Notre Notes

NEWSLETTER - SUMMER 2020

IN THIS ISSUE...

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169th Commencement Exercises

Celebrating the Class of 2020 Griffins

Alumni Profiles

2020 Women of Impact Honorees

ND' s 169 th G raduating C lass On Saturday, June 6th, the ND community came together virtually to celebrate as the Class of 2020 Pink & Blue Griffins became Notre Dame High School's 169th graduating class.

Among the 154 graduates were an unprecedented 52 who earned Highest Academic Honors.

Valedictory Speaker Divya Nair '20

Although the final weeks of their senior year were vastly different than expected, the Griffin spirit remained strong.

Speaking of their resiliency, valedictory speaker Divya Nair '20 said, "What makes us special, and what gives us (all jokes aside) 2020 vision, is that we have the clarity to see who we are and how we fit into the world around us. We embody our graduation outcomes as we truly are community leaders, justice advocates, life-long learners and spiritual seekers. We call ourselves Griffins for a reason. We are fierce enough to stand up to injustices and persevere. We are change-makers and activists, enriched rather than beaten down. The string of life-changing events we experienced and influenced in high school has taught us that life won’t always be smooth sailing, and our cries for justice will undoubtedly resound past our high school experiences. But Griffins, we are now ready to take life head-on with what we have learned. The sheer resilience of our voices, minds and souls allows us to build the future we want and bring change to the world in our own right." Divya will be attending Johns Hopkins University in the fall where she will major in molecular and cellular biology.

Sophie Ciechanowski '20, who will be attending Creighton University in the fall, delivered the salutatory address. She shared this Saint Julie quote: "We must have courage in the century we live in. Great souls are needed, having the interests of God at heart" and praised her Class of 2020 sisters for their commitment to justice and compassion. "Along with an accepting and inclusive spirit, the Griffin class is tied together by a common commitment to justice in our world. Our individual identities and perspectives are shaped by our various faith traditions, experiences and interests. From these, Notre Dame has shown us that devotion to service and social responsibility is a value that can tie us together. We’ve learned about human dignity and the common good from scripture and ethics, history and literature, and now know how to apply these very human, Catholic social teachings to the injustices we read about in our textbooks, and the hardships endured by members of our communities. We’ve learned how to approach social justice issues with awareness, analysis, discernment and action. Notre Dame has given us the tools to find our passions, and our class has taken these instructions to heart. In the Class of 2020, our century will find great souls to change the world."

Julie Billiart Award Recipient Sophie Ciechanowski '20

You can view a video of the graduation ceremony on our website at www.ndsj.org/ClassOf2020.

Principal’s Message Dear Notre Dame community, We are at the end of the 2019-2020 school year, Notre Dame’s San Jose 169th year. As I reflect on this most unusual year, I am grateful for our school community’s resiliency. The faculty pivoted in March and jumped into remote instruction, teaching their students from afar. Students took to Zoom and finished dance, science, art, all of their classes, from their living rooms, kitchens and bedrooms. Parents supported their daughters and their teachers. The Class of 2020 accepted the limitations of their senior year and joined a car parade in the parking lot under 280, walking the red carpet through pomp and circumstance to receive their diplomas.

Everyone did what was asked of them to meet the restrictions of the coronavirus pandemic.

Mary Beth Riley delivers a diploma to Nathalie Valencia '20 with the help of a pizza peel!

Notre Dame is not new to embracing the world around it and evolving to respond to the times. The school was here through the 1918 flu epidemic and I’m certain there were personal losses in our community. The school walked through the social impact of the civil rights movement in the 50s and 60s and emerged more committed to justice. The Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur have been challenged as a Catholic religious order of women and rely on the gospel, Jesus and Saint Julie to guide them as they respond. We are blessed with examples of challenge and resilience in our long history.

These same values of our Catholic faith and Notre Dame mission guide us today as we work to build a school model in 2020-2021 that will meet the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic and as we work to be in right-relationships with our students of color and dismantle policies, assumptions and behaviors of racism. I am confident that this community will meet these challenges and become another chapter in Notre Dame's proud legacy.

As the scaffolding comes down on the Center for Women's Leadership and the paint goes up on the outside, there is no question that this building is so much more than we imagined a year ago. The programs that we envisioned on each floor — STEM, integrated humanities, and Catholic in the 21st century — will strengthen our responses to compelling concerns around health, climate, systemic racism and Catholic worldview. When we cut the ribbon on August 18th, the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment granting women the right to vote, we will do so with both celebration and a commitment to educating needed leaders for the future.

I hope that you are all with us in spirit, and in Notre Dame,

Mary Beth Riley, Principal

Don't know what goes here Do you know of a classmate or other Notre Dame graduate doing good work in her community and/or career? We are compiling a list of Notre Dame alumni in various industries to honor and highlight as part of our Women of Impact activities. These are women of all ages building successful careers and/or working to make a real difference — serving the underserved, protecting the environment, or improving quality of life for those around them. Please take the time to nominate a member of the Notre Dame life-long network of alumni for this special honor. Nominations are now open online HERE and due August 1.

Seniors were invited to show their college sweatshirt pride as they prepare for the transition to learning beyond Notre Dame. Join us in celebrating these students as well as all members of the Class of 2020! View the complete list of college acceptances and read about their individual stories, dreams and plans for college at www.ndsj.org/Classof2020.

Most popular majors for the Class of 2020: • Chemistry/Biology/BioChem

• Political Science/International Affairs

• Computer Science

• Psychology/Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

• Business/Economics

• Nursing

• Engineering

• Arts

• Environmental Science

The Class of 2020 Pink & Blue Griffins Notre Dame’s 169th class of graduates earned accolades and were rewarded for their four years of hard work in academics, co-curriculars and the community.

Students in the

CLASS of 2020 were offered just under

16

MILLION

$

in scholarships

14

students in the class are First Generation to College

Where they're going 48% Private 28% UC/CSU 10% Out-of-State Public 8% Community College 3% International 3% Gap Year

154 5,497

students in the Class of 2020 served

100

of seniors who applied to colleges and universities were accepted

hours of community service with local and global organizations

99

75%

Over the course of their four years, the class has served

of students are matriculating to colleges and universities listed in Princeton Review’s List of Best Colleges

16,880 $429,258 total hours valued at

63

%

%

attending

college within California

37

%

attending

out-of-state colleges

"Graduating" with the Class of 2020 Three beloved educators also "graduated" from Notre Dame after many years of service to Notre Dame students. We wish them well on their retirement and the next chapter of their lives!

Charlotte Carlson has taught in the English department for 25 years.

Tori Evashenk has taught in the science department for 31 years.

Karen Herr has been part of the P.E. department for 33 years.

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S enior A warded R egeneron H onor In November, Shruti Sridhar '20 submitted a research project titled "Investigating Genetic Mechanisms of the Vascular Endothelium Using Deep Learning and Single-Cell Transcriptome Analytics” to the Regeneron Science Talent Search (STS), a national competition that recognizes original science research by high school seniors. "I am very passionate about computer science and artificial intelligence (AI), as well as biology," shared Shruti. "My project applied various AI methods towards analyzing healthy and cancerous immune cell datasets, with the goal of enhancing cancer immunotherapy.

I worked on this project throughout junior year and the summer before senior year, collaborating with a local lab. I was honored Shruti Sridhar '20 at BioGENEius competition to be named one of the top 300 national semifinalists in the STS competition, which includes a scholarship and money to go towards Notre Dame’s STEM program. This accomplishment was extremely meaningful to me, as it was the culmination of more than a year of hard work. I felt a sense of satisfaction and confidence in being able to effectively communicate my work to professional researchers in the field. It has also motivated me to continue pursuing computer science-related research in college."

Having been awarded 2nd place at the Amgen BioGENEius competition, Shruti was also invited to present at the California Life Sciences Association Pantheon DiNA Awards in November. "I was able to summarize my project on stage and network with several prominent researchers in the biotech field that I aspire to get involved in. It was an incredible opportunity to share my research with experts in the field, learn about their career trajectories, and solidify my career goals and scientific passions."

Shruti will be attending Stanford University in the fall to study biomedical computation. "My experiences presenting my research at Amgen BioGENEius, the DiNA Awards, Regeneron, and at the American Geophysical Union conferences through ND’s science research cohort have provided me the experience, confidence, and motivation to continue pursuing research in college and beyond," shares Shruti.

In other accomplishments, Shruti was awarded the CBS TV San Francisco Jefferson Award and the Prudential Spirit of Community Award for her work with Makers of Tomorrow (MOT), her non-profit organization. MOT’s mission is to empower underserved youth by introducing them to the vast possibilities that engineering and innovation provide by offering hands-on engineering classes that emphasize the accessibility, diversity and ubiquity of STEM. The sessions engage students with fun projects and equip them with technical skills, perspective, and confidence needed for future career success. She was also recognized at a San Jose City Council meeting, receiving a commendation from Mayor Sam Liccardo and Councilmember Magdalena Carrasco.

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S ervice A ward R ecipient Notre Dame’s Catholic in the 21st century approach provides a vibrant education for justice and leadership so today’s students can confront challenging and complicated issues in society. For Charlotte Ng ’20, the study of science and engineering go hand-in-hand with what her Notre Dame education has taught her about social justice.

Charlotte’s experience brought issues of disparity into focus both in and out of the classroom. Inspired by science teacher An Tam Vu’s chemistry project, where students examine whether the daily nutritional requirements of our unhoused and lowincome downtown neighbors are met, Charlotte rallied peers and created a club, Charlotte Ng '20 Homeless Not Hopeless, to respond to homelessness. Wanting to take a leadership role, she also ran for ASB commissioner of service and was elected. In her junior year, she traveled to New Orleans and helped rebuild homes still decimated by the effects of Hurricane Katrina. And her own direct service with downtown non-profits including the Window at the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Joseph, Martin Luther King, Jr. Library and Sacred Heart Community Service expanded her awareness of the diverse needs that regularly go unmet in our local community, including equitable access to science education.

For her Senior Service Learning Project (SSLP), Charlotte and classmate, Maria Le ’20, partnered with Sacred Heart Community Service’s annual Summer Academy, which provides academic, social and emotional development support to elementary-age students. Together, they taught a fifth grade biology and chemistry enrichment class, including labs, lectures and projects. “We chose to work with Sacred Heart because of the Catholic social teachings they address,” shares Charlotte. She recognizes that her service and advocacy offer an analytical and human vantage point on systemic barriers to education equity. “In the future I hope to use science to benefit different communities. As a leader, we have to be cognizant of the different communities we are serving and our impact. I believe the goal of leadership is to establish relationships with communities and build solidarity. During my junior year, I interviewed Ms. Vu for religion class and she talked about how, as a teacher, she saw God in all of her students. At that point, I didn’t understand what that meant, but when I became a teacher at Sacred Heart, I finally understood. I saw a lot of resilience and empathy in the students that was really inspiring.”

Charlotte is the recipient of the Sr. Margaret Hoffman, SNDdeN, Woman of Service Award, annually awarded to the outstanding graduate who demonstrates a consistent record of significant community service, who engages in leadership and becomes an advocate who confronts society’s injustices. The Carnegie Mellonbound graduate recently commented, “Notre Dame’s curriculum and emphasis on social justice helped me discover my passion for both engineering and advocacy, and has prepared me for the next stage of my life.”

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CLASS NOTES Karen Cauhape '60 Calcagno (1) CPCC, PCC, ORSCC, is the founder of Advantage Family Business Center, based in Soquel, CA. She works with families and multigeneration family businesses to help them design their legacy to fulfill their values.

A historic adobe belonging to the great grandfather of Judi

Sepeda '60 Cigan (2) was discovered

near the Notre Dame campus when the site for The Pierce (condominiums) at Market Street and Pierce Avenue was being cleared. The Zepeda adobe was too deteriorated for excavation but a plaque recognizing the historic building was placed near the front door of The Pierce.

The Class of '62 (3) has been meeting regularly for lunch for several years since its 50th reunion in 2012!

Last fall, the group gathered to celebrate their 75th birthday in style. They met for a lovely lunch at The Villages and viewed a great slide show that included highlights of their years (1958 -1962) at Notre Dame as well as many graduation pictures.

Juleantonette Lopez '03 (4)

accepted a new position as event manager for Apple’s legal organization focused on the Inclusion & Diversity Program. She manages external conferences and speaking engagements, volunteer and pro bono activities, and employee engagement events.

her husband, Patrick, welcomed a baby boy, Owen Hao Hsiang Li, on January 16, 2020.

of Experimental Mechanics) and GCURS (Gulf Coast Undergraduate Research Symposium). She will begin research this fall in Rotordynamics working at the Turbomachinery Lab at Texas A&M University.

Quinn Cabral '14 (7) graduated with a

Frances Maurer '16 (11) graduated

Michelle Jusinski '08 Lopez (5)

married Richard Lopez on August 11, 2019.

Rebecca Lee '08 Li (6), along with

master of arts degree in education from Stanford University and a secondary mathematics teaching credential.

Athena Canjura '16 (8) graduated

from American University with a BA in international relations. She is currently the finance assistant for the Nicole Galloway for Governor campaign in Missouri.

Lauren Compitello '16 (9) graduated from

the University of Portland with a BA in environmental ethics and policy and a minor in psychology.

Brianna Johnson '16 (10) recently

completed a summer internship at Sandia National Laboratories with a first author on non-linear dynamics research published at IMAC (Society

with a degree in film and digital media and a minor in politics from UC Santa Cruz.

She is currently doing volunteer work and, along with fellow alumna Athena Canjura '16, started a book club for alumni.

The book club is a place for learning and discussing history and justice with peers, and learning how history and theory can inform knowledge about current events.

For more information on how to join the book club, email francesmaurer0@ gmail.com.

Allison Quintilla '16 (12) graduated

with a Bachelor's in health science from Dominican University of California. She is a part of the 4+1 BS to MSOT program (5 years) and will be on her 5th-year graduate track to receive an MS in Occupational

Therapy (OT) in the upcoming fall term. Once Allison graduates with her MSOT, she plans to do fieldwork to prepare her for the NCOT for the OTR/L.

Michelle Ramirez '16 (13) graduated

from Scripps College with a double major in psychology and Chicanx/Latinx studies on the pre-law track.

She is the first in her family to graduate from college and earned Phi Beta Kappa Honors, Summa Cum Laude, and the Ray Buriel Memorial Prize.

Allie Tracy '16 (14) graduated

from Regis University with a degree in communications and a minor in business marketing (pictured with her are Avery and Alana, also ND Class of 2016).

Calling the Class of 1961! Interested in helping with your 60th reunion? Contact Judy Kayser ’61 Fitzgerald at jkfitz@sbcglobal.net

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Alumni Profiles Genie Isaacson ‘55 Pearman: RN on the Front Lines As a Notre Dame student, Genie wanted to pursue a career in journalism. She wanted to be a crime reporter, “to be in the middle of things.” While on a field trip to the San Jose Mercury News, she mentioned this to the publisher who told her that was not a place for girls but that she could write for the Society Section. That was the end of that dream!

Later she told Sister Dorothy Marie, the biology and science teacher, she was now thinking of becoming a teacher. Sister Dorothy Mae saw Genie’s strength in science and persuaded her to take the entrance exam for O’Connor Hospital’s Nursing School. Genie, who hated tests, reluctantly agreed and the following Saturday was one of 24 ND students taking the exam. Genie passed and was on her way to a career in nursing that would span 54 years.

As a registered nurse, Genie worked in several medical offices before landing at Good Samaritan Hospital in 1975 where she worked for almost 40 years. She was on the front lines during the HIV crisis and worked with other debilitating diseases including flesh-eating viruses. She found that although it hadn't been her first choice for a career, she indeed loved nursing.

Suzanne Imbornone ’59 Swanson: ThirtyOne Women Supporter Suzanne recently joined a ThirtyOne Women circle in support of tuition assistance. In the summer before her junior year, her parents divorced and her mother told her she could no longer afford Notre Dame. Notre Dame was Suzanne's second home, a place where she was learning about leadership as student body president in addition to getting an excellent education.

Her mother, a long-time employee of Hart’s Department Store in downtown San Jose, was able to help Suzanne get a job at Hart’s which paid for her final two years at Notre Dame as well as her education at San Jose State University. The support she received from her mom's co-workers, many of whom had limited educational opportunities, was important to Suzanne. They had watched her grow up and considered her success their own success. Now, as a member of ThirtyOne Women, she is making a Notre Dame education possible for a deserving student from a financially challenged family.

Amy McEntee ‘92 McFadden: Bringing COVID Care to Underserved Communities Amy currently serves as chief medical officer at Salud Para La Gente, a federally qualified health center in Watsonville caring for 28,000 patients, many of whom are farm workers or work in agricultural and service industry jobs. The center provides comprehensive care which includes addressing social determinants of health through connecting patients with social and legal services as well as food distribution sources.

During this time of COVID-19, Amy’s role has been to prepare the clinic to provide services to the community in a safe way while ensuring that patients have the resources they need to stay healthy. This has included setting up an outdoor clinic for sick patients and testing, converting most routine visits to tele-health visits, working to contact all patients to educate them about COVID-19 and prevention, providing assistance to acquire medications and helping them access financial support when needed. Despite these efforts, the community has been greatly impacted. Farm workers, considered essential, have continued to work but low wages and crowded housing conditions have made prevention and care particularly challenging. Amy and her Salud Para La Gente team continue to adjust their approach as they work to meet the needs of the community.

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Notre Dame continues a commitment to celebrating women's leadership. Join us in recognizing our 2020 honorees at the Women of Impact event on October 22, 2020.

Sandra Moore Faber

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andra Faber is University Professor Emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a staff member of the UCO/Lick Observatory. She is an observational astronomer with research interests in cosmology and galaxy formation. Some of her major discoveries include the first structural scaling law for galaxies (called the Faber-Jackson law), large-scale flow perturbations in the expansion of the Universe caused by superclusters of galaxies, and super-massive black holes at the centers of galaxies. In 1984, she and three colleagues presented the first detailed treatment of galaxy formation based on “cold dark matter,” which became the standard paradigm for galaxy and cluster formation in the Universe. Faber earned a bachelor's degree in physics from Swarthmore College and a PhD in astronomy from Harvard. She has received various awards for her work and holds honorary degrees from six colleges and universities in the United States and abroad.

Fatima Farheen Mirza '09

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atima Farheen Mirza was born and raised in California and graduated from Notre Dame in 2009. Her father grew up in the city of Hyderabad in Southern India while her mother came from a British-Indian family in Birmingham, England. They raised their family in the San Francisco Bay Area, and Mirza said at times she felt like both an insider and outsider of her community, faith and family. At 18, while on the pre-med track at the University of California, Riverside, Mirza tried her hand at fiction, tackling a story about the Muslim diaspora in America that was informed by her own experience as a first-generation daughter in an immigrant family. She is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and a recipient of the Michener-Copernicus Fellowship. She has taught creative writing and fiction courses at the University of Iowa, Catapult and NYU. Her debut novel, A Place For Us, was an instant New York Times best seller and is being translated into seven languages. Her essays have appeared in GRANTA and The Good Immigrant.

Notre Dame has chosen Fatima's novel, A Place for Us, as the ND Reads selection for 2020. We look forward to her author talk in the fall.

From Amazon: "A Place for Us is a book for our times: an astonishingly tenderhearted novel of identity and belonging, and a resonant portrait of what it means to be an American family today. It announces Fatima Farheen Mirza as a major new literary talent."

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NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION 596 S. 2nd Street San Jose, CA 95112 Address service requested

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Support the Center for Women's Leadership with a tribute to an important woman in your life!

We invite you to honor your daughter, mother, grandmother, mentor or any woman who has influenced you by purchasing an engraved brick in her name. Bricks will line our Women of Impact Plaza and leave a lasting legacy alongside the Center for Women's Leadership.

Visit our website at www.ndsj.org/CWL, use the envelope included in this publication or give us a call at 408.294.1113 ext 2157 to purchase your brick.