Tag: 2001

Hello and happy 2025 to the Class of 2001. Here are the latest and greatest updates from your fellow classmates.

Chietigj Bajpaee writes that at the end of 2023, he returned to his roots in the public policy field after spending over a decade in the private sector. Chietigj joined Chatham House, an international relations think tank as their senior fellow for South Asia, and he is currently working on his second book on the India–U.S. relationship. Chietigj welcomes any publishing advice!

After planning to be in Japan for two, maybe three years tops, Roger Smith recently celebrated 10 years in Japan! The first five years he contributed to the recovery of the northeastern Tohoku area post-tsunami. After that he had planned to return to the U.S. to restart his environmental career but transitioned to international work pressuring Japanese companies to do better on climate change and forest protection. Recently, Roger produced a feature documentary film about youth climate activists in Japan with director Yu Iwasaki called Michinoku Denki. It tells an intimate story of students working to help communities suffering from Japan’s energy policy as part of grassroots initiatives fighting for a cleaner and fairer future. Look for it at film festivals, and Roger welcomes any ideas for showings globally.

A little over a year ago, Rebecca Hume closed up her freelance design practice for nonprofits to take an in-house role leading design for Protect Democracy (co-founded and led by Ian Bassin ’98). It’s been—and continues to be—challenging work but also feels like the most meaningful thing she can be doing at this moment.

Mandy Sayle Rinzel is still living in Brooklyn (this is her 22nd year living on Eastern Parkway!) and teaching English language arts and English as a new language—but this school year she left the Bronx middle school where she had worked for the past seven years for a high school that is a block and a half from her house. But she doesn’t even get to “miss” being around middle schoolers, because she has two of them in her house. Stanley is in sixth grade and Julius, Mandy’s eighth grader, is about to make his off-Broadway debut in The Antiquities by Jordan Harrison at Playwrights Horizons. Mandy says it’s been pretty amazing to watch her kid fall in love with acting at the incredible NYC public school he attends (PPAS)—and for Mandy personally it’s gratifying that his first gig is in the kind of play she would have wanted to direct scenes from in Tim Raphael’s class at Wesleyan. Jay Golon and Bex Schwartz ’00 are coming to see it. If any other Wes folks go see the show, Mandy would love to hear from you!

Jenny Selgrath is living in Santa Barbara, where she has been for four and a half years. She works as a social-ecological scientist with the NOAA Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary and the California Marine Sanctuary Foundation (and bonus, Jenny gets to work with Jai Ranganathan ’97!) Jenny works across California on ocean access and environmental justice, on deep-sea corals, and climate change. She is still dancing and spends a lot of time trying to wrangle her fixer-upper house and her dog into submission.

Jim Isler writes in to tell us he is so proud of his wife, Emily Barth Isler, as she continues to write and publish books for young adults and children. Jim and Emily will celebrate their 21st wedding anniversary this spring. Last year, Jim created and produced an award- winning series for PBS called Say What?! that explores the origins of animal idioms. Currently he is producing another series he created for PBS called Comedians vs. Animals where participants pretend to be experts on weird-but-true animals. Jim is always looking for great leads on comedians if people have ideas!

Aryn Sperandio recently began a new project management contract with SNDL, one of Canada’s leading public cannabis companies. After AI started affecting her writing consultancy, Aryn founded Doer Agency in 2024—a people-first project management company focused on getting things done. Although it feels unusual to step away from marketing, Aryn is learning a lot about manufacturing and operations at SNDL. Working in the controlled substances industry comes with challenges, but the unique challenges also keep things interesting.

Be well,

Aryn and Mara

Lara Perez-Felkner (Perez-Longobardo) writes from Tallahassee, Florida: “I’m still at Florida State University and helped recruit three new Wes folks down here this year, two of whom are new department colleagues and are incredible, as you would expect. Twelve years later, I’m now a full/senior professor and on fellowships allowing opportunities for impactful institutional and community change around important things we can still do in Florida, like inclusive excellence initiatives, research-practice partnerships with community organizations, and creative interdisciplinary collaborations. I have a new book—Latin* Students in Engineering: An Intentional Focus on a Growing Population (Rutgers University Press)—and am trying to get ready to write another. I’ve occasionally gotten to catch-up with some folks on conference trips around the country, internationally, and beach reunions, but we’re definitely off the beaten track. Feel free to drop a line, and go Wes.”

From Eli Carroll: “After moving out to San Diego last year, [I got] married on October 5 in La Jolla, California, to my fiancé, Jennifer Li. Steve Munno, Tristan Gutner ’02, Oliver Platts-Mills, and Josh Berkowitz ’02 [were] all in attendance!”

About a year ago, Joanna Weaver (formerly Richman), invited me to join a book club she was putting together. It’s been great to see her regularly and get to know her friends. We just finished James by Percival Everett, which I cannot recommend enough. Between talking about books with Joanna, meeting up with other cherished Wes friends, and listening to Hamilton lyrics in my house nonstop thanks to my obsessed eight-year-old—ok, I’m obsessed too—I love how much Wesleyan we have coursing through our world these days. More please.

Happy summer Class of 2001! Our classmates are keeping busy as ever.

Chris Saenger writes in to share that he is back in Washington, D.C., after spending four years in Bogota, Colombia. He will now be leading USAID’s Ukraine desk for the next couple of years. Chris’s wife, Caroline Adams Saenger, still paints beautiful, abstracted landscapes, and he adds that he smiles wistfully when he passes the exit for Middletown on his way up to visit his daughter at the University of Vermont.

Elizabeth Savage has started her own practice, Elizabeth Savage Law, located in Portland, Oregon. She focuses on appeals, civil litigation, and family law. Visit Elizabeth’s website (savage-attorney.com) to check out more about her new private practice.

We have another law career update from Wei Hu. Wei was recognized by City and State New York’s 2024 Trailblazers in Law publication! Wei’s practice, MRTA Law PC, was highlighted for helping to advance social justice and economic equity in New York’s adult-use industry and cannabis law. Wei is considered a leader in this category in part for prevailing in a pro bono appellate matter that changed New York State’s marijuana conviction expungement laws in 2023, as well as for having worked with Governor Hochul’s office on regulatory and enforcement matters to stem unlicensed dispensary operations throughout New York in 2024. As if Wei has not been busy enough, he, along with two co-owners, also recently opened Lenox Hill Cannabis Co., a dispensary located in Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

Correction from last issue: Mattitiyahu Zimbler’s name was misspelled. We apologize for the error.

Whew! Thanks so much to everyone who shared their news. We love hearing from you.

Best,

Aryn and Mara

Great to hear from you as always.

Mattitiyahu Zimbler writes, “I recently accepted a faculty position in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at Boston College. As part of my teaching, I had the absolute honor of having Kate McGrew, Megan Bartlett, and Eric Rueter ’99 provide incredible guest lectures for my classes. Their relevant expertise has made my classes all the better for it!”

From Matt Earp: “I’ve been pursuing immersive experiences ever since I moved back from Berlin in 2016 and returned to Oakland. For the last five years, I’ve been in Reality Labs at Meta working on immersive experiences for the Quest Virtual Reality headsets. I’m a content designer on the Metaverse team, which means I focus on defining new concepts and then working with [the] team to figure out how to build them. It’s been a wild ride, with a highlight being creating concerts and events in Horizon Worlds, including for Post Malone. I’ve also continued to DJ professionally since college, and now have a duo act called sw00se with my wife, Sara (also a DJ herself). Or maybe now it’s a trio since we welcomed our daughter, Rhye, into the world a year ago. Her favorite toy is a Fischer Price record player and she adores music of all kinds. I still trade tunes with Tim Jones ’02 who also lives in Oakland—we’ve kept our blend of hip-hop and electronic music alive since our WESU radio show days and he still inspires me.”

Nora Friedman writes, “My news is that in May I became the director of the Suzuki Program at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music in Park Slope, where I’ve been on violin faculty for the last 12 years. I would be thrilled to hear from any Wesleyan alums thinking of enrolling their children in bass, flute, violin, guitar, cello, or piano lessons in our program! My email is nora.friedman@bkcm.org.”

Congratulations to Emily Barth Isler for her second book for middle school-aged readers coming out this March, called The Color of Sound. Focusing on a neurodivergent character, the book “explores intergenerational relationships through time travel, and depicts Jewish identity and traditions in an accessible, thought-provoking way.” I see praise already piling up, with best-selling author John Cho writing, “The Color of Sound is a valentine to families everywhere. Isler explores multiple intergenerational relationships lovingly and honestly, while keeping a gifted and vulnerable girl firmly at the center. It’s hard to imagine a book that I would want both my parents and my children to read, and yet, here is one.”

Best,

Mara

Our 2001 class is as busy as ever.

Emily Barth Isler and husband Jim Isler just celebrated 19 years of marriage and four years of living in Los Angeles with their two children. Jim created a kids’ series for PBS about the origin of animal idioms, which is premiering this fall. Emily, author of AfterMath, an award-winning book for middle school–aged kids and adults, has written two more books that were recently announced. The Color of Sound is a middle-grade novel that will be published by Lerner Book Group in March 2024, and Emily’s first picture book, Always Enough Love, will be out from Penguin/Nancy Paulsen Books in 2026.

Will Engel is writing a novella! Will tells us that it’s a comedic story about Santa Monica neighbors during the quarantine. The working title is, I Live in Sweatpants: the Life and Times of Jamie Jordan. Will is putting the finishing touches on his novella and hopes the story can translate well into television.

After a series of adventures, Somachi (Chikwe) Kachikwu is back in Maryland working as a curriculum director for a training agency while pursuing her doctorate in education. Life has taken Somachi to Nigeria and England since graduation, but now she’s back home. Somachi looks forward to reconnecting with many of our fellow classmates soon.

Lisa Weinert’s recently published book, Narrative Healing, offers a new paradigm for personal growth, self-care, and community action through an embodied writing practice. Her six-step process of healing through storytelling—awaken, listen, express, inspire, connect, and grow— incorporates somatic practices, creative prompts, and mindfulness exercises to guide readers in releasing stories held within their bodies.

Thanks so much to everyone who shared their news. We love hearing from you.

Best,

Aryn and Mara

It’s strange, the class notes that came in just happen to be only from good friends. It’s almost as if I forgot to do any outreach whatsoever and sent a pleading SOS out to them the night before the notes were due. If that were the case, I’d be very grateful. Maybe someday I’ll have the opportunity to thank them for some situation like that, but probably not since it would never happen!

Ben Stanko has spent the last 15 years working for Philadelphia Parks & Recreation as an arborist and is currently managing the Street Tree Management Division of the department. He is very excited to help with the implementation of the new Philly Tree Plan, the city’s first strategic urban forestry plan (https://www.phila.gov/programs/philly-tree-plan/). He lives in the neighborhood of Mount Airy with his wife Kim and their two sons, Theo (10) and Louis (5). He is always happy to see other Wesleyan folks at the schoolyard of the local public elementary school.

Jesse Kudler has been active in political organizing in Philadelphia, currently volunteering with progressive candidates for city council and mayor. He has been enjoying returning to live musical performance and has been a part of the Balinese gamelan ensemble the last few years. He’s recently taken up a bit of rock climbing as well.

Joey Conover has moved on from building houses to helping others buy and sell houses, currently including a couple of Wes alums who have a cute, two-bedroom renovated and centrally located house with a dependency out back coming on the market this spring. She is at Nest Realty. Give her a call if Charlottesville is tempting you!

Here in Boston, I’m still recovering from the intense effort of baking a (kind of weird looking) cake in the shape of a giant Lego head for my son’s seventh birthday. The things we do for love.

Sending my best wishes to everyone,

Mara

Happy New Year Class of 2001! We hope 2023 has kicked off to a great start.

Wei Hu writes in to tell us that after 15 years of regulatory/administrative law and administering public benefits at the NYC Department of Social Services, he founded a boutique New York cannabis law practice (www.mrtalaw.com) last year. MRTA Law counsels adult-use licensee and license applicants and assists ex-marijuana offenders to expunge prior convictions. Wei also accepted an adjunct professor position at CUNY School of Law where he will be teaching NY Cannabis Law: Social Justice and Economic Equity under the MRTA. Wei resides in Manhattan and Ulster County with his wife and two young daughters.

Doctor of Dental Surgery, Julia Jackson, has just launched her new professional bio. In it, Julia shares she was drawn to dentistry because it harmonizes the relationships between art, science, and people. Julia also lectures regularly on implant dentistry and holds several memberships in dental organizations in the Virginia area as well as nationwide. Julia even founded two study clubs: 1st Ladies of Dentistry and The Essentials lecture series. Julia loves her profession, her patients, and doing good works in the community. Check out her full bio in the electronic version of Class Notes. Also be sure to follow Julia on social @socket_grafting_girl.

Matt Auerbach was named the 2022 Philadelphia Eagles Fan of the Year, which includes a VIP trip to the Super Bowl! He’s excited, and we can understand why. The competition must have been fierce. This  article on the Eagle’s website explains the touching background story for Matt’s love for this NFL team:  https://www.philadelphiaeagles.com/news/matt-auerbach-eagles-fan-of-the-year-an-american-dream-come-true#disqus_thread.

Thanks for all the news and updates. We love hearing from you.

Oliver Platts-Mills and Natasha Sienitsky ’02, joined by their daughters Ursula (6) and Ona (4), have taken over an Appalachian Mountain lodging and campground on the Blue Ridge Parkway in Central Virginia. Oliver says, “Come visit us at www.loveridgeva.com!”

Andrew Drane writes, “I got married in December 2020 and we became foster parents in September 2021. We are currently caring for an adorable 2-year-old foster daughter!”

Grace Anderson-Smith now lives in Georgia, and has a “beautiful, smart, 4-year-old daughter and future Wesleyan field hockey player. I am proud to have successfully accomplished working in corporate for Time magazine, then graduated from NYU with a master’s in education. I worked and coached at Rye Country Day School, taught math, and had a math tutoring company for over 20 years. Grateful for all I have accomplished with multiple sclerosis. I have MS, but MS it does not have me.”

From Emily Barth Isler: “My debut middle-grade novel, AfterMath, came out in September from Lerner/Carolrhoda, and was called ‘a gift to the culture’ by Amy Schumer and ‘pretty close to perfect’ by Judith Viorst. AfterMath also won the 2022 Mathical Book Prize, was A Mighty Girl’s Books of the Year list winner 2021, and was chosen as Nate Berkus’s Nate’s Reads book club pick for the month of April 2022! I was delighted to be on a panel at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books in April with John Cho, Kelly Yang, and Lexie Bean, speaking about the importance of books that address difficult topics for middle-grade readers. AfterMath deals with the lasting impact of gun violence in communities, as well as themes of grief, resilience, friendship, and family, and sadly it’s getting more relevant every day in light of recent mass shootings. I’m quite involved in several gun violence prevention organizations and donate a portion of my proceeds from the book to said orgs. I love doing school visits via Zoom or in person, so if you teach middle school or know a teacher who wants to bring authors into classrooms, please be in touch! Learn more at emilybarthisler.com/aftermath.”

Ben Clark was hired by the United States Attorney’s Office, Northern District of New York, to serve as an AUSA in the Criminal Division.

Jennifer Tuft’s entertainment technology company, Kaleidoco, has opened an immersive mixed-reality experience called Particle Ink: Speed of Dark in the arts district of Las Vegas. Particle Ink: Speed of Dark is a narrative experience, one that seamlessly weaves live performance with mixed-reality technology. If you find yourself in Las Vegas and want to step into a living graphic novel, go see Particle Ink! More at particleink.com.

Joanna Weaver (formerly Richman) moved her family of four to Boston this year for her faculty position at Northeastern University. She has enjoyed re-connecting with fellow class of ’01 alumni Will Tsoules and Mara Voukydis [aka me, and the feeling is mutual!] and alum Demian Szyld ’00. She is hoping to discover more Wesleyan friends in the area!

Always great to hear from you all.

Best,

Mara

Hi 2001,

So much has changed, but what remains the same is how happy I always feel to hear from our classmates about the things they are up to around the globe. Keep sending in those notes!

Myra Sessions shares that she had so much fun watching Katie (Barge) Paris Zoom interview the U.S. surgeon general, Dr. Murthy, in a panel arranged by the White House. Topics included COVID-19 and keeping kids safe, as well as political activism.

Ben Hurwitz, Aryn (Kalson) Sperandio, Scott Kushner, and Aaron Rosenberg left behind parental and professional duties for a weekend together in the California desert to celebrate the wedding of Jess Goldfarb to James Winston on March 5.

Ben Spatz has been promoted to reader at the University of Huddersfield and continues to explore connections between artistic research and theories of identity. View Ben’s work at urbanresearchtheater.com/, including videos and publications. Visitors to Northern England are always welcome!

Ashley (Crossan) Morse lives with her husband and two sons in Chicago, where she occasionally has the pleasure of hanging out with Loren Berlin ’00. This past summer, Ashley and her kids traveled to Los Angeles to spend cherished in-person time with the ladies of 54 Home (and their partners and sweet kiddos): Julie Ames, Sarah Kozinn, and Liz Weiner—an “annual-ish” visit that usually includes Kate Purdy too (she was quarantining this time). Ashley also shares that after nine years as an organizational effectiveness consultant at Allstate, she has brought her career back full circle to the not-for-profit sector and is now doing social impact consulting and loving it. Last, but definitely not least, she has also found time to take a painting class—in Ashley’s words, “a delightful, albeit sometimes bewildering, challenge!”

Andrea Donnelly writes in with news that her work as a sound and energy healer, spiritual mentor, and coach took off last year. She was featured on Yahoo, Bustle, Hello Giggles, Re-Spin, and several incredible podcasts including, Chakra Girl Radio and Raising a Powerful Girl. Andrea is particularly proud of an interview with Thrive Global on finding happiness and joy during turbulent times, which seems to be a continued theme as we move into 2022. If you’re interested in learning more about Andrea’s work, find her at wearehere2remember.com or reach out at andrea@wearehere2remember.com.

Until next time, 2001.