Winter is near and what better way to enjoy a warm fire and a big mug of hot chocolate than with some class notes, right?! Here’s what some of your fellow classmates are up to:

Seth Halpern is working in Washington, D.C. as a strategic consultant for hospital executives at The Advisory Board Company, and is also in his second year of the evening MBA program at Georgetown University. Seth is overworked and underpaid, and looks forward to seeing everyone at the five (5!!!) year Reunion in the spring.

Laura Masulis is working as the senior partnerships manager at Interise, a social enterprise that trains local business owners to help take their businesses to the next level. On the side, she is helping found a community bike and board shop, The Lawrence BiciCocina, to improve the quality of life in Lawrence, Mass., encourage more physical activity, and provide job and leadership training for youth. Laura also just had a wonderful woodsy get-a-way weekend with Tressa Eaton, Sara Hirsch, and Ellie Wiener.

Lilly Fink Shapiro shares that she is studying public health and sustainable food systems at the University of Michigan.

Dominic Ireland left Bridgewater Associates back in February, spent March wandering solo around Turkey (awesome), and now he’s in Connecticut, working IT at Stamford Hospital.

Elana Baurer is a first-year associate at Duane Morris LLP in Philadelphia, PA, working in the Employment, Labor, Benefits, and Immigration group. She splits her time between employment and immigration matters. Elana passed the Pennsylvania and New Jersey bars and was to be admitted formally before the New Year.

Ray Ward, Sawyer Greene, and Jeremy Finch are now living in Cambridge, Mass., where their apartment features nearly one pull-up bar per capita.

Ari King has launched a website and podcast titled Off Campus, which is based on his book Now What?! Conversations about College, Graduation, and the Next Step and has a Kickstarter to raise money to produce the show. To find out more, see: thisisoffcampus.org

Only five months until our 5-year Reunion. Get excited! And keep the notes coming!

Alejandro Alvarado
ale.alvarado12@gmail.com

Although most cardinalis cardinalis in fact do not migrate south for the winter, several of our classmates are making big moves and here is what they report:

Alice Maggio reports the following: “After making pie in Brooklyn, teaching English in the Alps, and cooking Basque food in Manhattan, Alice Maggio (Sociology and French, 2010) has found herself back at home in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, working on the region’s local currency, BerkShares. Much to her surprise, her role at the Schumacher Center for a New Economics has had her traveling around the world (and even back to Wesleyan) to speak about the potential of local currency to create more democratic and sustainable local economies.” Alice even had time to make an appearance on PBS News Hour to discuss the benefits of local currency!

Jory Kahan has moved to Boston to start medical school at Tufts University. Jory is happily living in downtown Boston and is excited to hang out with any Wes Alums in the area.

Jeffrey Rovinelli wrote in with perhaps the coolest note of the year: “Razor (formerly Ray) Edwards ’10 and myself just got married in a quiet ceremony in Bushwick, only partially for tax reasons. Jeff is a recently accredited non-denominational minister running a small animal therapy outreach program in Williamsburg and Razor has a side project as a vegan taxidermist. (For real! This is a thing that people want!)”

On Oct. 15th, Grace Kredell welcomed her first child—a healthy baby girl named Maine—into the world with her partner Alex. For the last two years, Grace has been building up a successful tarot card reading practice in Los Angeles.

Katherine Rodriguez-Perez Colone checks in to report that she was married in 2012, has moved to Atlanta, and is now working as a technical editor contracting for an aeronautics company.

Raphaelle Brochet writes in from India, where she is teaching music in a recent school that offers jazz, contemporary world and Carnatic music; the first school of its kind in India!

Katherine Kitfield Bascom “is taking to the air. In 2014, she will be joining the dance company ‘Human Architecture’ as an aerialist, and will be featured in a major public work in NYC’s Central Park (theoneshow.com). Lately, she can’t get enough of the Sufi poet Hafiz, or cooking with goose fat from the farm project she’s running with her brother up in Vermont (Want local organic goose for the holidays? getyourgoose.com)”

Caitlin McHugh is finishing her second to last quarter at Western Washington University where she is working toward an M.Ed. in Environmental Education and a certificate in Non-profit Administration through Western Washington and the North Cascades Institute M.Ed. program. Caitlin spent a full year living, working, and taking classes in North Cascades National Park on Lake Diablo in Washington State and just moved back to Bellingham, WA in September to finish her coursework. Caitlin adds this awesome description of her work: “As part of my studies this summer, I coordinated curriculum and volunteers for a community-based environmental education, literacy, and nutrition program in Concrete, WA. It was a collaborative effort between the National Park Service, United General Hospital’s Community Health Outreach Program, and the Concrete School District. Basically, we pulled together the funds to provide a free, 6 week summer camp for Concrete Elementary school children– most of whom would not have the resources to go to camp otherwise. The camp focused on improving the literacy levels as well as nutrition; we provided breakfast and lunch every day because many of the students receive free and reduced lunches during the school year. We also focused on exploring and enjoying the local outdoors both in Concrete and the neighboring national park (North Cascades National Park). This summer was its pilot season, but our efforts were successful enough that the Concrete Summer Learning Adventure is set to go again next summer!”

A quick update from Seth Rosen: “I moved to Vancouver in September to work for Klei Entertainment as a game designer. I’m enjoying exploring the city and am loving my job: so far I’ve made a short horror game, ‘The Screecher,’ and now I’m working on a second title, ‘Don’t Starve.'”

Ian Pylvainen had the thrill of attending the recent wedding of Kacey Wochna and Samuel Kachuck in Ithaca, N.Y., along with good friends and fellow Class of 2010 classmates Justin Bohn, Ted Nichols, Liza Litvina, Jason Bitterman, Alex Holachek, Greg Storch, Jake Litke, and Anna Mageras, and Ethan Hoffman ’14. It was a beautiful wedding, quaint, lively and full of laughs!

The boys at Lua continue to do big things. If you haven’t heard of Lua either here or elsewhere before, Lua is the company started and run by Michael Keoni DeFranco, Eli Bronner, and Jason Krigsfeld. Lua provides mobile workforce technology to customers with mostly out-of-office employees. Their product makes communication and connection between distant employees simple and efficient. Two years after launching their product, Lua recently announced plans to offer self-service public availability by 2014 (finally opening the product to the public). This is a major step for the company and more can be read by searching for Lua on TechCrunch.com. The guys are also excited to announce that their software will be powering the Superbowl this coming year, and they currently work with such clients as eBayNow, various international airports, hotels, and the Department of Defense. Congratulations to the whole Lua team and keep it up!

Jesse Bordwin recently passed his comps, receiving an M.A. on the way to a Ph.D. in English literature, here at the University of Virginia. Jesse also reported that he “donated to Wesleyan for the first time…the nostalgia is only just kicking in.” Indeed, Jesse.

Thanks again for everyone’s contributions, and, if you have an update to share, feel free to post anytime on WesConnect, or send me a blurb directly at my Wes address. Happy 2014 everyone!

David Layne
DLAYNE@WESLEYAN.EDU

Hope as many of you who could returned to Wes for Homecoming to watch our Wesleyan Football team capture the Little Three Football Title with its win over Williams! Go Wes! As for the Class of 2011, many exciting updates to report!

In California, Bradley Spahn and Maryann Platt have both started PhD programs. Maryann reports, “I moved to sunny Irvine, Calif., to start my PhD in neuroscience!” Bradley is at Stanford, pursuing his PhD in political science.

Terrence Agbi, Jasmin Rahman, and Margaret Aldredge are also pursuing graduate educations. Keep up the good work, class of 2011! Terrance says, “I’m at NYU School of Engineering getting a master’s in management, with a focus on e-commerce and technology management. I’m also working at Dumbo Incubator part time.” Jasmin Rehman writes, “I’m wrapping up my second year of a master’s in social work program at The University of Chicago’s School of Social Service Administration. I’m most likely sticking around Chicago post graduation.” Margaret is working at MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, Queens, as a curatorial assistant and just started a master’s program at the Institute of Fine Arts, NYU.

Samantha Pearlman reports, “I’ve been living in Philadelphia since graduation and working as a professional actress. My thesis show, Devotedly, Sincerely Yours, had its post-graduation premiere in the 2012 Philadelphia Fringe Festival. From that production, I was invited to bring the show to the Annenberg Center for Performing Arts at UPenn as part of their By-Local Series this past October. In the next year, I will be performing in assorted plays and musicals in the Philadelphia area, as I relocate to NYC in 2014.”

Mike Rosen has moved from Less Williamsburg to Mostly Williamsburg, where he lives with Myles Potters ’12 and practices such alternative lifestyles as veganism, “dating,” and “work.” He sends hair-related updates: Josh Smith had (for a short time) shaved his goatee whereas Louis Russo has maintained his luxurious locks. Mike performs poetry still sometimes and has, believe it or not, been informed that he looks like Macklemore.

Olivia Parkes says, “After graduation, I worked in London as an archivist for Film Finances, dealing principally with material from post-war British cinema. In November of last year I moved to Berlin, where I applied to the Universität der Künste to study Bildende Kunst (Fine Art). I started the first year of the degree this fall.”

Jared Gimbel finished the one-year fellowship at the Paideia Institute in Stockholm and is now in the master’s program in Jewish civilizations at the Hochschule für Jüdische Studien Heidelberg. In 2013, he founded “Present Presence,” a media initiative focused on showcasing contemporary Jewry throughout the world, and his upcoming master’s thesis focuses on perspectives and portrayals of Jewish life in Finland and in Greece.

Elana Scudder writes, “Mike Gaines and I have recently moved to New Orleans and we adopted a very cute and lovable dog! Mike is in his first year of law school at Tulane and I am busy saving the world, one cake at a time!”

Seth Alter has been self-employed in Boston for a year as a video game developer. After a year of development, much showcasing at festivals such as PAX East, and a successful Kickstarter campaign, Seth released his first game, Neocolonialism, in November (subalterngames.com). Neocolonialism is a Marxist strategy game in which players attempt to extract as much wealth from the world as possible. Seth now spends his days catching up on sleep and planning the next game.

Jon Sheehan reports, “I’m in Virginia working on the McAuliffe campaign.”

Lots of great updates! Keep it coming!

Allie Southam
asoutham@wesleyan.edu

Daisey Perez
deperez@wesleyan.edu

It’s been a few months since graduation, and the Class of 2013 is already busy taking the world by storm. We’ve been off working, teaching, studying, traveling, and embracing everything that life has to offer. Although there is the bittersweet realization (often accompanied by poignant nostalgia) that we are no longer in college, we’re also excited to dive right into the next chapter of our lives.

Many 2013ers can be found residing in New York. Catherine Taibi is an associate media editor at The Huffington Post. Her job includes managing the media page, writing and editing stories, creating viral content, managing the Facebook and Twitter accounts for HuffPost Media, creating photo posts and slideshows, and tracking site traffic. Kevin Curtin is living on the Upper East Side and working for JP Morgan’s investment bank. Isabella Cucchi is living in West Harlem and working in the South Bronx as a site coordinator for Reading Partners, NYC. She also works with children on their reading skills at the Metropolitan Lighthouse Charter School. Isabella loves hanging out with other Wesleyan folks in her free time. Sarah Cassel is a corps member at Avodah, a Jewish social justice group. She also works at The Bronx Defenders and spends her free time volunteering at the Homebound Leadership Institute in Harlem, where she works with young men of color on professional development and leadership through identity-based education. Senior speaker Anna Swartz is rooming with Paul Silverman in Brooklyn. She is writing and looking for full-time work, while he works as a kindergarten teacher. Joining Anna and Paul in Brooklyn is Julian Applebaum, who is a software engineer at Squarespace, where he researches, designs, and codes new tools and workflows for e-commerce merchants. In his spare time, he plays bass in the Sirs & Madams, a five-piece folk/singer-songwriter group.

In other parts of the country, 2013ers are also settling into their new jobs and embarking on new adventures. Chris Pao writes in from Boston, where he is working as a remote services consultant at ServiceNow, a growing IT enterprise cloud management software company. He helps clients with their software platform post-implementation with fixing anything that’s broken, not functioning properly, or even adding new functionality per the client’s request. He hopes to become a technical consultant after graduating from the two-year program. When he is not working, Chris enjoys playing in an adult hockey league, an indoor soccer league, and also exploring what the city has to offer. Robert Vance is living in his hometown of Birmingham, Ala., working for Impact Alabama, a community service nonprofit, and writing for Onyx Path Publishing. He’s planning to attend law school next year, focusing on public interest and civil rights law. Ashleigh Corvi writes in from Wesleyan, where she is working as an assistant dean of admission. She lives nearby with her girlfriend (and fellow ’13er) Tori Redding, who also works at Wesleyan as an assistant field hockey coach. They both love staying in touch with friends and professors while being a part of the community in a different capacity. Lisa Sy writes in from the Bay Area, where she is a full-time designer at a Web and mobile application consultancy in San Francisco called Thoughtbot. She works with clients that include start-ups and technology companies to build profitable products and services for their customers. Her day-to-day tasks include interfacing with clients, creating mock-ups and wireframes, leading product design sprints, collaborating with other Web developers, and coding/designing the websites. She is excited by the amount of learning she gains everyday, and is always open-minded to collaborating with other Wesleyan people on interesting projects. Also in California is film aficionado, Michael Steves, who is in post-production on his first feature film, Clinger, a low-budget horror-comedy he directed and co-wrote starring Vincent Martella (Phineas and Ferb, The Walking Dead, Everybody Hates Chris). The cast and crew included about 20 Wes students, including ’13ers Stefan Skripak, Leah Rosen, Paulie Lowther, Becca Kitsis, Sam Barth, Scott Kan, Chris McNabb, Sam Korda, and Ben Smith. Now living in L.A., Michael is co-producing another horror feature with director/producer Jon Hess (American History X) and second-unit directing a horror feature starring Terrance Howard. He also opened a production house specializing in music videos and commercials with two of his high school friends.

On the other side of the world, James Gardner is working as a project assistant for an Afro-German organization that focuses on integration, education, and social work for the Afro-German and African immigrant communities in Berlin. He has been given the opportunity to give presentations on Afro-German history and has also created a “WesGermany” Facebook group for Wesleyan alums and current students in Germany. They had a small event in October and are looking for more friendly faces to join. Shoot him an e-mail (jgarder@wes) if you are in the area! Nearby, Adam Rashkoff is serving as an English language teaching assistant at two different high schools in western Austria on a fellowship funded by the Austrian government and administered by the U.S. Fulbright Commission. He is enjoying teaching and working with high school students, as well as adjusting to the Alpine lifestyle. Any Wes peers who find themselves traveling in Europe and have a desire to go skiing and snowshoeing, eat tasty food and drink superb beer and mulled wine, and explore Roman ruins and medieval cities are welcome to come visit and stay on his pullout couch.

As for me, I’ve settled back at home in the Bay Area and am working for Apple as an engineering program manager. Thanks to everyone for the contributions and wishing all the best to my classmates!

Laura Yim
Lyim@wesleyan.edu