queens. Yvonne Berkel ’90 is a wonderful teacher at my school.”

Laura Catana lives in Havana, Cuba, and is the label manager at Havana’s first independent urban music label, Guampara Music. She is also opening an Afrocuban house of music and culture, a space to help connect foreign travelers with the local music and arts scene in Havana. Look out for Guampara 165, opening in summer 2018! She also works in tourism in Havana, so feel free to find her and ask for some travel help if you’re planning to head to the island soon!

Matthew Gregory and wife Lena moved to Boston after living in the Bay Area. They are expecting their first child, a boy, in April.

Victoria (Santoro) Mair married William Mair on Oct. 28 in Somerville, Mass. A strong Wesleyan contingent was present for the nuptials! Additionally, Victoria was recently voted a shareholder at her law firm.

Jesse Nasta has some exciting career news to report, saying, “I completed my PhD in history at Northwestern University last summer. This year, I am a visiting assistant professor of African American Studies at Wesleyan. I would always be very happy to see any classmates who are passing through campus.”

Meanwhile, Ian MacLeod organized his own mini-reunion over this summer. He reports, “I married Jennifer Brownfield on July 15 in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park in California. Tim Radcliff, Piotr Brzezinski, and Alex Early were in attendance. We all had a great time!”

And finally, Scout James reports that he will be performing in his final show at Juilliard—Waiting for Godot—before he graduates with an MFA in May.

Please keep sending your updates, career news, and life events to us.

Megan Harrington | wesleyan007@gmail.com

Victoria Belyavsky Pinsky | victoriapinsky@gmail.com

Amelia Geggel passed away in April 2016 after a long battle with cancer. Her family has established the Amelia Geggel Environmental Scholarship in her memory. At Wesleyan, Amelia was a religion major. During her junior year, she studied abroad in Chile and she graduated with honors a year later.

Amelia was hearing impaired from birth, yet this never stopped her from pursuing her passions. She discovered her love for animals and the environment at an early age and, by the fifth grade, was a “moral vegetarian.” At the age of 26, she was diagnosed with sarcoma, but still she persisted. In the following six years, she got married (to a carnivore who shared her dry sense of humor), completed a master’s degree in public health, and worked full-time as an environmentalist.

The Amelia Geggel Environmental Scholarship will exist in perpetuity in Amelia’s memory to provide financial aid for students, with demonstrated financial need who are interested in environmental science or environmental studies. If you’d like to contribute to this fund, please go to give.wesleyan.edu and indicate that you would like to give to the Amelia Geggel Environmental Scholarship.

Calvin Cato | catocals@gmail.com

Asher Brown created High Cuisine, a cooking competition show for Verizon/go90 where professional chefs get stoned and then compete to create amazing plant-based dishes. Season One began airing in November and runs through the end of February. Free to watch at go90.com.

In April, Erin Malone and partner Brian Guy, welcomed Josephine Marie into the world. As a new mom, Erin continues to build her business, Momo’s Market, in the Old North End neighborhood of Burlington. Visitors are always welcomed!

Anna Seastrand started as assistant professor of art history at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities in the fall. She’d love to meet other Wes alumni in the area!

Kate Reder Sheikh and her husband, Nadeem, welcomed their son Dominic in October. They returned to San Francisco after living in Singapore and London.

Noah and Julia Bruckner Newman are happy to announce the arrival of their second daughter, Chloe Sofia, in December, joining big sister Hannah. Noah is still working at Pixar and Julia is an ob-gyn at Kaiser.

Michael Lewis married David Scott in Lewes, Del., on Sept. 30. Kate Nattrass, Robert Zeliger, Zoe Levy, Shana Simmons, Matt Fox, and Jilian Vallade were in attendance. Michael and David met almost 10 years ago in Miami, where both were on extended business trips, and they started dating in 2015.

Tejas Desai is preparing to release his international crime trilogy The Brotherhood Chronicle. You can visit his website tejas-desai.com for up-to-date information.

George Obulutsa is at Reuters News in Nairobi. During 2017, he managed to meet with Ben Schelling ’04 and Devyani Srinivasan ’01 during the year.

On Oct. 5, Matt Kushner and Lauren Edgar Kushner (Brown ’04) welcomed their second child, Theresa Eve. At three months, Tessa is thriving, smiling, and just starting to laugh. “Big sister Marian is as in love with her as we are.” In the working world, Matt is still at Method Studios in Chelsea, where he just finished working on the visual effects for Justin Timberlake’s newest music video, “Filthy.” Lauren is still at the American Museum of Natural History, modernizing their permanent exhibits with the use of visual effects and AR/VR technology.

Gabriela Herman’s seven-year photo project, The Kids: The Children of LGBTQ Parents in the USA, was released last fall. For the book she photographed and interviewed 100 subjects about their experiences having an LGBTQ parent.

Last summer, Matt Lerner and his wife, Chelsea Finn, welcomed their second child, Sawyer, into the world. His older brother, Everett, is 4-years-old, and loves singing “Rock-a-bye Baby” to his little brother when he cries; Sawyer seems to like this, too. Matt is an assistant professor of psychology, psychiatry, and pediatrics in the clinical psychology program at Stony Brook University, where he runs an autism research program studying treatments for kids and teens with social challenges.

Arcelie Reyes and Evan Newell ’02 started 2018 with a transatlantic crossing in early January, boarding the Queen Mary 2 during the Northeast “bomb cyclone.” Arcelie is impressed at how quickly all three of their children got their sea legs.

Ted Quinn and Laurie Shaner Quinn welcomed their second child, Henry Kieran Quinn, on Dec. 25. Elsie, Henry’s 3-year-old sister, now believes that Santa Claus is capable of bringing her anything since she got the baby brother that she started asking him for it this past spring.

Sarah Erlinder still lives in Flagstaff, Ariz., where she continues to work as a public defender. Sarah and her husband, Charlie, welcomed baby Zeke to the family this fall. He and big brother Caleb, age 3, keep their parents on their toes.

On Feb. 22, Jesse Pearlman Karlsberg and his wife, Lauren, welcomed their daughter, Lucey Rose. They bought a house in Decatur and Jesse works as senior digital scholarship strategist at the Emory University Center for Digital Scholarship.

Amy Tannenbaum | atannenbaum@wesleyan.edu

NEWSMAKERS | 2000s NEWSMAKER SUNNY CHYUN ’02 Sunny Chyun ’02 is the winner of the 36th United Overseas Bank (UOB) Painting of the Year Award for her linen artwork titled. Dyspraxia. The UOB judges said, “[We] were impressed by the artwork’s details which consisted of various embroidered patterns created with a mix of threads, acrylic, oil and glow-in-the-dark paint.” She was honored at an awards ceremony in November. Chyun was a studio arts major at Wesleyan and earned an MFA from the Korean National University of Arts.

Congratulations are in order for Una LaMarche and Jeff Zorbedian. They welcomed their second son, Max, on Nov. 5, joining his 6-year-old brother Sam. Congrats also to Ben Goldstein and his wife, Cheng Li, who welcomed their second son, Noah Li Goldstein, in December. Big brother Malcolm is loving having a younger brother. Ben is an assistant professor of biostatistics at Duke University. 

Speaking of second children, I (Justin Lacob) had a second daughter with my wife, Melanie, in October. We named her Juliette Violet Lacob; she joins big sister Scarlett. We also moved to a new house in the wilds of the Hollywood Hills, where we all fall asleep listening to howling coyotes and hooting owls. 

Also want to extend congratulations to Paul Kim and his wife, Mirjam, who celebrated their two-year wedding anniversary and moved to their new home in Brooklyn Heights in November.

And, congrats to Lin-Manuel Miranda for winning his third Grammy this year for Best Song Written for Visual Media for “How Far I’ll Go” from Disney’s Moana movie. 

Britton Boyd went to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria with the FBI’s first relief team. They distributed food, water, tarps, baby food, and Britton calls this “the highlight of his career so far.” And after spending a year in Pakistan, Eric Donelan and his wife, Danielle, moved with their three children–Grant (5), Wyatt (3), and Freya (1)—to Budapest, Hungary, where he still works for the Diplomatic Security Service of the Department of State as a supervisory special agent and security attaché. 

Aaron Schwartz “is excited to see his small business, Ayurvedic Mouthwash Company, YALA, excel nationally and internationally, entering major market stores like Free People and Anthropologie.” Meanwhile, his pediatric dental practice in Atlanta continues to grow. He and his wife, Thea Delage ’04, are keeping busy with their son, Martin. Lauren Geller Rascoff lives in Denver, Colo., with her husband, Sam, and their three children–Jonah (8), Roselle (6), and Joely (2). Lauren is a urogynecologist at the University of Colorado and “loves it!” And Caitlin Hardy lives in Collingswood, N.J., with her husband, Jeff, and their daughter, Savannah. She is finishing her radiology residency at Cooper Hospital and will be staying on next year as a women’s imaging fellow. 

Ryan Akers is a brewer at Anchor Brewing in San Francisco, after managing the filtration department. He also had another child, Victor, who is 1¹/₂ years old. Lexi Keeler is working at Summer Search in fund development and lives in Seattle with her wife and kids (Emmett, 6, Will, 4, and Harper, who is also 4). And Sunny Chyun was awarded the winner of the 36th United Overseas Bank Painting of the Year–Singapore in November. She would like to thank the Freeman Foundation, her studio arts advisor, Keiji Shinohara, and Wesleyan studiomate, Dave Golden. 

Keep those notes coming!

Justin Lacob | justinlacob@gmail.com