Tag: 2007

Greetings, classmates. Megan here. As I write this, many of us are fresh off a weekend of Foss Hill picnicking and tent party dancing. Over 200 of us attended the 10th Reunion weekend at Wesleyan, but if you weren’t able to catch up with classmates in person, read on for some updates!

Johanna Goetzel was sad to miss Reunion, but delighted that Wes friends from 2005-2008 could join her and James Rising for their wedding on May 28 in Cape Cod. In January, they will be moving from Brooklyn to London, where Johanna will continue to work as the head of member engagement for The Climate Group and James will begin a role at LSE. Visitors welcome!

Nasim Khoshkhou sends word that she and her husband, Howard, moved to Bedford, N.Y., with their new baby boy, CJ, and two dogs.

Using our Wesleyan education as a strong foundation, many of our classmates have been busy completing graduate degrees. Veronica Slaght writes, “I graduated with my doctorate of psychology from Widener University in May and will be starting as a postdoctoral fellow at George Washington University’s Professional Psychology Program this summer. I’ll be seeing patients and helping to train psychology students in their community mental health clinic. Excited to connect with Wesleyan people in D.C.!”

Portia Hemphill says, “It’s been a busy few years! After obtaining my joint PhD in political science and public policy from the University of Michigan in 2015, I began work as a presidential management fellow in the federal government where I helped bring to scale two interagency President Obama initiatives (Promise Zones and My Brother’s Keeper) and served as the federal ambassador to Gary, Ind., in an effort to increase jobs for youth in the area. I also bought a cute fixer upper in Southeast D.C. that is a job all in itself, but where I now proudly call home. Hopefully we can have a Wes fest at my house in 2018!”

The Class of 2007 has also been making career headlines! Gavin Alexander lives in Brookline, Mass., and works as an associate in Ropes & Gray LLP’s Hedge Funds group. He serves as the co-chair of the board of directors of the Massachusetts LGBTQ Bar Association, and was named one of the “Best LGBT Lawyers Under 40” by the National LGBT Bar Association. Before starting at his firm, Gavin served as a law clerk to the Hon. Ralph D. Gants, chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.

Gabrielle Fondiller says, “The organization I co-founded, Hatua, is now 10 years old. Last year we graduated our first class of 14 students from university. One hundred percent of these young people are now working, earning three times Kenya’s average income.”

And Sarah Elmaleh writes, “I moved from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 2015 for videogame voiceover and have been happily working on a range of indie and AAA games, as well as some commercials and TV. Recent roles include voices in Final Fantasy XV and the female Viking Raider player character in For Honor. I’ve also judged the Audio category for the Independent Games Festival, and co-hosted and co-produced the IndieCade awards.” Sarah adds, “I was thrilled to find out about the new Computational Media: Videogame Design and Development course at Wesleyan. If there are other Wes alumni with a foothold in games who want to help me grow and expand the games presence at Wes, please do not hesitate to be in touch!”

As always, please keep sending your updates, career news, and life events to us.

Megan Harrington | wesleyan007@gmail.com

Victoria Belyavsky Pinsky | victoriapinsky@gmail.com

I am very excited to catch up on all the exciting news of my fellow ’07ers this May at our 10th Reunion! In the meantime, here’s a snapshot of the happenings of our class.

After traveling the last two years throughout Latin America, Laura Catana has spent the last year in Cuba, working with the island’s first independent music label, Guampara Music, alongside the talented musician DJ Jigüe. Based out of Havana, she has been involved in a variety of music events and productions, including music festivals, performances, and documentaries. Laura is not the only musician in the ’07 clan; Himanshu Suri is still a rapper. This year he’ll be performing at the Kaufman Music Center with pianist Vijay Iyer, and at Coachella with his new project, Swet Shop Boys. Rapping is pretty fun.

Meanwhile, Dante Furioso wrapped up three years at the Yale School of Architecture with an M. Arch I degree in May. He works for Selldorf Architects in New York. Scout James (née Michael) is in his third year of actor training at Juilliard’s drama division and has founded the only student-run newspaper there.

Amy Rosen is a recovering attorney who is writing corporate governance articles for CQ Roll Call, a D.C.-based company run by The Economist Group. Her stories are posted on Westlaw’s “Practitioner Insights” section. As she contemplates a move to the West Coast, she is running, lifting, and cooking, all while not trying not to forget the Chinese she learned from 2005 through 2007. She (sadly) just recently figured out Twitter and seeks interesting bird friends @amyleerosen.

Shawn Thomas Diefenbach recently relocated from Los Angeles to Brooklyn. He and his new pup, Champ, are living the dream.

And of course, we haven’t forgotten to ensure that there are students for future Wesleyan classes. Nasim Khoshkhou had a baby boy named Cameron (“CJ”) in October with husband Howard. They live in Bedford, N.Y., and would love to catch up with any Wes folks in the nearby area. Mary Campion Wolf and Patrick Wolf welcomed Eamon Peter Wolf (‘38?) to this bonkers world on Sept. 15. He is a great guy. The Wolf den is in Millburn, N.J. Mary is a pediatric hospitalist at Morristown Medical Center and Pat plucks strings in various locations with his band Goodnight, Texas. Nishita Roy-Pope (“Nya”) is loving life in Rhode Island. She and her husband, David, can’t believe six months have passed since the birth of their first child, Zamir! She is a consultant marketing manager at Dell and is infusing the Wes community service spirit into her work, including the establishment of a corporate high school internship program to promote STEM careers for girls.

Megan Harrington | wesleyan007@gmail.com

Victoria Belyavsky Pinsky | victoriapinsky@gmail.com

Greetings Class of ’07! Can you believe it? Our 10th Reunion is just months away. Hope to see you all on campus next May! In addition to Wesleyan alumni, many classmates have added a new title to their résumé: parent. Megan Harrington writes, “My husband, Brian (Princeton ’07), and I welcomed our first child, Teddy Paul Harrington, in June. We’re looking forward to showing him around campus ASAP!”

Fellow ’07-ers have followed suit:

Katie Koerten says, “I’m living in western Massachusetts with my husband, Matt Valliere (Hampshire ’07). Since graduation I’ve been sharing my curiosity and wonder for nature with children and families as an environmental educator in Amherst. Matt and I welcomed a baby daughter to our family in March. We love living close to Grace Nowakoski, and her husband, Jeff!”

David Scardella and Jaime Wendel welcomed a son, Andrew Reed Scardella, on May 31. David, Jaime, Andrew, and their dog, Penny Lane, reside in Duxbury, Mass.

Kara Schnoes and Jeremy Brown ’08 made the trek west from New York this summer, settling in Eugene, Ore. Jeremy is an emergency physician for Sacred Heart Medical Center and Kara continues her consulting role remotely for Rosetta out of NYC. They happily welcomed their first child and daughter, Edia Rae, on Sept. 2 and are grateful that mom and baby are healthy. Abby Austin and Julia Mergendoller joined in the fun with a due date visit and celebration.

Julie Edelman writes, “My husband, Oliver Broad, and I just welcomed baby #2 on Sept. 4: Lael Eve. Lael joins big sister Maayan Rose, who just turned 2. I’ve been living in Berlin, Germany for seven years this October! Would be thrilled to see any Wesfolks who pass through these parts!”

Wes grads have also been busy researching, studying, and making career moves. William Santiago moved from Florida to attend medical school at the University of Connecticut. He married Vladrose Santiago ’05 in 2008 and they have two girls: Lisette (5) and Natalia (18 months). William is proud that Lisette started kindergarten this fall and that Natalia has started speaking. He continues to enjoy poetry, dancing, basketball, and science.

Jon Pierowicz writes, “After graduating from the UCLA School of Law in 2015 and a brief stint in NYC, I returned to my hometown of Buffalo, where I work as an associate at Phillips Lytle LLP. I specialize in real estate development and environmental law.”

Matt Franco says, “I (finally) defended my PhD in the history of science at Johns Hopkins back in April. I am in the midst of settling my publishing contract with a university press, so maybe the book will be out by our 15th Reunion—ha! I had a bunch of interviews for professorships this year, but no offer, so I am still teaching as an adjunct professor at a small liberal arts school in Maryland. Hope to see you all at the 10th Reunion.”

Jessica Mack is headed back to Mexico City to do research for her dissertation on the history of UNAM, Mexico’s largest public university.

Rosa Cohen-Cruz married Elric Kline on June 18. The wedding was officiated by Jacqueline Rubinstein and was attended by several ’07 Wes alumni. Rosa left her job as staff attorney at Prisoners’ Legal Services of New York, and is now an immigration attorney at the Bronx Defenders.

Grace Nowakoski reports, “I’m loving my new work as a birth doula. It’s such an honor to help families on the journey of welcoming a little one. It’s great living in the Pioneer Valley near dear Wesleyan friend Katie Koerten and spending time with her beautiful baby daughter as often as possible.”

Our class is also making waves in the art world. Scout James is entering his third year in the Juilliard drama conservatory. And Leon Hilton writes, “I received my PhD in performance studies from New York University in May and have been teaching at Occidental College in LA. This year I am a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s Penn Humanities Forum.”

Jennifer Celestin received her MFA in fiction this year from Queens College of the City University of New York. Additionally, a microfiction piece that she began in Writers’ Bloc was published as a part of Akashic Books’ noir online series. She has been invited back to the Queens Library to facilitate a creative writing workshop for adults. She spent Labor Day weekend at a Wes ’07 wedding and in Vermont with Kaitlyn O’Donnell’s new bundle of joy. She’s settling into her new position in Harlem at SUNY/CUNY. She feels like Claudine, with the grace through adversity that only Diahann Carrol can bring. Every morning, she dances down 125th street like Mary Tyler Moore.

Maude Bass-Krueger received her PhD in decorative arts, design history, and material culture from the Bard Graduate Center in New York this past May. She’s completing a postdoctoral fellowship in the department of history at the University of Tel Aviv and moving back to Paris as a research fellow at the Modern History Laboratory of the CNRS (IHTP/CNRS). In Paris, Maude will direct a monthly seminar on dress history and prepare the opening of an exhibit she is curating, Mode et Femmes, 1914 to 1918, opening at the Museum of the Bibliothèque Forney in February. If you’re in Paris, drop her a line to grab a drink and get a tour of the show!

Finally, our class agents, Eric Altneu, Estrella Lopez, and Liam McAlpine would like to remind everyone to mark your calendars for May 25 to 28, and stay tuned for Reunion updates. Eric adds that he’s back in Ohio and looking for Midwest friends!

As we gear up for the big 1-0, keep the updates and good news coming! Send submissions to wesleyan007@gmail.com, victoriapinsky@gmail.com, or megan.kretz@gmail.com.

Megan Harrington | wesleyan007@gmail.com

Victoria Belyavsky Pinsky | victoriapinsky@gmail.com

Victoria writes: One more year until our 10th Reunion and a lot of excitement already brewing for the class of 2007! The careers of ’07ers are filled with excitement:

After finally receiving her dual Italian-American citizenship, Tess Amodeo-Vickery has been taking advantage of her open borders by touring her first studio album, Soul Whisperer, across Europe and North America, “collaborating with local artists to rediscover my music and my image as part of her Soul Voyager concept tour (soulvoyagertour.com).” For Wes alumni in the Boston area, she played Club Passim’s Campfire Festival on May 27 before continuing on to Montreal!

After spending his 20s on Capitol Hill advising members of Congress, like Rep. John Lewis (Ga.) (and becoming a 2015 defending Jeopardy! Champion), Will Anderson is headed back home to Atlanta. After a brief stint in corporate relations, Will returned to public service as communications director for the City of Atlanta’s Office of Sustainability. He’s focused on making his hometown a greener, stronger, and more sustainable place for everyone to live, work, and play. He encourages fellow civic-minded folk to reach out!

Jeffrey Petrusek graduated from Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine in May and will be starting an otolaryngology residency at Loyola Medical Center in July.

Vlad Gutkovich is living in Oakland, Calif., with wife Nicole Tirado-Strayer, who is finishing up a PhD in education. Vlad works at an education technology startup (Schoolzilla, PBC), and at a recent show in Oakland personally handed a copy of his Wesleyan thesis on Parliament Funkadelic to George Clinton.

Christopher Dieck will be starting his PhD in astrophysics at the Catholic University of America while continuing in his job monitoring the wobble of the earth at the US Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C. Also, he and his wife, Jacqueline Chapman ’08, will be celebrating their second wedding anniversary this September.

There have also been a number of mini Wesleyan reunions among friends happening across the country: Part of Hew X ’07 enjoyed a great dinner in Boston in April. Mariel Pina and her partner, Eva, were in from New York, along with Jon King to see Danny Silva, Julia Perciasepe, and Tory Masterson. We missed the little Masterson, Miles, but hope to see him and all our ’07 classmates at our 10th Reunion next May!”

In October 2015, Nicholaus Norvell married Adam Renteria in San Diego. Wes friends attending the nuptials included Victoria Santoro, Rob Mitchell ’06, Ellen Werble, and Andrew Bleeker.

We also have another new baby to welcome: Shelby Thurston Marscher and her husband recently welcomed baby girl Inara to their family. Shelby is also working on her thesis for her doctorate in school psychology.

Megan Harrington | megan.kretz@gmail.com

Victoria Pinsky | victoriapinsky@gmail.com

Greetings class of 2007! As we welcome spring, we also begin the countdown to our 10-year Reunion. Between new family additions and exciting career moves, our class has been busy. Mark your calendars—we’ll have a lot to catch up on at the tent party next May!

Wedding bells have been ringing for many of us and the big day often provides a great opportunity to see old friends. Frani Geiger was excited to celebrate with her 35 Home Ave. housemates Ben Levinger, Scott Diamond, Loren Adler, and Brandon Stein at her wedding in November. To add to the excitement, the whole 35 Home Ave. crew was able to spend time with the first baby in the group, Desmond Levinger!

Molly Shuster married Edward Otocka on Sept. 12, 2015, in her hometown in Massachusetts. Many Wes friends were in attendance, including Victoria Santoro, Tiffany Lo, Elise Meyer, Amanda Belichick, Nicole Foley Clement and Lirra Schiebler Hill. Molly and Eddie recently moved to Riverside, Conn., with their two dogs, Penelope and Shiloh. Molly continues to work as a freelance food stylist and writer. Her first cookbook is slated to be published in 2017 by Hachette Livre.

Yoni Rabino and Naomi Ray-Schoenfeld also got married this past summer! Yoni recently started a distillery called Neversink Spirits, where they make apple brandy, whiskey, and other liquors for people to enjoy. Naomi is a nurse practitioner working in NYC and they are living in Queens.

Over this past New Year’s—as they’ve done for several years running—Arielle Cohen, Erica Pasciullo Cahill, Annie Rorem, and Nicole Tirado Strayer got together for a celebration and adventure. These friends have had plenty to celebrate recently, including Nicole’s wedding to Vlad Gutkovich, and Erica’s to Chris Cahill—both in 2014. Arielle, a family nurse practitioner serving un- and under-insured patients at a Federally Qualified Health Center in Santa Rosa, and Nicole, a developmental psychology doctoral student looking forward to her 2016 graduation from Stanford University, live in nearby neighborhoods in Oakland. On the other side of the country, Erica, in the third year of her obstetrics and gynecology residency at George Washington University, and Annie, recently hired as the senior research manager for the National Women’s Business Council, are also lucky enough to live within walking distance of each other. These women look forward to welcoming Erica and Chris’ new baby into the mix in April of this year!

The Class of 2007 is also doing its part to fill future Wesleyan classrooms. Robert Chang writes, “Our oldest daughter Angelina is now 23 months old and we are expecting the arrival of her baby sister in March. We also just bought a house back in my hometown of Bethesda, Md. The girls are now within walking distance to the same primary and secondary schools that their father attended.”

In December, Abby Bader Bullock and her husband, Jon, welcomed baby daughter, Juniper Lou.

Melissa Mondesir Miller and her husband, Andrew, celebrated the birth of their son, Theodore Olivier, on Nov. 29, 2015. Theo can’t wait to have play dates with fellow Wes babies in NYC! Melissa also completed her master’s in fundraising management at Columbia University in October.

James Picariello is an equity analyst with KeyBanc Capital Markets in Cleveland. He received an MBA in finance from Washington University in St. Louis (2011). James married Hannah Stubbs ’06 in 2012. Hannah, who was inducted into the Connecticut Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2015, is a molecular medicine PhD candidate at the Cleveland Clinic and Case Western University, with research focused on brain cancer. Their son, Jack, was born in October 2015. The three Picariellos and their two dogs live in Shaker Heights at a home residence aptly numbered 3033 (James #30, Wes football; Hannah #33, Wes basketball).

Plenty of ’07 grads have been making Wesleyan proud when it comes to career success. Luke Mecklenburg graduated from the University of Colorado School of Law in 2014, was a law clerk for Chief Justice Nancy E. Rice of the Colorado Supreme Court, 2014–15, and now is an associate at the law firm of Snell & Wilmer L.L.P.

And 2015 was a big year for Portia Hemphill. In August, she received her joint PhD in political science and public policy from the University of Michigan and was chosen as a 2015 Presidential Management Fellow. Portia works at HUD’s headquarters in DC and is having a ball. She says, “See y’all next year!”

Gabrielle Fondiller has taken a one-year sabbatical from running her nonprofit in Kenya to pursue an MS in management at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. Gabi reports that, so far, she loves it! Meanwhile, her nonprofit is now sponsoring and mentoring 300 Kenyan students in high school and university.

Tessa Hirschfeld-Stoller is living in NYC and working on her PhD in neuroscience at Columbia University. Her research investigates the role of developmental serotonin in psychiatric disorders. When not in the lab, Tessa is doing photography, traveling, or on her bike! Also in NYC, Scout James (née Michael) is in his second year of Juilliard’s drama conservatory.

Himanshu Suri reports that he’s enjoying the Heritage Hotel Artist Residency in Goa, India. And in case anyone is wondering, he still raps.

As we gear up for the big 1-0, keep the updates and good news coming! Send submissions to wesleyan007@gmail.com, or either address below:

Megan Harrington | megan.kretz@gmail.com

Victoria Pinsky | victoriapinsky@gmail.com

Victoria writes: Max Baehr still lives in New York, which feels like it’s been going on both forever, and for all of 15 minutes. New York is like that, apparently. He lives in Brooklyn with his girlfriend, Abigail, and is planning on getting married mid-next year. So, fiancée, technically. In any case, she’s pretty cool. He’s recently taken a client-facing position with the marketing product Percolate, for which he is anxious and excited in equal measure. Max isn’t the only one tying the knot. Zach Canter recently (July 11) got married to the beautiful Christina Canter (née Ditolla), in Boston, their hometown. Many Wesleyan alumni and their spouses attended, including Gabe Landes ’02 (Zach’s brother-in-law), Shavawn Dean Waelsch, Chris Waelsch, Joe Pepe (best man), Brian Mahr, Tim Cullen, Molly Adams Mautone, Alex Mautone, James Picariello, and Hannah Stubbs Picariello ’06.

Allison Wilcox got married to her longtime partner, Will Connell, at her family’s farm in upstate New York, Woodshill Homestead; Mike James and Veronica Slaght were among those in attendance. Will and Allison then moved from Louisville, Ky., to the Upper Valley region of New Hampshire, where Allison has since started her residency in general surgery at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. They’d love to connect with any fellow Wes alums in the area!

Grace Nowakoski also had a whirlwind summer spent in the Pacific Northwest. She attended three weddings, including Jacqueline Rubinstein’s to her lovely bride, where it was nice to reconnect with the three out of four bridesmaids who were Wes folk: Nicole Sugerman, Emily Keeler, and Rosa Cohen-Cruz, spent time with her husband Jeff Diteman’s family, and grilled with old friends in Portland, Ore. Sadly, she didn’t make it to Brooke Duling’s wedding in beautiful windy Astoria. She’s happy to be back in western Massachusetts, where she gets to see Katie Koerten almost as much as she wants to, and runs into Rachel Lindsay ’05. She works as an assistant to a quilt artist and is training to become a doula while Jeff gets a PhD. She’s looking forward to her second New England autumn in six years!

Wesleyan grads are making a lot of great career moves. Eric Altneu is living in Houston for residency and is looking for other Wes grads in the area! Kerem Alper moved back to Istanbul, his hometown, to start a design incubator called Atölye Labs (atolyelabs.com) and opened a co-working space called Atölye Istanbul (atolyeistanbul.co) for the creative community.

Kimberly Greenberg graduated in May from an MBA program at the University of Notre Dame, which was a great experience—oh, and very different from the Wesleyan environment, to say the least! She then moved out to the Bay Area to work with a tech start-up, and her goal is to ultimately work in impact investing. As always, she loves catching up with Wesleyan folks out here and elsewhere 🙂 Hit her up if you’re in the Bay Area and want to catch up, crash with her, etc.!

Over the summer Daphne Clyburn graduated from Bennington College’s Master of Arts in Teaching a Second Language program. She continues to teach Spanish at Saint James School in Hagerstown, Md., and she is excited about taking what she learned both at Wesleyan and Bennington and rethinking what learning a language looks like for young people today!

Patrick Meaney just wrapped shooting on his first narrative feature film, Trip House. The movie shot in LA for a month in August and had the assistance of several younger Wes grads on the crew. It will hopefully be out next year.

After graduating from Temple Law and practicing in Philadelphia, Amy Rosen now works as a corporate governance analyst for CQ Roll Call in Washington, D.C. She recently finished the Ocean City, N.J., half marathon in 1:54:52.

When Brian Dilks-Brotman last checked in, he was working in Philadelphia as a wage and hour attorney, helping victims of wage theft obtain the compensation owed to them by greedy bosses who tried to cheat them out of their pay. He has since changed jobs, but he is proud to say that he is still fighting greedy bosses, as a staff representative for a public sector union in New Jersey.

Other Wesleyan graduates are helping to create the Wesleyan classes of the future. Janine Criscuolo Sax and Ben Sax just had their first baby girl on May 8th—Zoe Caroline Sax!

Zachary Kolodin and his wife, Hilary, celebrated the birth of their son, Jett, on Sept. 3, 2015. Zach graduated from NYU Law in May 2014, and is now an associate at Boies, Schiller & Flexner. He will be clerking for Judge Edward Korman of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York starting in 2016, followed by Judge Chester Straub of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Zach, Hilary, and Jett live in Brooklyn.

Victoria Pinsky and Megan Harrington | wesleyan007@gmail.com

The Class of 2007 has been busy making moves—both literally and figuratively. After many years in New York City, I recently traded in a city of 8 million for a small town of 1,900. I’m now living in Cambridge, N.Y. (a stone’s throw from the Vermont border), and welcome any and all visitors!

After two years in Montreal, Kathleen Day and her husband, Karl Otto, are back in Chicago, Kathleen’s home town. The couple has been living in and fixing up the house where Kathleen grew up, while she works as a development associate at an affordable housing development organization. Kathleen says, “Coming back to Chicago was not an easy decision (Québec has such a fantastic quality of life), but I wanted to go back to my roots and make an impact where I know it’s needed. In my professional life I work on the revitalization of neighborhoods through the development of quality affordable housing, and in my community I work with my neighbors on anti-violence and youth development actions.” Kathleen added that she had the pleasure of catching up with Liam McAlpine, Ben Sax, Janine Criscuolo, Mira Wijayanti, Brittany Speisman Kugler, and Alicia Dodds at Liam’s wedding to Sam Gulino in Beacon, N.Y., last fall.

In early June, Nicholaus Norvell rode his bike 545 miles from San Francisco to Los Angeles over the course of seven days. The ride’s purpose was to raise money for HIV/AIDS services as part of AIDS/Lifecycle. Nicholaus says, “I would love other ’07ers to join me in future years!”

Ian MacLeod recently spent some time with Alex Early and her husband, Alexis. The old friends had a great night out on the town in the Mission District of San Francisco. When he isn’t checking out San Francisco’s hot spots, Ian can be found working as a restoration ecologist for the California Department of Conservation, Office of Mine Reclamation.
This comes as no surprise, but the class of 2007 is one smart bunch. We have multiple graduations to celebrate, as well as a national TV appearance! Jessica Mack just finished an MA in history at Princeton and will be starting dissertation research for her PhD this summer in Mexico City.

Lauren Smith graduated from Berkeley Law and completed a fellowship at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, in the Office of the U.S. Chief Technology Officer.

Michael James (d.b.a. Scout James) is entering his second year in Juilliard’s drama division as an MFA candidate.

If you noticed a familiar face on the television this past winter, you weren’t imagining it. As of January 2015, Will Anderson became a repeat Jeopardy! champion. When he’s not searching for the Daily Double, Anderson serves as a senior policy adviser in Washington, D.C., for a House member from Georgia.

And last but certainly not least, Marlon Bishop won a Peabody Award for his 2014 investigation into gang violence and child migration in Honduras for the NPR program Latino USA. The episode was titled “Gangs, Murder, and Migration in Honduras.”

The last several months have brought weddings, exciting career changes, and cross-country and global relocations for the class of 2007. Tory Molnar was married this past summer (Sept. 1). In attendance were Julia Perciasepe, Danny Silva, Eric Altneu, and Mariel Pina! It took place in Ipswich, Mass. In spite of the 100-year floods that washed out the roads to her wedding site a week beforehand, Abby Bader still managed to marry Jonathan Bullock in Denver on Sept. 21st. Antonietta Kies ’06 was Abby’s maid of honor, Cassye Dunkhase ’06 played the cello, and Annie Park, Gian Ishino, Patrick Meaney, and Brendan Dolan-Gavitt ’06 attended! Good times were had by all. Abby also changed jobs in the past year, and is now the manager of software engineering at Spectraseis, Inc.

From moving to the Dominican Republic and teaching, to now-married-for-six-years and living in Inwood, NYC, with her husband and 4-year-old son, every year brings wonderful transitions to Yokasta Tineo. Yokasta recently graduated from the Swedish Institute and is now a licensed massage therapist and Reiki practitioner, who will also soon be a certified personal trainer and certified doula. She has also joined the board of the Brotherhood-Sistersol, a nonprofit which she has been part of since 2002 and is her second family. 2014 has been a year of accomplishments and new beginnings, and she looks forward to sharing all of this with her Wesleyan community.

The class of 2007 also has several new attorneys to welcome to the mix. In May Nicholaus Norvell graduated from the University of San Diego School of Law and will be starting in September as a public law associate at the Sacramento office of Meyers Nave Riback Silver & Wilson. Simon Au is a fresh-faced yet cynical attorney at Mayer Brown.

Other ’07ers have been working on starting their own companies and projects. Andrea Silenzi ’07 has started her own radio show on WFMU in Jersey City, N.J., called Why Oh Why. The show recently featured an interview between Holly Wood ’08 and Avery Trufelman ’13 discussing why dudes never want to be our boyfriends and adulthood is a social construct. It’s only a matter of time before they are asked to join the writing cast of HBO’s Girls. Judith Klausner co-founded the smallest art museum in the world, The Mµseum (check it out online at themicromuseum.com!).

Chris Krovatin continues pouring time and money into the ever-widening gyre of his adult life. By day, he works at Random House; by night, he writes children’s horror novels. His band, Flaming Tusk, is wrapping up the recording of their second full-length album. He can be heard hosting the show Invisible Oranges on Tuesday nights at 10 p.m., on East Village Radio, where he broadcasts under his journalistic pen name Scab Casserole. After 10 years in the US, which started with coming to Wesleyan, Kerem Alper moved back to Istanbul to start a design and innovation hub. You can find out more at atolyeistanbul.co. Kerem is excited to be back home. Himanshu Suri has also traveled a long way and is on self-imposed exile in India.

Others have only traveled cross-country. Vlad Gutkovich is living in the San Francisco Bay Area with his now fiancée, Nicole Tirado Strayer. He’s working with a B-Corp education technology startup in Oakland. Ian MacLeod is also enjoying his new home in beautiful California. He has been mountaineering, backcountry skiing, and plans to move to Sacramento for a new job! Visitors encouraged.

Victoria Belyavsky and Jesse Bardo
wesleyan2007@gmail.com