Class Notes | 2010s

Please send news and updates to your class secretary.

Charlotte Pitts just graduated with her master of architecture degree from the University of Virginia and is heading out to Northern California to begin her career at Mithun. She is joined by her fiancé, John Henry Vansant, who will work in Oakland as an in-house law clerk for AFSCME, a public-sector labor union, before returning to the University of Virginia School of Law and Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy for his final year of studies. They are excited to settle down in Northern California and look forward to spending time with fellow Cardinals out West.

Daniel Lee is now working in the Silicon Valley as an engineer for Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses. It’s a new product so he is currently testing the device and using it day-to-day to listen to music and to capture special moments. He says, “It’s a cool product you guys should try out at your local stores!” 

After deciding to pursue a crazy career pivot during senior year at Wes, Sonya Levine is graduating from the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine in May and starting her residency in family medicine at Brown in June. She hopes to work with dancers again one day and get back to her roots! She is marrying Henry Simon(Bates ’16) this summer, and they would love to have lots of Wes visitors in Providence in the coming years.

Ilana Ladis married Dylan Abrams on May 4 in Charlottesville, Virginia. Of course, Erica DeMichiel and Courtney Laermer were instrumental to the day as bridesmaids and by Ilana’s side the whole time. Ilana is moving back to New England over the summer to begin her clinical psychology residency at Brown University and would love to connect with any Wes alumni in the greater Boston/Providence area!

Julia Tyminski graduated from graduate school with a master’s in speech language pathology in May and will be working in Philly in the medical field with adults and children with swallowing, cognition, speech, language, and voice disorders.

Adam Rochelle is still going strong as a cat person. The release party for his Endless Pants album was crashed by anti-pants protestors, but after much discussion and smooth jazz they reversed their position and declared that pants need not end. He is still riding high from playing Bonnaroo last summer with Matan Koplin-Green ’15 in Paper Idol, and this fall he and Johnnie Gilmore ’18 (who just got his driver’s license, go congratulate him) started a fusion band called Low Poly Cactus (poly as in polygon, not polyamory, though circle back on that one later).

Ketrah Mugambe ’18 and I will be tying the knot in August of this year and are excited to celebrate with friends and family including Wesleyan alumni!

I hope you are all well!

Please see updates from our classmates:

Zach Larabee is enjoying his new home in Springfield, Massachusetts, with Betsy, his fiancée, and their dog Roxy. When they’re not working their day jobs in the restaurant tech industry, they’re out enjoying the food and beverage scene of New England, or bartending at a local restaurant. If anyone wants to give or get any recommendations for amazing restaurants in New England, please don’t hesitate to reach out! Zach’s excited to spend his summer weekends exploring the golf courses around western Massachusetts and continue to beat Cameron Rahbar ’15 by only a few strokes during their monthly golf outings. They’re excited to celebrate a few upcoming Wesleyan weddings with loved ones and friends this summer and fall, as well as plan their own wedding in the near future!

Sarah Mi, Melissa Leung, Chiara Wabl, Kellyn Maves, Martin Malabanan, Giselle Torres, Taran Carr, Dacheng Zhao ’18, and Deborah Mi ’14 traveled to Puerto Rico to celebrate my wedding in my hometown of Ponce back in February! We even took a walking tour of the historic area of Ponce, led by Melina Aguilar ’10, through her tourism company, Isla Caribe. From Sarah: “It was an amazing time reuniting with old friends and a reminder that our alcohol tolerance is not what it used to be…!”

I am also excited to announce that I matched to residency in ophthalmology at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque—which I found out about during the cocktail hour at my wedding! Please let me know if you are out there and would like to connect or have any advice or recommendations—they will be greatly appreciated. I can’t wait to spend (at least) the next four years in the Southwest, closer now to several Wes friends on the West Coast.

Stay well!

Mariam

Please write to your class secretary.

Hi 2014 classmates!

We hope that you are all finding time to take care of yourselves despite how hectic life often becomes. We hope that those who were able to make it to our 10-year reunion had a great time.

Anthony Calderon writes, “I should’ve never taken that flight to Madrid (thank you Dylan Turmeque ’13, MA ’14)! I’m celebrating 10 years of living in Europe. These days you’ll find me splitting my time between Madrid and Ibiza. Work-life balance.”

Happy 2024! Thanks to all my classmates who wrote in!

Anna Swartz is still enjoying life in Boston but was dismayed to see that not a single member of the Class of 2013 wrote in with an update for our last class notes. Hopefully she can rectify this with a small update: she saw the eclipse from her porch last week (partially). She also hopes to plant some herbs this spring and enjoy fresh mint and chives. All the best! Danielle Craig says, “Hey, Wes! I am living in Sacramento, California, (farm-to-fork capital of the world!) where I have been working as a public defender since finishing a clerkship in Anchorage, Alaska, after law school. Life is good and excited to see some Wes peeps at my wedding in June. Hope everyone is doing well!”

Andrew Pfeiffer and Kaya Ceci  got married in McMinnville, Oregon, in front of a beautiful crowd of family and friends, including a wonderful Wesleyan contingent present to celebrate. They are happily settled in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with their dog, Diego, and cat, Haku. Kaya is working at the Petey Greene Program, a national nonprofit network specializing in carceral education programming, and Andrew is working in student services at a charter school in North Philly and touring with his band, FeelFree. 

Erica Robenalt recently finished her PhD at Newcastle University in media, culture, heritage and has since published her first book, The Queer Museum: Radical Inclusion and Western Museology. It looks at the relationship between museums and LGBTQ+ communities. It is available on Open Access. Nick Orvis graduated from the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale this past May with an MFA in dramaturgy and dramatic criticism and is continuing into the same program’s doctor of fine arts degree. He and Andrea Ruiz-Lopez are living in White Plains with their extremely cute dog, Brego. Evan Carmi is still living in northeast Portland, Oregon, with his partner, dog, and ever- growing urban garden. Recently he’s been enjoying skiing on Mt. Hood, gardening, and growing food, and cultivating creativity in work. Reach out if passing though! 

James Gardner was selected in January 2024 as the diversity, equity, and inclusion–health equity officer for the William S. Middleton Veteran Affairs Hospital in Madison, Wisconsin. He oversees organizational health and development, strategic planning, education, and coordination for the health-care system covering over 40,000 veterans and 3,000 employees. James also oversees metrics to achieve maximum health equity outcomes and reduce health disparities for underserved and historically marginalized veteran populations. James has been at the Madison Veteran Affairs Hospital (VA) for nearly six years now, having led Madison VA’s DEI strategic planning, cultural and organizational transformation, data-driven health-equity projects, DEI Committee, Anti-Racism Action Team, and worked nationally on the LGBTQ+ subgroup to the VA secretary’s Inclusion, Diversity, Equity & Access (I-DEA) Council, for which he received the VA secretary’s Coin of Recognition in June 2023. If you happen to be in the Madison, Wisconsin, area, feel free to connect with him over LinkedIn!

Matt Lichtash and Margot Sidman welcomed their baby boy, Adrien, in July 2023. He is happy and healthy, and Matt is already training him to compete in Wesleyan intramural sports. He has had the pleasure of spending time with many Wes ’13ers and ’14ers, especially David Nam ‘14. Zach Schonfeld recently published his second book, How Coppola Became Cage, a comprehensive study of Nicolas Cage’s early career and rise to fame. The Wall Street Journal described it as “delightful” and noted that “Mr. Schonfeld revels in all manner of minutiae.” Speaking of minutiae, Mr. Schonfeld is also collaborating with several other alums on a project to restore the Wesleying archives, which were destroyed in a tragic accident in January. Tobias Butler started a business making electronics in his Oakland apartment: Tuneshine is a live album art display that automatically shows the artwork for the music you play on streaming services on a tasteful lo-fi LED display. He’s sold more than 250 as of April and is planning on selling about 750 more by the time of his wedding in August. 

Prince Emenalo is now a father of two: a two-year-old son and his soon-to-be one-year -old daughter. Prince has been working in telemedicine since May 2023 and also went skydiving for the first time with a fellow alum, Galimah Baysah, for his 32nd birthday. 

Greetings from your Class of 2012 class notes secretary, Amanda Schwartz, in sunny Los Angeles.

Please enjoy the following updates from your classmates:

Raghu Appasani writes, “I’ve been living in San Francisco and running my own integrative/addiction concierge mental health practice while building a new start-up focused on the digital wellness movement. Excited to attend Rishi Shah and Ari Fishman’s ’13 wedding at the end of May!”

Kenny Feder writes, “I live in Baltimore with my wife and three-year-old son, who loves to read, make up songs, and go bird-watching. I’m an assistant research professor at Johns Hopkins. My research focuses on public health approaches to drug overdose prevention and I teach a graduate statistics course.”

Kirsten “Kiri” White writes, “I moved to sunny Santa Barbara, California, in November of 2022, and am still adjusting to the pace of life on the West Coast. In this season of my life, I both wholeheartedly welcome and obstinately resist slowing down, mindfully taking my time, and (literally) smelling the flowers (lush jasmine and orange blossoms).

            “I have been working as a wardrobe stylist for the past 10 years, and more recently, as an embodiment coach. In my coaching work I support curious and heart-centered people to reclaim their inner wholeness by connecting to their bodies, accessing radical self-love, and developing a shameless devotion to their pleasure so that they can thrive and lead vibrant and fulfilling lives.

            “For the past 18 months, I have been immersed in a somatic love, sex, and relationship coaching certification with the VITA™ method. The program has been personally and professionally life-changing, challenging, liberating and a lot of fun.

            “Dancing around in the sun, doing yoga, drinking copious amounts of carbonated beverages with friends, and belly laughing are still four of my favorite activities.

            “If you’d like to connect, drop me a line! Kiri@stillemergingcoaching.com.”

Joyce Chung is the curator at Asian Arts Initiative in Philadelphia. Her curatorial projects focus on Asian diaspora art, new media art, performance, and intersections between feminism and visual arts. Joyce is interested in exploring the complexity of identity and representation through the lens of the politics of place. Her most recent curatorial works include Eiko Otake: I Invited Myself vol.III and The Body You Want, a group of six Asian and Asian American artists exploring their queer identity. Her upcoming exhibition, Dream House: Inside Music + Video, will highlight the shifting roles of music video as a creative form of art. The show will be on view from April 26 through August 3.

She has worked at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Seoul, Gwangju Biennale in Gwangju, Kukje Gallery in Seoul, Hyundai Card in Seoul, and Performa in New York. Joyce studied art history at Wesleyan and the University of Chicago.

Hi, Class of 2011,

Hope you’re doing well. Fun additions to our class below!

Allie Altman (née Diamond) is living in Berkeley with her husband, Eli, and just welcomed their daughter, Josephine, in the fall of last year. She graduated with her PhD in clinical psychology in 2022 and is currently seeing patients and doing research as a psychologist at UCSF.

Donovan Arthen writes, “This January my wife and I welcomed our son, Avenn, into the world!”

Congratulations, Allie and Donovan!

Best,

Allie

Greetings, Class of 2010! Just two updates to share for this edition:

Shannon Sun-Higginson and Andrew Murphy live in Manhattan with their one-year-old daughter, Kira, and eight-year-old cat, Minerva. Shannon is currently producing two episodes of a true crime docuseries for Hulu, while running her independent production company, Shoes Off
Media. Andrew is in the third year of his psychiatry residency at Columbia Presbyterian, where he is currently doing research as a Leon Levy scholar in neuroscience. Shannon and Andrew recently took Kira on her first flight to New Orleans to introduce her to her uncle, Julien Burns.

And in baby news, Jonathan Killeen and his wife, Alisha, welcomed their first child—and future Cardinal—Kennedy Sterling Killeen on July 22, 2023. Congrats, Jon and Alisha!!

Thanks as always to those who contributed and, as always, feel free to pass along notes anytime at DavidALayne@gmail.com or dlayne@wesleyan.edu.