Tag: 2003

I am sorry to share the news that Amber Cook passed away on October 25, 2024. She was a talented marketing professional in the gaming industry and a devoted mother to her six-year-old son, James. (A link to her obituary can be found at classnotes.blogs.wesleyan.edu.)

Matt Kushner decided to take a leap into tech this December as a 3D design technologist in Visual Innovation Services at Amazon, after a four-year stint in immersive entertainment at Illuminarium Experiences. Lauren Kushner (Brown ’04) enters her ninth year as a staff 3D animator at the American Museum of Natural History. Kids, Mimi and Tessa, are thriving in fourth and second grade respectively. 

National Geographic has released a feature film on Alison Criscitiello, For Winter: “In the frozen heights of Mount Logan, Canada’s tallest peak, a team of scientists launches a daring expedition to unearth thousands of years of climate data in one record-breaking ice core. The sample is an invaluable piece of the global climate puzzle. And the seven experts, with their scientific genius, physical strength, and high-alpine survival skills, are some of the only people in the world who can complete this monthlong mission.” For Winter is a one-hour documentary featuring the leader of this brutal quest—ice core scientist and National Geographic explorer Alison Criscitiello. The film aims to inspire support for climate research and diversity in science and exploration ( http://natgeo.org/forwinterfilm).

Ben Rhatigan just passed the 20-year mark living in Spain, recently moving from Barcelona to the Canary Islands. He also bit the bullet and launched Arrival Projects, a brand strategy agency focused on travel, destinations, and hospitality companies. 

Earlier this fall, Oz Hazel started his term as chair of the Wesleyan Fund. He is spending more time on campus brainstorming how to drive alumni engagement and ensure current and future students have the opportunity to enjoy Wes as much as we did. Shoot him a note with your ideas or just say “hi.”

Hurricane Helene dealt some difficulties to Caroline Knox and her family and neighbors in Asheville, North Carolina, displacing them for more than a month. The community rallied together, and they were grateful for all the support from around the country. Running water is a resource they no longer take for granted! They enjoyed a reunion with Professor Gayle Pemberton on a New England swing this July. Asheville is welcoming visitors again, so please let her know if you are in the neighborhood!

Julie Stankiewicz has started her own nonprofit advocacy organization entitled CARE for People with Chronic and Invisible Illnesses. CARE has an innovative and comprehensive approach, providing patients educational health resources, addressing prejudice and discrimination against people with chronic illness, and addressing larger environmental and cultural issues that contribute to chronic illness. Julie’s former thesis advisor from Wesleyan, Francine Rosselli, serves as secretary on CARE’s board of directors. As the organization grows, Julie would love help from Wesleyan alumni, particularly those with an interest in holistic and/or functional medicine, social advocacy for underserved groups, and nonprofit development. If you are interested in being involved, contact Julie at info@careaboutinvisibleillness.org.

Kate Standish is living binationally in Nicaragua with her 10-year-old son and husband, Tony, and doing clinical and research work out of Boston at Boston Medical Center, having completed fellowship training in breastfeeding medicine.

Stu Sherman is starting 2025 by launching a new business in Brooklyn, All Things Grow. The business offers classes on home growing cannabis and mushrooms as well as gardening supplies. 

Tejas Desai is planning to release his latest book, Bad Americans (The Human Tragedy, Volume 2), this year in an ambitious publishing campaign involving 18 distinct publications. The full schedule and more information about the Great American Pandemic Novel are on his website: http://tejas-desai.com. He ran into Michelle Burgos and her husband, Dave Weintraub, on Election Day in Astoria, Queens—they had just voted early and Tejas was running his monthly literary salon, The New Wei. He also got together with Bayard Templeton, Ted Quinn, and Laurie Shaner Quinn in Philadelphia.

Tricia Homer coaches executives and leads team-building retreats. She helps individuals and groups navigate conflict and articulate their vision and values. Her clients have included Comcast Global, Mozilla, Harvard Business School, the DNC, National Domestic Workers Alliance, and Clean Water Action/Fund. She does speaker coaching for conferences and conventions like the Clean Energy Buyers Association Summit and the New York State Employees Public Federation Convention. She’s also a keynote speaker and emcee. Credits include the closing keynote for the 2023 Big Ten Development Conference. After more than 10 years at the University of Maryland and two years as a senior program officer at the U.S. Institute of Peace, she’s left the DMV and returned home to the U.S. Virgin Islands, where she’s always happy to host! “Let’s do some good work together. Or COME VISIT!” 

John Graham has expanded his company’s cultural tour offerings with trips to Sicily and Ethiopia. He is also offering high-end boat charters in the Galapagos and Turkiye, with accompanying specialist guides. See www.johngrahamtours.com for all tours.

John Graham is living in Tbilisi, running cultural and hiking tours in the Caucasus Mountains. He visited the States in July and was thrilled to reconnect with Ari Wolfe, Josh Dankoff ’02, Nate Rich ’02, Tim Keiper ’02, Katie Takayanagi ’02, and Dan Firger ’01, and hopes to see even more friends next year. In May, John helped introduce Aaron Peisner ’12 to a number of folk ensembles, while he was visiting Tbilisi on a three-week research grant. Wesleyan alums are welcome to be in touch if they come through Tbilisi!

Paul Feder recently released Echoes, a synthpop EP and music video trilogy that explores his uneasiness about being replaced by AI, and it incorporates AI technology as a collaborator in the creative process.  

I’m sorry to share the news that Rachel Sirota has passed. My thoughts are with her friends and family. 

Becca (Joffe) Filson, NP ’03, found herself working as a hospitalist with Jim Most ’89 MD at Southwestern Vermont Medical Center in Bennington, Vermont, where they enjoy talking about Neon Deli orders and giving their Williams College colleagues a hard time. 

Roberta Pereira was recently appointed the Barbara G. and Lawrence A. Fleischman Executive Director of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, located at Lincoln Center. The library holds one of the world’s most extensive research collections in theater, film, dance, music, and recorded sound, as well as a wide array of circulating and reference materials. Roberta lives in New York City with her six-year-old daughter, Bianca, who also loves going to The New York Public Library and using her Spider-Man library card.

John Graham lives with his wife and three children in Tbilisi, Georgia, where he runs a cultural and hiking travel business. When traveling to Vermont this past summer, he saw Ari Wolfe, Adam Tuck ’05, and Josh Dankoff ’02.

Matt Kushner is currently working on installing Illuminarium Experience’s fourth venue, this time in the Wynn Hotel in Macau, China, after a successful opening of the first international venue in Toronto, Canada, in August. Lauren Kushner (Brown ’04) continues to create interactive animations at the American Museum of Natural History and is preparing for the production of the next planetarium show. Kids, Mimi and Tessa, are doing great in third and first grade respectively. They are both performing in dance and winter showcases at school.  

After 20-plus years in educational theater, Andrea (Wilson) McCoy recently joined the mass exodus of public school teachers to take on a new position as head of children’s services for a town library. Although it’s an adjustment not having summers off, she’s enjoying a better work-life balance with her spouse, two kids, and two dogs.

Leslie Spencer, née Burns, and her family of four—Izaac, Reid (11), and Cole (8)—had an amazing July in Costa Rica! They met every monkey and swam in every waterfall.

Matt Kushner just marked his two-year anniversary at Illuminarium Experiences, where he was recently promoted to director of software. In addition to Atlanta and Las Vegas venues, a new Illuminarium opened in Toronto at the end of the summer, a joint venture with Secret Location. More venues are on the horizon, both nationally and internationally, at the end of 2023 and into 2024. Meanwhile, Lauren Kushner (Brown ’04) continues to enhance the American Museum of Natural History’s museum experience with her animations, most recently in the brand-new Gilder Center where the insect interactives she collaborated on are featured. Kids, Mimi and Tessa, are thriving, enjoying summer camp, and ready to enter third and first grade respectively in the fall.

Ryan Garbalosa was recently honored with the Hilton P. Terrell Teacher of the Year Award by the McLeod Residency Program for his dedication to medical education. In May he teamed up with Greg Ferrucci and Carmen Carrillo to make the trek back to Wes for the 20th Reunion, making sure to visit their old rooms at La Casa and reminisce on the hill with fellow ’03ers. Along for the ride was wife, Lucy Garbalosa, and soon-to-be-born Rafael R. Garbalosa, making his first of many trips to Wesleyan!

George Obulutsa is still going strong as a journalist at Reuters News based in Nairobi.

After 15 years in Boston, Samantha (Gillombardo) Larson and her family relocated to her hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, in July 2021. Samantha started a home organizing business in Holliston in 2018 and has recently reopened in Shaker Heights! In March 2021, she, Emily Teitsworth, and their families reunited in southern Arizona for a visit punctuated by hiking, swimming, admiring Saguaro cacti, and consuming record-breaking amounts of guacamole. It was perfect.

John Graham lives with his family in Tbilisi. They welcomed a third child, Ilian Diasamidze-Graham, into the family. John is running a tourism company featuring hiking and cultural tours in Georgia, Armenia, Turkey, and Ethiopia; www.JohnGrahamTours.com.

While she still tries to think of herself as a New Yorker, Coe Will Hoeksema is back in her hometown of Hartford after living in Brooklyn for 17 years. She left her NYC architectural marketing job and joined a tech firm based out of San Francisco that focuses on knowledge management for architecture firms. She and her husband Craig work remotely and spend their limited free time fixing up their 115-year-old house and chasing after their three sons, Owen Calder (7), Luca Sinclair (5), and Eliot Wilder (2). She welcomes Wes friends to reach out if you’re ever passing through Hartford, there’s plenty of room for guests!

After two-and-a-half years of training, Ariana Mufson recently earned her AASECT certification (American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors and Therapists) as a sex therapist and is proud to add CST (certified sex therapist) to her credentials. She works as a psychotherapist in private practice out of Newton and Brookline, Massachusetts.

George Obulutsa is still going strong at Reuters news in Nairobi, where he works as a breaking news correspondent for Sub-Saharan Africa.

Tejas Desai’s latest novel The Dance Towards Death has won 12 literary honors. Despite being hit by an inattentive driver while on his “Road Trip across America” in May 2022, he has continued work on his latest book, Bad Americans (The Human Tragedy, Volume 2). During his research, he has received valuable assistance from many Wes alumni from across the world. Among others, Rachel Luria gave him a tour of the Hamptons; Bianca Sultana called him from Brazil to provide the inside dope on the NYC modeling world; and Vanessa Levine-Smith ’04 has advised him from Michigan on the rigors of social work. He’s deeply appreciative of this feedback and knows more Wes buddies will aid him in developing a great fifth book!

I’m looking forward to our 20th Reunion this spring and hope to see many of you there!