Class Notes

1950s

Ronald Botsko ’59 Granbury, Texas

Ron took a special interest in NASA’s recent mission to Mars, having invented methods and instruments used to test the integrity of spacecraft in the Saturn and Apollo missions to the Moon. He was featured in his local newspaper, the Hood County News. Ron earned his bachelor’s degree in metallurgy at Case Institute of Technology.

1960s

Joel Third ’60

Ridgefield, Connecticut Joel gave a virtual presentation on Currier & Ives prints at the Keeler Tavern Museum & History Center in January and February. He’s a passionate collector of antique prints, including those of the firm created by Nathaniel Currier and James Merritt Ives. Their lithographs were among the most popular wall hangings in 19th-century America.

Michael Diamant ’68

Shaker Heights, Ohio Michael was named to the 2021 SVAMC Tech List of the World’s Leading Technology Neutrals. SVAMC, the Silicon Valley Arbitration & Mediation Center, promotes efficient and effective technology dispute resolution by vetting and identifying leading experts. Michael earned his bachelor’s degree in engineering science from Case and his law degree from Harvard Law School. He serves on the board of the Case Alumni Foundation. underserved populations. He has worked in the medical device field for 30 years as an engineer, project manager, director and CEO and holds 17 patents. Peter earned his bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering from Case Institute of Technology.

1970s

Marc Karon ’70

Wellington, Florida Marc was inducted into the Heavy Duty Aftermarket Industry Hall of Fame during virtual Heavy Duty Aftermarket Week in January. He’s president and CEO of Total Trucks Parts in Florida. Marc entered the trucking business in the 1970s as an engineer for Bendix, where he earned two patents before moving to Florida to open a distribution business in 1979. Headquartered in West Palm Beach, Total Truck Parts has six locations across Florida and employs more than 100 people. Marc reports he has no plans to retire anytime soon.

Leonard C. Uitenham ’75, MS ’81, PhD ’85

McLeansville, North Carolina Leonard was inducted into the College of Fellows of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), which represents the top medical and biological engineers in the nation. He’s the National Institute of Aerospace Liaison Professor at North Carolina A&T State University, where he founded the first ABET-accredited bioengineering program at an historically black college. Leonard earned three degrees in macromolecular science and engineering at Case Institute of Technology, including his doctorate. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps for 31 years, was a naval aviator and retired as a colonel.

Peter Galen ’76 Portland, Oregon

Peter is the co-founder and chief innovation officer of Hemex Health, a Caseconnected startup that aims to create affordable, lifechanging medical diagnostics for

Debra Wilfong, ’78, MS ’82, PhD ’85

Minneapolis, Minnesota Debra shared her rich industry experience as part of the Women of Wonder: Sharing HERstory series, which celebrated Women’s History Month at CWRU. The former vice president of technology at BP, she also played innovation leadership roles at Donaldson Company and 3M. Debra earned three degrees in polymer science and engineering at Case Institute of Technology, including her doctorate. In retirement, she enjoys traveling and pursuing her love of art, wine and music.

1980s

Michael J. Folise ’81, LAW ’84

Seattle, Washington Mike is a patent lawyer and the author of The Inventor’s Handbook. He led a webinar on attaining and protecting intellectual property rights as part of a Veale Skills Lab in March. Mike earned his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and applied physics at Case Institute of Technology and his law degree at CWRU. He’s an attorney for Lowe Graham Jones PLLC in Seattle.

Laurence B. Glass ’81

Laramie, Wyoming Brett is the founder and owner of LARIAT. net, which Broadband Communities magazine describes as

the world’s first wireless internet service provider, or WISP. LARIAT.net has been in continuous operation since 1992 deploying rural broadband to unserved areas of Albany County, Wyoming, where the average population density is five people per square mile. Brett earned his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Case Institute of Technology.

Mike Bothe ’83 Uniontown, Ohio

Mike has joined Middough Inc., a Cleveland-based Engineering, Architectural and Management firm, as senior project manager. Previously, he was a senior process design engineer at Marathon Petroleum, where he worked for a dozen years. Mike earned his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Case Institute of Technology.

Mike Sieger ’83

Chagrin Falls, Ohio Mike, the claims president at Progressive Corporation, discussed the power of leading with accuracy and efficiency as part of the CWRU Entrepreneurship Speaker Series March 10. His career journey to the top of the insurance world began with an electrical engineering degree from Case.

Ron Cass ’84

Granger Township, Ohio Ron is the founder and CEO of DonorPoint, a donor engagement software developer formerly known as Big River. The company recently changed its name to reflect a refocusing of mission and business model. DonorPoint guides non-profit organizations toward ecommerce practices that make it easier for donors to support them. Ron, who earned his Case degree in Systems & Control Engineering, is first vice president of the board of directors of the Case Alumni Association and president of the Case Alumni Foundation.

Ka-Pi Hoh ’84, MS ’87, PhD ’89

Painesville, Ohio

Ka-Pi was a presenter at the second annual Mentoring Monday, a Feb. 22 summit that gathers hundreds of Northeast Ohio women to discuss and promote professional development. A three-degree alumna, she’s the organizational change management director at Lubrizol Corp. and was named one of Northeast Ohio’s Notable Women in STEM by Crain’s Cleveland Business.

Fares Mubarak ’84, MS ’85

Pleasanton, California Fares is the CEO of SPARK Microsystems, a Montreal-based semiconductor company specializing in low power wireless communications for the Internet of Things. He’s a seasoned Silicon Valley executive with more than 30 years of management and hands-on experience in semiconductor design and software development. Fares earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering at Case Institute of Technology.

Venkata Raja Gosula ’85, MS ’87

San Diego, California Raja is the digital ASIC DSP technical leader II at Cisco, leading project teams in the design of computer architecture. He held similar positions at Luxtera and Qualcomm. He came to Case as an international student from Brazil and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering. His microchip is in the Ingenuity helicopter that the Perseverance rover carried to Mars.

Elie Habib, MS ’85

San Jose, California Elie is the founder and CEO of MotivaimLeaders, where he applies his years of experience as a Silicon Valley corporate executive and entrepreneur as an executive coach. He’s also the co-founder and a board member of Lebnet, a network of Lebanese American professionals in the high-tech industry. Elie earned his master’s degree in computer engineering at Case Institute of Technology.

Kimberly Wiefling, MS ’86

Redwood City, California Kim is the founder and president of Wiefling Consulting, Inc., where she leads behavior-changing “WorkShoks” for global teams. In February, she led a workshop on design thinking and strategies for career success as part of the Women of Wonder series at CWRU. Kim earned her bachelor’s degree in physics at Case Institute of Technology. She’s the author of Scrappy Project Management.

Lee Morgan ’87

Gaithersburg, Maryland Lee is the official veterinarian of Alaska’s Iditarod Sled Dog Race, performing veterinary care for 300+ canines at checkpoints during the annual 30-day Nome-to-Anchorage dog sled race. He’s the owner of Georgetown Veterinary Hospital in Washington, D.C. Lee earned his bachelor’s degree in biology and a minor in chemistry from Case, where he ran track and field for legendary Coach Bill Sudeck and worked summers as a dolphin trainer at Kings Island.

1990s

Linda Rae, MS ’90

Shaker Heights, Ohio Linda has joined GE Digital in Cleveland as general manager of its Power Generation and Oil & Gas Business Unit. Previously, she was president of Qualitrol and before that commercial president of Tektronix. Linda earned her master’s degree in electrical engineering from Case Institute of Technology and her MBA from the Weatherhead School. Soon after, she joined Keithley Instruments, where she rose to become president and led Keithley through the acquisition by Tektronix. She’s a member of the board of directors of the Great Lakes Science Center.

Chris Holt ’95 Columbus, Ohio

Chris is the co-founder and COO of Power to Hydrogen, a Columbus startup that won a NASA grant to develop a power source for a future Moon base. The company was awarded $3.4 million to develop a prototype of its reversible fuel cell technology, which uses solar energy to produce hydrogen and power around the clock. It spun off from pH Matter LLC, a materials science company which Chris also co-founded. He earned his bachelor’s degree in physics at Case, where he was a brother of Sigma Alpha Epsilon.

Constance (Boua) Akani, MS ’96

Arlington, Texas

Constance is the chief executive officer at Texas IT Consultants. Previously, she was a principal application architect at Sabre Holdings and a manager of Data Warehouse Development at Travelocity. She earned her master’s degree in computer engineering from the Case School of Engineering.

Marzell Brown ’96

Euclid, Ohio

Marzell is the talent management lead for Rockwell Automation, where he develops relationships with colleges and universities and helps to build a talent pipeline of engineers. He also volunteers his time and skills to design and open MC2STEM and Design Lab high schools. Marzell, a product of Cleveland public schools, earned his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the Case School of Engineering.

Matt Whittaker ’96, MSE ’00, PhD ’07

Kirtland, Ohio

Matt is a crystal growth scientist and ICF Manager at Gooch & Housego, a global leader in photonics technology in the Cleveland suburb of Highland Heights. His team’s crystals were packed aboard the Perseverance rover to help analyze soil on Mars and team members were featured on local news reports after the successful landing Feb. 18. Matt earned three degrees in materials science at Case, including his doctorate.

Maria Bennett, MS ’98

Beachwood, Ohio

Maria has been named one of the Top 25 Women in Medical Devices for 2021 by The Healthcare Technology Report. She is the founder and CEO of SPR Therapeutics, a medical device company that has commercialized a non-opioid, nerve stimulation therapy designed to relieve pain. She also serves as vice president of the Beachwood School Board. Maria earned her master’s degree in biomedical engineering from the Case School of Engineering.

2000s

Justin Haselton ’03

Broadview Heights, Ohio Justin is the new engineer for North Royalton, Ohio, effective January 14. He and his employer, CT Consultants, will provide engineering services to the Cleveland suburb of 30,000 people. John joined CT in 2018 and has 13 years’ experience as a civil engineer.

Maxwell H. Briggs ’06, MS ’08, PHD ’15

Cleveland Heights, Ohio Maxwell in September became program executive of NASA iTech, responsible for connecting entrepreneurs and startups to the nation’s space program. Previously, he was the portfolio manager of the Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate and an economic development specialist at the NASA Glenn Research Center. Maxwell joined NASA Glenn in 2009 as a mechanical engineer. He earned three mechanical engineering degrees at Case, including his doctorate.

Susan (Lingenfelter) Paterson ’09

Highland Heights, Ohio Susan is a roadway engineer for the Cleveland offices of TranSystems, where she specializes in transportation engineering. She earned her bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering at the Case School of Engineering and her master’s at Cleveland State University.

2010s

Aaron Colorito ’10, MS ’11

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Aaron was chosen as the Engineers’ Society of Western Pennsylvania’s Young Engineer of the Year for 2020. He’s a senior structural engineer in the bridge design group of Michael Baker International, where he specializes in complex bridge analysis and bridge inspection and rehabilitation. He and his wife — Laura (Thompson) Colorito, CWRU ’12 — have two young sons, Leo, 2, and Walker, 6 months.

Abirami Muralidharan, PhD ’11

Minneapolis, Minnesota Abirami is a biomedical engineer for Abbott Laboratories, where she develops devices that promote the restoration and improvement of neurological and cardiac functions. She earned her doctorate in biomedical engineering at the Case School of Engineering.

Oluwakayode Omoyosi ’12, MEM ’14

Lakewood, Ohio

Kayode is the project technical lead at Clear Image Technology, a Cleveland medical device company specializing in miniature imaging devices. He’s also a mentor for Minds Matter Cleveland. Kayode earned his bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering at the Case School of Engineering, where he was a member of the National Society of Black Engineers and the Case African Student Union.

Katherine Colbaugh ’13, MS ’15

Cleveland Heights, Ohio Katie is the value stream manager and a materials scientist at Gooch & Housego, a global leader in photonics technology in the Cleveland suburb of Highland Heights. She was part of the team that grew crystals packed aboard the Perseverance rover to help analyze soil on Mars. Katie earned her master’s degree in materials science and engineering at Case.

Send your updates, including photos, about job promotions, professional development and personal milestones to casealum@casealum.org.

Zhuoying (Zoey) Jiang, MS ’14

Cleveland, Ohio

Zoey, a PhD candidate in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Case School of Engineering, was selected to participate in the 2020 CEE Rising Stars workshop hosted by Carnegie Mellon University. The workshop targets outstanding women doctoral students and postdocs interested in pursuing teaching and research careers in civil engineering. Zoey earned her master’s degree in Materials Science and Engineering at Case.

Ross Nanopoulos ’14

Quincy, Massachusetts Ross has joined the Product Security team at Digital Ocean, a cloudcomputing infrastructure provider with data centers worldwide. He was a founding software engineer at Komand, an internet security firm that was acquired by Rapid7, where he became lead security engineer. Ross earned his bachelor’s degree in computer science at Case, where he was a member of the Association of Computing Machinery and the Hacker Society.

Brooke Beecher ’15, MS ’17

Cleveland, Ohio

Brooke is the sports performance nutritionist for Case Western Reserve University varsity athletes and the owner and operator of Nutrition with Brooke. She helps to assess, educate and counsel Spartan athletes on their nutritional needs in order to optimize performance. A former CWRU women’s basketball player, Brooke ranks 10th in school history with 551 career rebounds. She earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in nutrition from the College of Arts and Sciences.

Kristina Collins ’16, MS ’19

Cleveland Heights, Ohio Kristina was the primary convener for the session, “Amateur Radio in Geophysics with HamSCI” at the virtual Fall 2020 meeting of the American Geophysical Union, a major scientific conference. She also organized a worldwide citizen science campaign to look at the ionospheric effects of the Dec. 14 solar eclipse. Kristina earned her degrees in electrical engineering at Case, where she was president of the Case Amateur Radio Club.

Kayla Andersen ’17, MS ’17

Rosemead, California As a mechatronics engineer for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, Kayla helped design robotic systems for the Perseverance rover and its Mars mission. She worked on the caching system that will collect samples seeking evidence of past life on Mars. Kayla earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering at Case. An internship led to a full-time job with NASA. In addition to working on robots for space exploration, she rock climbs, plays the trumpet and sings in local bands.

Elizabeth Fregoso ’18

Mountain View, California Elizabeth, a software engineer for Google, has become a mentor for the Women in Science and Engineering Roundtable (WISER) at CWRU. She earned her bachelor’s degree in computer science at Case, where she was president of the Association of Computing Machinery and founded CWRU’s ACM-Women’s chapter. Before joining Google in 2019, she was a Student Cyber Intern for the U.S. Department of Justice.

Darshan Parikh ’18

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Darshan is a hardware engineer in the Pittsburgh office of Netronome, a California-based designer of data center infrastructure. He earned two bachelor’s degrees at Case, in mechanical and electrical engineering, and served the school as president of the Case Engineers Council.

Jessica Qian ’18 Cleveland, Ohio

Jessica is a consultant and business technology analyst for Deloitte Consulting. She earned bachelor’s degrees in biomedical and mechanical engineering at Case, where she was president of the Case Engineers Council.

Chris Carr ’19

New York, New York Chris is an astrophysicist-in-training and a graduate student at Columbia University, studying galaxy evolution and the Milky Way. He earned bachelor’s degrees in physics and astronomy at CWRU, where he hosted the science radio talk show, Enter Galactic, on campus radio station WRUW-FM 91.1.

Send your updates, including photos, about job promotions, professional development and personal milestones to casealum@casealum.org.

Andrew Jimenez ’19

Cleveland, Ohio

Andrew has been named secretary of the board of the Latinx Alumni Association of CWRU. The Los Angeles native is a graduate research assistant at the NASA Glenn Research Center while pursuing his master’s degree in mechanical engineering at the Case School of Engineering.

2020s

Patrick Crossey ’20

Falls Church, Virginia Patrick is an engineer for Grunley Construction in the Washington D.C. area. The former captain of the Spartan football team has been awarded the prestigious NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship, which recognizes excellence on the field and in the classroom and includes $10,000 for graduate school. He’s the seventh player in the history of CWRU football to receive the award. Patrick earned his bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering with a focus on construction management.

Alexander Gordon ’20

Deerfield, Illinois Alex is an automation engineer at PCC Structurals, a Portland, Oregon-based supplier of structural castings to the aerospace industry. He earned his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering at Case, where he was active in the improv comedy troupe, IMPROVment, and played trumpet for the Spartan Marching Band.

Emily Herrmann ’20

Ogden, Utah

Emily is an associate systems engineer for Northrop Grumman. She earned her bachelor’s degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering at Case, where she also received UAA All-Academic recognition as a member of the Women’s Track & Field team. She was also a campus tour guide and a member of the Society of Women Engineers.

Jackson Routhier ’20

Westlake, Ohio

Jack has joined Invacare Corp. in Elyria as an associate development engineer. He began with the medical device maker through a co-op while earning his bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering. Jack brought humor to Case Quad as a member of the campus comedy troupe IMPROVment.

Ern Tan ’20

Cleveland, Ohio

Ern has joined OverDrive, a leading developer of online reading platforms, as an education product support specialist. She earned her bachelor’s degree in mathematics at Case, where she was a project leader for the Humanitarian Design Corps and wrote for The Observer.