Occidental Magazine - Spring 2022

Office of Communications F-36 1600 Campus Road Los Angeles CA 90041-3314

SPRING 2022

Nonprofit U.S. Postage Paid Occidental College

Josh Schlisserman ’19 Brings Crypto to the Masses

President Elam’s Inauguration Goals

Address Service Requested

SPRING 2022

Last fall, attorney Michael White ’76 read a Los Angeles Times story about USC’s plans to award diplomas posthumously to 120 Japanese American students deprived of a USC degree during World War II. The story prompted him to research Oxy’s own wartime efforts, when President Remsen Bird wrote prospective colleges and offered letters of hope and encouragement to the six Japanese American students enrolled at Occidental in 1942. Bird also had the foresight to persuade College librarian Elizabeth McCloy to store more than 500 letters relating to his efforts, along with various other documents: “How we have behaved toward these people should be known and carefully recorded for future reference,” he wrote.

Today, Oxy’s Japanese American Relocation Collection houses 3,200 documents, including articles, pamphlets, reports, newslet-

Professor of Chemistry L. Reed Brantley confers with Ted Tajima ’46 (standing, left), Iko Tanzawa ’42, John Nishiyama ’43, and Mary Kariya ’45 in April 1942.

Photo courtesy Occidental College Special Collections

ters, issues of relocation center and campus publications, and proand anti-Japanese media. A digital archive, launched in 2005 with the support of the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation’s Archival Grants Program, offers a representative selection of these historic materials online for research.

As a board member of the Grace Nixon Foundation in Walnut Creek, White has the discretion to make a small annual grant to a nonprofit of his choice. Citing Nixon’s own life experiences during WWII—when her studies as a music major at San Diego State University were interrupted in 1942 by President Roosevelt’s executive order authorizing the internment of Japanese Americans— White reached out to associate professors Jane Hong and Alexandra Puerto in Oxy’s History Department about designating his gift to support the College’s curation of its Japanese American Relocation Collection. Consequently, the foundation’s generosity will underwrite the work of a student intern on the collection this fall.

The digital archive was the first of its kind for Oxy’s Special Collections, and Dale Ann Stieber was hired to be the project’s manager and digital archivist, working under Mike Sutherland, the College’s longtime Special Collections librarian. (Sutherland died in April 2005, months before the online project’s unveiling.)

According to Stieber, the digital archive comprises only about 3 percent of the College’s relocation holdings. “This project has always embodied for me what makes Special Collections so integral to the student experience,” says Stieber, who retired in December after 17 years at Oxy. “Michael White and the Grace Nixon Foundation have given us the opportunity to build a true collaboration between faculty, students, and Special Collections.”

“I am very excited to see how the internship benefits students and raises awareness of Japanese and Asian American histories among the wider College community,” Hong says. Her enthusiasm is echoed by Puerto: “We look forward to developing this exciting and timely initiative, which will offer high-impact opportunities for our students and raise consciousness about Japanese American history, and Asian American studies at large, across campus.”

oxy.edu/magazine

Occidental College Office of Gift Planning M-36 | 1600 Campus Road Los Angeles CA 90041-3314 | Phone: 323-259-2644 Email: giftplanning@oxy.edu | oxy.edu/giftplanning | facebook.com/BenCulleySociety

ALUMNI TRIBUTES TO SIX RETIRING FACULTY /// JILLIAN HOPEWELL ’89 DELIVERS HEALTH CARE TO UNDERSERVED MIGRANTS

Building on Oxy’s Digital History

ICON of Econ

After 52 years at Oxy, what’s next for Professor Woody Studenmund?

OXYFARE Alumni Seal Awards to Decorate Eight During Reunion Weekend Volume 44, Number 2 oxy.edu/magazine OCCIDENTAL COLLEGE

Harry J. Elam, Jr. President Wendy F. Sternberg Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the College Charlie Cardillo Vice President for Institutional Advancement David T. Carreon Bradley Vice President for Equity & Justice Rob Flot Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students Amos Himmelstein Vice President & Chief Operating Officer Maricela L. Martinez Interim Vice President of Enrollment Marty Sharkey Vice President for Communications and Institutional Initiatives Jim Tranquada Director of Communications editorial staff

Dick Anderson Editor Marc Campos College Photographer Jasmine Teran Contributing Writer Gail (Schulman) Ginell ’79 Class Notes Editor SanSoucie Design Design DLS Group Printing

Brad Fauvre ’87, president of Velocity Vehicle Group, a privately held commercial vehicle dealership, will be honored as alumnus of the year at Reunion Weekend as part of the 2022 Alumni Seal Awards. Woody Studenmund, Laurence De Rycke Professor of Economics, will receive the faculty emeritus Seal Award. Other honorees include Jake Stevens ’08, vice president of Faring, a progressive real estate firm based in West Hollywood (Erica J. Murray ’01 Young Alumni Award); Luis Céspedes ’74 M’81, judicial appointments secretary for Gov. Gavin Newsom (professional achievement); Lt. Dawn (Gruber) Callahan ’09, group surgeon for Commander Naval Surface Group Middle Pacific in the U.S. Navy (professional achievement); Ray Yen ’82, past Board of Governors president and co-chair of the Oxy Fund executive and leadership gift committees (service to the College); Clarissa Martinez de Castro ’89, deputy vice president for policy and advocacy at UnidosUS, the nation’s largest Latino civil rights and advocacy organization (service to the community); and Eddie Gorton ’01, principal of Colfax Charter Elementary School in the Los Angeles United School District (service to the community).

Back on campus! June 10-12

Alumni Reunion Weekend 1972

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Welcome the Class of 1972 into the Fifty Year Club!

Celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Class of 1997!

Please join us in Eagle Rock June 10-12 for Alumni Reunion Weekend 2022.

Come back to campus and revel in rich Oxy traditions, honoring this year’s Alumni Seal Award recipients and commemorating your milestone reunion.

Witness the induction of the Class of 1972 into the Fifty Year Club, and celebrate FYC awardees Charles McClintock ’68 (Auld Lang Syne) and Professor of Cognitive Science and Philosophy Lynn Mehl (Io Triumphe).

Reunite with your classmates and celebrate Oxy. This year, our milestone reunions are graduating class years ending in 2 and 7, but all alumni are welcome to celebrate Reunion. Our three days of activities will include both live and virtual events and plenty of opportunities to reconnect with your Oxy family.

To learn more and register, visit alumni.oxy.edu.

Access & Opportunity Reception, February 27

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Amy Munoz, retired Associate Vice President for Hospitality Services, and family Standing: Alex Ringold ’14 Sofie Munoz Ringold ’14

Seated: Richard Munoz P’10 ’14 Amy Munoz P’10 ’14

Alex and Jonathan: Occidental College T-shirt EZ100 Tee in dark orange or heather black. Sizes S-XXL. $17.95 Sofie and Chelsea: Occidental College script short-sleeve crew T-shirt in heather apricot or heather graphite. Sizes S-XL. $26.95 Richard: Occidental Dad T-shirt in dark orange or heather black.

Sizes S-XXL. $17.95 Amy: OXY tackle twill crewneck sweatshirt in graphite or black.

Sizes S-XXL. $49.95 Maia: Toddler/youth full-zip orange sweatshirt. Sizes 6 months to 5T/6T. $37.95

Standing and seated: Jonathan Williams Chelsea Munoz Williams ’10 Maia Williams, age 1

Occidental College Bookstore oxybookstore.com To order by phone: 323-259-2951 All major credit cards accepted.

Published quarterly by Occidental College Main number: 323-259-2500 To contact Occidental magazine By phone: 323-259-2679 By email: oxymag@oxy.edu By mail: Occidental College Office of Communications F-36 1600 Campus Road Los Angeles CA 90041-3314 Letters and class notes submissions may be edited for length, content, and style.

Occidental College online Homepage: oxy.edu Facebook: facebook.com/occidental Instagram: instagram.com/occidentalcollege TikTok: occidentalcollege Twitter: @occidental Cover photo by Sam Bhang Oxy Wear photo by Marc Campos

2,022 Ways to Mark Oxy’s Big Day Occidental will commemorate its 135th birthday —April 20, 2022—with the third annual Day For Oxy! With the support of 2,022 members of the Oxy family on this day, a new chapter will begin in the life of the College. Your APRIL 20, 2022 generosity on Day For Oxy supports students, faculty, staff, and a host of academic and athletic programs. If you’re reading this after April 20, thank you for your support! (You know who you are.) If you haven’t make a gift yet, there’s still time to support the College before the end of the fiscal year. Visit givingday.oxy.edu for the latest Day For Oxy updates.

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1. Patrice Cablayan, director of gift planning and stewardship, with Oxy parents and grandparents Bill Holmes and Christine (Ray) Holmes ’59.

2. Siddharth Saravat ’15 catches up with Annemarie Schnedler ’16. 3. Tents and tables adorned Sycamore Glen for the luncheon. 4. Ryan PrestonRoedder, Obama Scholars Program faculty adviser and associate professor of philosophy, with senior fellow Micah Wilson ’22 and Advisory Council co-chair Hector De La Torre ’89. 5. David Abernethy ’59 and Carole Abernethy ’59. 6. Alan Freeman ’66 M’67 and Kathie Freeman ’65 M’72.

7. Karen van der Baan ’67 chats with Brighten Winn ’22 and Tye Hernandez ’23.

alumni.oxy.edu

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Features 8 A Healthy Migration Jillian Hopewell ’89 has spent her career advocating for better care for underserved populations—and a $5 million gift will boost those efforts.

10 Here’s the Pitch Josh Schlisserman ’19 helped raise $2.5 million as a summer intern in Silicon Valley—and after Scooter Braun kicked him out of his office, he knew he’d found his calling as a venture capitalist.

14 Psychology Professor Nancy Dess will retire this spring after 36 years at Oxy. Go to oxy.edu/magazine to revisit our 2009 profile of Dess.

Departments

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Personal Touchstones A look inside President Elam’s office tells his story in five artifacts.

OxyTalk John Callas M’75 built a career in Hollywood by saying “Yes” to new opportunities—but he had to overcome trauma to get there.

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First Word President Elam reflects on Oxy’s commitment to social justice and the actions that reinforce those words. Also: new books by Oxy alumni, and Cooper Raiff ’19’s Sundance-winning film.

From the Quad After two years of remote rhythms, Dance Production returns to the Thorne Hill stage; a new program introduces students to the problemsolving power of the humanities; and more.

Appreciation Professor of Psychology Emeritus Dave Cole M’48 (1922-2022) brought personality to the classroom and beyond.

34 Tigerwire Class notes for all years.

Year Two President Harry J. Elam, Jr. reflects on the lessons of the pandemic, the evolution of academic excellence, the future of strategic planning, and the necessity of a culture of care.

Lessons From Woody Economics legend A.H. “Woody” Studenmund closes the textbook on a 52-year career at Oxy.

24 Many Thanks As five retiring faculty take their classroom curtain calls, we asked a few prized pupils to toast their Oxy mentors.

PHOTO CREDITS: Jim Block Hopewell | Marc Campos Dess, Alexandra Puerto (From the Quad) | Sundance.org Raiff | John Callas M’75 Callas, with Jefferson Starship’s Grace Slick | Joe Friezer Cole

FIRST WORD » FROM PRESIDENT ELAM

Ideas Into Action: Fulfilling Oxy’s Mission

Photo by Marc Campos

When I first encountered the racist text messages sent by an Oxy student that were posted on social media in February (page 6), like everyone else, I was sickened and saddened. Seeing one of our own express such vile opinions is deeply troubling. As an administration, we have repeatedly and will continue to speak out against racial hatred and bigotry. We remain focused on supporting the community members most directly impacted by these words and continue to work to make Oxy an educational environment where all can feel safe, seen, supported, and able to thrive.

The response of our students and the faculty to this incident has been powerful.

Members of the Oxy faculty have used class time to critically examine and address with their students the text messages and the administrative response. Our students have equally demonstrated resilience, community, and commitment. With determination, they have proclaimed the values we hold dear at Oxy and have expressed the need for us to keep working together to become an anti-racist institution.

As we undertake the fundamental work of confronting inequity and injustice, we can look to our mission. To me, this statement of social commitment is so much more than rhetoric and I thank you for joining with me 2

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in working to put this mission into action. In a recent opinion piece, Judy Lam ’87 writes, “The sun still shines brightly on the Oxy that I know and still believe endures as a haven for education, differing ideas, and respect.”

With the return to in-person education, our students have enjoyed some particularly notable achievements. This semester senior comps have put student excellence on display—comps that range from a studio art show in the Oxy Arts gallery and a series of solo, self-scripted theater performances to presentations such as Nanki Sandhu’s “Questions of Monstrosity in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein” and Haleigh Hoffman’s “CO2 and CH4 Gas Flux in Different Urban, Oil, and Agricultural Development Areas of Los Angeles.” Drawn from an extremely strong pool of candidates, this year’s five Oxy Science Scholars will be working with faculty mentors in the fields of geology, physics, biochemistry, biology, and chemistry. Significantly, for the 17th consecutive year, Oxy was recognized this spring as one of the country’s top producers of student Fulbright recipients.

The arts have reemerged on campus with full force. After two years of virtual performances, Dance Production packed Thorne Hall for three performances in midMarch (page 4). Up the hill in Keck Theater, sets are being built and rehearsals are underway for the Theater Department’s April production of Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods. The Occidental, Oxy’s student newspaper, recently picked up seven prizes at the recent California College Media Association awards ceremony, including “Best Newspaper” (for California colleges with fewer than 15,000 students) and top honors for writing and photography.

Excited by the prospect of finally being able to compete after two seasons lost to the pandemic, Oxy’s student-athletes have also stepped up. The men’s golf team outshot eight other teams to win the Cal Lutheran Invitational. Inside Oxy’s superlative De Mandel Aquatics Center, women’s water

polo hosted its first-ever tournament with four teams from across the country. And both the men’s and women’s track and field teams beat Pomona-Pitzer handily in their annual dual meet.

Faculty have been equally busy—and productive. We applaud Kristi Upson-Saia in religious studies and Alexandra Puerto in history for securing a $1.5 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to fund our new Humanities for Just Communities program, a three-year initiative that will introduce incoming and first-year students to the problem-solving power of the humanities (page 7). Two Southern California galleries are currently featuring the work of faculty artists Linda Besemer and Mary Beth Heffernan. Associate Professor of History Jane Hong is serving a yearlong appointment as a Public Fellow in the Public Religion Research Institute’s Religion and Renewing Democracy Initiative. And faculty in all disciplines continue to publish their research in prestigious academic journals and books, and share their expertise with NPR, The Washington Post, CBS News, and The New York Times.

Looking ahead, our ongoing integrated strategic planning process will keep at the fore our central institutional values, which include excellence and equity—and I would like to emphasize that merit and equity never were, and are not, at odds. Moreover, the College’s pursuit of these higher goals cannot be defined simply by a fixed outcome or point of destination, even as we put in place metrics for success. It is important to note that this will always be an ongoing process involving the whole community, a striving in which our community members truly feel enfranchised and know they belong.

Harry J. Elam, Jr.

FIRST WORD

» MIXED MEDIA A Rose Named Peace: How Francis Meilland Created a Flower of Hope for a World at War, by Barbara Carroll Roberts ’78 (Candlewick). Francis Meilland was passionate about roses. He loved their rich perfume, their buds unfurling in the summer sun, and their petals, soft as lambs’ ears. Like his father and grandfather before him, Meilland cultivated flowers on the family farm in France. In his teens, he set about grafting and experimenting, determined to create a rose no one had seen before, and as the world braced for World War II, he rushed cuttings to rosegrowing friends around the globe. Six patient years later, word reached him: His rose had not only flourished; people were calling it the Peace Rose. With beautiful illustrations by Bagram Ibatoulline, this life story of a special flower digs deep into world history, botany, and the rewards of perseverance. Roberts (Nikki on the Line) lives in Virginia with her husband, two cats, and “one very goofy dog.”

States of Disorder: Ecosystems of Governance, by Adam Day ’00 (Oxford University Press). Today’s vision of world order is founded upon the concept of strong, wellfunctioning states, in contrast to the destabilizing potential of failed or fragile states. This worldview has dominated international interventions over the last 30 years as enormous resources have been devoted to developing and extending the governance capacity of weak or failing states, hoping to transform them into reliable nodes in the global order.

But with very few exceptions, this project has not delivered on its promise. States of Disorder addresses the question, “Why has U.N. state-building so consistently failed to meet its objectives?” It proposes an explanation based on the application of complexity theory to U.N. interventions in South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where the U.N. has been tasked to implement massive stabilization and state-building mis-

sions. Far from being “ungoverned spaces,” these settings present complex, dynamical systems of governance with emergent properties that allow them to adapt and resist attempts to change them. Based on more than a decade of Day’s work in peacekeeping, this book offers a systemic mapping of how governance systems work—and work against —U.N. interventions. Pursuing a complexity-driven approach instead helps to avoid unintentional consequences, identifies meaningful points of leverage, and opens the possibility of transforming societies from within.

Dragons in My Classroom: A Teacher’s Memoir, by Barbara Kennard ’80 (She Writes Press). Barbara Kennard had very high standards as an English teacher. As a dyslexic child, she had adored, even revered, certain teachers, and she wanted to be as inspiring to her own students. But over time, Kennard began to feel out of place at the Fessenden School in Boston, where she had taught for four years.

Having struggled as a child to succeed academically, had she internalized an unrealistic work ethic and set of expectations and become a perfectionist?

When an opportunity arose for Kennard to do a teaching exchange with the Dragon School in Oxford, England, she decided that exposure to different teaching styles would give her a fresh perspective. Her year away was inspiring and transformative, reigniting

her love of teaching and also reconnecting her to her faith. Kennard taught English and performing arts from 1980 to 2015. The Barbara Kennard Sixth Grade English Prize was established in her name by a family at the Fessenden School. She lives in Texas with her husband, Brady Millican, and their cat, Piper.

Cha Cha Real Smooth, written and directed by Cooper Raiff ’19 (streaming June 17 on Apple TV+). Fresh out of college and without a clear life path going forward, 22year-old Andrew (Raiff) is stuck back at home with his family in New Jersey. But if there’s one thing that belongs on his nonexistent resume, it’s how to get a party started, which lands him the perfect job of motivational dancing at the bar and bat mitzvahs for his younger brother’s classmates. When he befriends a local mom (Dakota Johnson) and her daughter, Andrew finally discovers a future he wants—even if it might not be his own. Winner of the 2022 Sundance Film Festival Audience Award in the U.S. Dramatic competition, Cha Cha Real Smooth is Raiff’s followup to his 2020 SXSW Film Festival Grand Jury Prize-winning S#!%house.

ICYMI: Winter’s Tales Occidental magazine is back in your mailbox and online, but in case you missed our digital-only Winter 2022 edition, here’s a teaser of the good reading that awaits you. n “Outside the Box” explores the impact of Oxy faculty in public policy and the world at large. n In “Technology Meets Theology,” Steven Barrie-Anthony ’04 curates a conversation about the impact of technology on human relationships. n It’s not easy to follow culinary legend Clancy Morrison, but Amy Munoz made the job her own after “40 Million Meals Served.” n Journalist Patt Morrison ’74 returns to a passion project —the L.A. River—and from Hawai‘i, David Louie ’73 shares the view From the Desk of the Attorney General in a new memoir.

Illustration by Chanelle Nibbelink

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FROM THE QUAD “Finale” Choreographers: Executive Board “It’s very rare to be able to gather every Dance Pro member in the same room,” says Lucy Smith ’22. “The Finale is a way for us to celebrate ourselves and each other and to excite the audience one last time. It’s a lovely moment and a tradition that Mara and I (and the rest of E-Board) were dedicated to bringing back this year.”

Safety Dance!

After two years of remote rhythms, Dance Production returns to the Thorne Hill stage, masks and all

“Wild Together” (Contemporary Lyrical) Choreographers: Alison Hwang ’23 and Allison Wilson ’23 “Allison Wilson ’23 and I came across John Legend’s song ‘Wild’ as we were preparing for last year’s virtual show,” Hwang says.

“We both agreed that our vision would look best on the stage, dressed in lights, and surrounded by music.”

(For additional content, visit oxy.edu/magazine.)

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Dance Pro co-presidents Kristiansson and Smith.

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Mara Kristiansson ’22 first learned about Dance Production on a college tour and got involved as a first-year.

“I started dancing when I was 5, so I came to Oxy looking for more opportunities to dance,” says the physics major from San Jose. “The welcoming environment of Dance Pro was the first place I felt at home on the Oxy campus.”

Coming back together this year “felt so good,” adds Kristiansson, who with classmate Lucy Smith served as co-presidents for Dance Pro’s 74th annual show. “While it was great to be able to continue with the club last year on Zoom, it didn’t compare to dancing together in person. Our first showing last semester, when we finally had the whole club together in person, really reminded me why I love Dance Pro so much.”

From the start of rehearsals through all three performances, everyone adhered to Oxy’s safety protocols.

“Everyone in the dance studio was masked except for the occasional sip of water, and we limited the number of people per dance to 25 [down from 60] to comply with the lower room capacity of the dance studio,” says Smith, an art and art history major from Brooklyn.

“Dance is my creative outlet and my primary form of self-expression,” Smith adds. “Whether I’m dancing onstage or in the privacy of my room, I feel the most embodied and grounded while dancing. I’m really grateful for Dance Pro because it not only gave me the opportunity to share this part of myself with the audience, but I was also able to offer my dancers that same opportunity to use dance as a way to empower themselves.”

“Dance has always been a place where I can be myself,” Kristiansson adds. “While a lot of studios can be very competitive, Dance Pro has been so supportive, truly making it feel like anybody who wants to dance can do it.”

FROM THE QUAD

Photos by Marc Campos

“Redemption” (Hip-Hop) Choreographer: Leo Kim ’22 “The most rewarding thing about bringing the performance together was seeing all my dancers have so much fun and invest so much of themselves into my choreography.”

Together again for the first time: Members of the Dance Pro 2022 team gather for the traditional group photo.

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FROM THE QUAD

Six Words That Went Viral A racist text exchange between two students goes public, putting College policy under a microscope and stirring a conversation around campus culture

A text exchange between two Oxy students in December 2020—one that included the declaration “all asian people need to die”— surfaced on social media more than 13 months later, igniting a debate on protected speech at Occidental that offers no easy answers in responding to racist behavior.

On February 2, 2022, President Harry J. Elam, Jr. and his senior staff became aware of the private text exchange, which surfaced on social media and was quickly denounced “as false and contrary to the values we share and that are embodied in Oxy’s mission,” David T. Carreon Bradley, vice president for equity and justice, wrote in a February 3 email to the Oxy community.

“While inconsistent with the College’s values,” Carreon Bradley explained, it was determined that the messages fell outside Oxy’s definition of unlawful harassment or discrimination. “And, as offensive as these messages are, they qualify as protected speech under College policy and state law.”

California’s Leonard Law explicitly prohibits private colleges from subjecting a student to disciplinary action for speech that would otherwise be protected by the First Amendment or the California Constitution’s free speech clause.

It wasn’t long before the administration came under fire from some students, faculty, and alumni. Ina Morton ’22 called Oxy’s response “insufficient,” adding, “Is this really the image Occidental wishes to present itself to its students and to the public, one that allows unabashedly genocidal comments to go completely unaccounted for?”

“By focusing on the legal issues, the administration’s emails downplayed the pro-

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found fears for personal safety and the deep distress that this incident has caused, especially among AAPI [Asian American and Pacific Islander] faculty, staff, and students who have felt targeted, intimidated, and terrorized by the entire incident,” Professor of History and Faculty Council President Sharla Fett wrote in a letter signed by 132 faculty. An open letter circulated by the Oxy Law Society bearing more than 1,000 signatures urged the College “to reconsider their decision to dismiss these threatening messages and live up to their mission, values, and obligation to protect their students.”

“You have shared the frustration, anger, and disappointment you feel in reaction to the racist text messages and our administrative response,” Elam wrote in a February 8 email to the Oxy community. “The text messages reflect racism and ignorance, perpetuating hatred for Asians and Asian Americans and promoting the erroneous and harmful perception that the pandemic is a ‘Chinese mistake.’ The student who sent the messages has expressed remorse and regret for her actions, and is no longer enrolled at Oxy.” In addition to facilitating group sessions and holding restorative spaces for Asian Pacific Islander Desi American students and the larger student body, Elam also promised to convene a series of campus forums and antiracism workshops. He attended an emotional campuswide forum held February 14. “The words institution and community are different; community involves care,” one student said. “We have the potential to become a real community. We need to do better.”

Several administrators became aware of the texts in November 2021, when Shanna

Yeh ’22 and a second Asian student contacted Chris Arguedas, director of the Intercultural Community Center. “To be clear, it’s the most explicit racist language that I’ve seen in my time here written out,” Arguedas told The Occidental newspaper. He filed a Care Report on behalf of both students to the College’s Student Success Team (SST), a cross-disciplinary campus group.

In assessing the Care Report, the SST and Occidental Behavioral Intervention Team determined that the text messages posed “no threat,” Vivian Garay Santiago, associate dean of students and Oxy’s director of student success, told The Occidental.

“These messages were over a year old. They were a conversation between two people.”

After the regional and national chapters of Kappa Alpha Theta sorority declined to take disciplinary action against the student who wrote the texts—who pledged Theta only after writing them—another Theta member posted them on Instagram on February 2. On February 18, sorority members voted unanimously to disband the Eta Mu Chapter, which was installed at Oxy in 2004.

Chapter president Hannah Christensen ’22 told The Occidental that Theta’s remaining funds will be disbursed among the chapter’s former Asian members, Oxy’s Asian Pacific Islander Desi American Association, and Associated Students of Occidental College’s Diversity and Equity Board.

“My heart breaks to see hate strike at Occidental College,” wrote Judy Lam ’87, an L.A. attorney and first-generation college student, in an opinion piece on AsAmNews.com. “Excellence and equity are among the cornerstones of Oxy’s mission and my experience as a student. And yet, this did not make my alma mater immune from racist ignorance.”

Connie Chung Joe, CEO of Asian Americans Advancing Justice–Los Angeles, called for Occidental and all universities “to move beyond just responding to the current moment of anti-Asian hate and build a sustainable movement around racial equity” in an open letter posted online February 11.

“If anything, this incident shook us into the reality that we have got to do better in terms of being inclusive,” Elam noted in a March 10 interview with Occidental (page 14).

“The antidote to hate is unity,” Lam wrote. “We should battle hate, bias, and inequality—not people.”

FROM THE QUAD

A Boost for the Community A new interdisciplinary program introduces students to the problem-solving power of the humanities Photo by Marc Campos

A $1.5 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation will fund a three-year teaching and community-engaged initiative that will introduce incoming and first-year students to the problem-solving power of the humanities to advance health equity, migrant justice, and freedom struggles.

Beginning this fall, the interdisciplinary Humanities for Just Communities (HJC) program “will expose first-years to a wide array of conceptual, methodological, epistemological, and ethical tools from the humanities applicable to each year’s social justice theme and activated in their community-engaged project,” says Kristi Upson-Saia, David B. and Mary H. Gamble Professor of Religious Studies and co-principal investigator.

“Ultimately, the program aims to produce social justice leaders who understand the value and power of leveraging humanistic approaches, setting students on a path to take more humanities courses,” says Alexandra Puerto, associate professor of history and coprincipal investigator. “It’s a natural fit for Oxy and its mission.”

“I wholeheartedly believe that the HJC program will have a transformational impact on Oxy students’ interest in the humanities,” says President Harry J. Elam, Jr. Occidental is one of 12 liberal arts colleges nationwide to receive grants totaling more than $16.1 million as part of the Mellon Foundation’s new Humanities for All Times initiative. Mellon’s initiative seeks to address the decline in undergraduate humanities degree recipients and the rising undergraduate interest in social justice issues.

“The Humanities for All Times initiative underscores that it’s not only critical to show students that the humanities improve the quality of their everyday lives, but also that they are a crucial tool in efforts to bring about meaningful progressive change in the world,” says Phillip Brian Harper, Mellon Foundation higher learning program director.

Religious studies professor Kristi Upson-Saia, above, developed the HJC project together with Alexandra Puerto, associate professor of history.

At Occidental, interest in the humanities has been mixed, with some programs experiencing a marginal drop in majors and en-

rollments and others seeing significant increases. The HJC curriculum “aims to attract students into humanities courses early, at a time when they are becoming aware of their curricular options,” Upson-Saia says. “As we increase the number of students in the humanities, we also intend to increase the diversity of those students,” Puerto adds.

Each year’s program will be built around a specific social justice theme. This fall the theme will be “Health, Illness, and Dignity,” followed by “Migration, Displacement, and Cultural Resistance” in 2023 and “Protest, Abolition, and Freedom” in 2024. Faculty in Oxy’s English, history, media arts and culture, music, philosophy, religious studies, and theater departments will contribute courses built around the health theme this fall.

Each year’s HJC program will culminate with a paid 10-week, full-time residential research experience for approximately 15 rising sophomores. Students underrepresented in the humanities will be strongly encouraged to apply. The research fellows will present results of their research at an annual Summer Humanities Conference.

Over three years, it is expected that the HJC curriculum will enroll more than 500 students, involve at least two-thirds of Oxy’s humanities faculty, and engage hundreds more students and community members.

Fortune Smiles on Caleb Reyes ’22 Not long after his $24,698 win on Wheel of Fortune was broadcast nationwide March 30, the jokes hurled at Caleb Reyes ’22 started from his Tiger baseball teammates: “Dinner’s on you tonight, right, Caleb?” And “We gotta get you a kilt”—a reference to the trip to Scotland that made up part of his winnings during the venerable game show’s College Week.

After taping the episode March 3, the kinesiology major and right-handed pitcher from Woodland Hills was contractually silenced from discussing his performance against students from the University of Michigan and Cal State San Marcos until the show aired. But Reyes was used to waiting—he auditioned for the show more than a year ago, after getting in the habit of watching with his parents during the pandemic.

One key to his success decoding such phrases as “Living on Campus,” “Career Center,” and “Olympic Gold Medalist Chloe Kim” was aggressively buying vowels. “That seems to be a running strategy on the show,” Reyes says. “Before the taping, they give you some tips, and they really preach buying vowels.”

Reyes plans on taking his Scottish trip this summer, after Commencement and before graduate school, where he will study for a master’s in exercise science. (He’s still waiting to hear from a few programs.) Parents Jayne and Alexander Reyes are “proud and thrilled,” he says, but will never let him forget his inability to guess the puzzle on the $39,000 bonus round: “Going Home.”

If only he had picked an “O.”

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A Healthy

Migration Jillian Hopewell ’89 has spent her career advocating for better care for underserved populations—and a $5 million gift will boost those efforts

A

By AN DY FAUGHT Photo by J IM BLOC K

s a teenager in Berkeley, Jillian Hopewell ’89 was not keen on uprooting her life to move to Peru. “My parents took me kicking and screaming,” she recalls. “But I ended up loved everything about it. Nobody knew me, so I could be totally different. I decided I would present myself as a confident person.”

Jillian’s family moved to South America during her first year of high school. Her father, a UC San Francisco physician and tuberculosis specialist, helped rural villages create protocols for diagnosing and managing the respiratory disease. Her mother worked with local artisans, expanding her folk-art business. The awkward teen, meantime, shucked her angst, got comfortable in her skin, and discovered a world in need.

“Peru provided me an opportunity to reinvent myself against the backdrop of a shifting kaleidoscope of new people, cultures, food, and experiences,” says Hopewell, who oversees the West Coast office of the nonprofit Migrant Clinicians Network (MCN), the oldest and largest clinical network dedicated to improving health care for underserved migrants.

Living abroad in other third world countries—including Indonesia, Ecuador, Paraguay, and the Dominican Republic, where she spent a summer during her college years

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running a public health and development program—was a clarion call to service.

As director of education and communication at MCN, Hopewell works closely with clinicians and advocates at community health centers, health departments, communitybased organizations, and others to provide education, training, and technical assistance around the health needs of migrants, immigrants, and asylum seekers. This includes workers in the agricultural and meatpacking industries, who have significant health disparities and encounter numerous barriers to basic care. She also directs MCN’s extensive communication efforts, which advocate for the health needs of these often-overlooked populations.

Following the emergence of COVID in 2020, MCN worked with American farmers to take basic measures to protect their employees, like allowing workers who tested positive to self-quarantine. “Growers were suddenly more interested in collaborating with the health-care system, because they understood that in order to have a functional workforce, they needed to have a healthy workforce,” Hopewell says.

One of the biggest challenges is getting migrant workers to get health care in the first place. In March, MCN received a $5 million gift—the largest in the organization’s history—from author and philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, which MCN will use to continue “urgently and effectively filling the gaps” in care for vulnerable populations.

The organization also pushes for legislation around the country to protect migrant and immigrant workers who are frequently left out of basic worker protections like on issues of overtime pay, equitable access to vaccines, and heat stress—the latter a growing concern as the climate crisis progresses.

More recently, the organization has begun virtual care coordination for asylum seekers who arrive at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Hopewell’s sensibilities are strongly influenced by her Oxy experience. She chose Occidental after she and a classmate at Lima’s American School, Astrid Raczynski ’89, took a West Coast road trip to visit eight college campuses. Loading up on junk food that was unavailable in Peru, the pair cruised the coast in Hopewell’s mother’s Toyota minivan to the sounds of the English Beat, R.E.M., and Violent Femmes.

far left: Hopewell, right, and Astrid Raczynski ’89 at Oxy in 1986. left: Traveling to Indonesia in 1989. below: At Migrant Clinicians Network’s California offices in Chico. bottom: Working with a family in rural Maryland. MCN serves the mainland United States, Puerto Rico, and Virgin Islands.

“We had interviews at every college we visited,” says Raczynski, who lives in Vienna, Va., and has worked in international development. “We’d drive for hours and change clothes in fast food restaurant bathrooms.

She really took care of me, because I would not have been comfortable driving around the United States.”

“Oxy wasn’t even really on our radar, but we thought, ‘Well, we’re here, we’ll check it out,’” adds Hopewell, following a gut feeling about the College. “When we got to Oxy, we just thought, ‘This is it.’ We both loved it.’”

Hopewell had always planned on going to medical school, but she changed her mind after not feeling any zeal toward chemistry courses. She became a public policy major after enrolling in what was then a new interdisciplinary program in public policy created

by Derek Shearer, the Stuart Chevalier Professor in Diplomacy and World Affairs.

The course’s nine students were an eclectic mix of political leanings and academic interests. While Hopewell was interested in international development, one classmate’s passion was gender politics. All the while, Shearer “respected and encouraged our individual points of view,” Hopewell says. “I felt supported and was allowed to grow.”

“Jillian was one of the top students in the original group,” says Shearer, who joined the Oxy faculty in 1981. “She combined a topnotch intelligence with a commitment to social justice and a deep tenacity of spirit. She also had a wry, wicked sense of humor.”

After graduation, Hopewell studied indigenous political movements in Ecuador on a one-year Thomas J. Watson Fellowship.

She worked near the Amazon River, where residents battled oil companies over what they alleged were illegal land grabs.

“The fellowship got funded with a little asterisk, saying, ‘We’re not sure if this is safe, but we’re funding you anyway,’ ” Hopewell says. She ended up observing a village ceram-

Photos courtesy Jillian Hopewell ’89 | Bottom photo by earldotter.com

ics collective, where she researched how artists can maintain their culture while selling their creations to foreigners.

Hopewell went on to earn a pair of master’s degrees from the University of Texas at Austin (her thesis addressed tuberculosis control on the U.S.-Mexican border). That’s when she interviewed with MCN, which offered her a job. Today, the married mother of three reckons with health disparities magnified by a pandemic and social upheaval.

While solidarity has been tough to find during the pandemic, and while COVID has exposed systemic racism in how health care is provided to marginalized groups, Hopewell remains optimistic. “I think there’s been a renewed understanding of what the role of public health is,” she says. “I’m hopeful that if things can simmer down, people can really look for solutions together.”

Faught wrote “Head First” and “We Meet Again” in the Fall 2021 magazine.

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Josh Schlisserman ’19 helped raise $2.5 million as a summer intern in Silicon Valley—and after Scooter Braun kicked him out of his office, he’d found his calling as a venture capitalist

By DICK ANDERSON Photos by KEVIN BURKE

“Josh and I met through the men’s soccer program and both lived in Braun Hall during our first year,” Glass says. (In fact, he adds, the soccer class of 2019—Glass, Luke Haas, Matthew LaBrie, Austin Lee, Liam Walsh, Ariel Rosso, and Schlisserman—lived together all four years.) “Our closest friends came from the soccer team and Braun.”

Growing up in Scotch Plains, N.J., Schlisserman played soccer at the nearby Wardlaw-Hartridge School. He was on a recruiting trip at Trinity College in Texas when he ran into a childhood soccer buddy who was looking to transfer. “One of the schools he was looking at was Occidental,” Schlisserman recalls. “My parents and I looked at the Oxy website and we started talking about the liberal arts. Trinity had been my No. 1 choice but it switched after that. There was a soccer

as J-Term and meeting entrepreneurs and business leaders through weekly Mondaynight sessions in Johnson 203. “I wouldn’t have started my company if it weren’t for J-Term,” Glass says. “Josh wouldn’t be the successful VC he is today without it.”

Through J-Term, “I started building up a network, learned a lot about entrepreneurship, and immediately fell in love with it,” says Schlisserman. “I knew this is what I’m going to do with my life.”

f ever a case needed to be made for the value of Twitter—which Elon Musk recently priced at $54.20 a share in his hostile takeover bid—one need only point to its role in the fortunes of Josh Schlisserman’s first big break—there are Schlisserman ’19. With 2,741 followers comthree in this story—came after his sophopared to Musk’s 82 million, his tweets might more year, when he did a summer internship not move markets or prompt SEC investigaat Vicarious VR in San Francisco, which cretions, but the social media platform has ated virtual reality social media for multiple gained him an audience with some of the naplatforms. Shadowing company founder and tion’s most sought-after venture capitalists.

CEO JM Yujuico ’00, Schlisserman helped That precipitated the launch last raise $2.5 million that summer— year of his first venture capital fund, “I’d say the biggest name investor Behind Genius Ventures, with cothat we raised from was Maveron [a founder Paige Doherty—whom he VC firm co-founded by Starbucks met on Twitter, naturally.

CEO Howard Schultz P’09] and By definition, venture capital— musician will.i.am’s manager.”

VC for short—is a form of private The whole experience “was like equity financing that firms or funds something out of a movie,” Schlisprovide to startups, early-stage, and serman says. “JM and I did a road trip to L.A. to meet with celebrity emerging companies. By the time he influencers—part of the business was old enough to invest, “I studied was consumer social—so we met the business of VC as if it was my with Zendaya and her dad before she major,” says Schlisserman, who was blew up with the first Spider-Man named (with Doherty) to Forbes’ 30 Schlisserman (in the Oxy shirt) with his academy soccer team. movie. We also got a meeting with Under 30 Venture Capital 2022 list.

Scooter Braun [manager of Ariana “Most people get into venture because they think you get to meet great [start- camp a month later, so I ended up flying out Grande, Justin Bieber, and Demi Lovato, up] founders, and that you’re wheeling and to California. As soon as I walked on the among others] through a mutual friend and dealing money. I’m not that interested in campus, I knew this is where I needed to be.” promptly got kicked out of his office 30 min“We did not see Josh live until he came utes later,” he adds with a laugh. “It was a that. What gets me excited in the morning is, How do I win? How do I create a thesis that to a camp late in the recruiting process,” says wild ride. I got to pitch alongside the CEO differentiates itself and gets me a filter to the men’s soccer coach Rod Lafaurie. “He had al- and learned everything about wheeling and best founders? How do I create a portfolio ready committed to Oxy prior to that, and he dealing. I was 20 years old, not even legal to and construct a portfolio that mathematically actually got injured during that camp. But he drink yet, and living the Silicon Valley dream.” works out? Those are the things that excite was always so valuable and so smart.” After At the end of the internship, Yujuico ofme in the morning. The business of VC is a second injury his sophomore year basically fered him a full-time job—which would have much more interesting to me than actual VC.” ended his time on the field, Schlisserman entailed dropping out of Oxy—but he turned “Josh eats, sleeps, and breathes venture pivoted to the coaching staff, “working with it down to return to school. (“Funny enough, capital,” says his good friend and fellow econ our goalkeepers and helping us break down JM is now a limited partner, investing in my major, Ocra co-founder and CEO Ethan Glass set pieces,” Lafaurie says. “He endeared him- fund,” Schlisserman adds.) But the experience ’19. (Ocra—short for One-Click Rate Adjust- self to a group of his peers that allowed him affirmed his intention to become an investor. ment and previously known as Park Place— to be a part of the coaching staff.”

“I remember thinking at the time, ‘Why In addition to soccer, Schlisserman and were people investing in us?’ VR was super is an omni-channel management platform for parking operators.) “His passion for the Glass bonded over their mutual interest in hot—we were building in the metaverse befield and perseverance to break into the in- business. Each found their calling through fore the metaverse was a thing—but the timdustry have been phenomenal to witness. Oxypreneurship, the College’s entrepreneur- ing didn’t make any sense. The technology ial club, leading a winter boot camp known was so far ahead of where the market was.”

There is no limit to what he can achieve.

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Photos (pages 11-12) courtesy Josh Schlisserman ’19 | Formal photo courtesy Ethan Glass ’19

Back at Oxy, “Josh took multiple courses with me and we had numerous conversations,” says Jesse Mora, assistant professor economics. “I recall him being very enthusiastic about cryptocurrencies and how these might affect venture capital and individual investors. Given Josh’s intellectual and professional interests, I encouraged him to study venture capital as part of his final project of the senior seminar.”

As part of that project, Schlisserman wrote a research paper on seed accelerators —fixed-term mentorship programs designed to assist promising startups—which he presented to his classmates. “I learned a lot about venture capital that day,” Mora says.

“Josh was singularly focused on the VC in-

above: Rocking the orange with his fellow Oxypreneurship club members in 2016. right: Schlisserman and classmate Ethan Glass as Oxy seniors, after a sorority formal in Highland Park.

To pay the bills, he started a recruiting firm for startups (“I would basically point talent their way”). At night, he would drive around Los Angeles, pick up broken TVs off the street, fix them, and sell them (a skill he learned from soccer teammate Haas after their first year at Oxy). Whatever leftover money he had at the end of the month, he would invest into startups. “Angel investing

“What gets me excited in the morning is, How do I win?” dustry, and it is no surprise to me that he has been very successful. He was ahead of the game then, and he’s ahead of the game now.”

During spring semester of his senior year, Schlisserman took a full-time job working for LvlUp Ventures, a new VC firm created by former Quake Capital co-founder Brandon Maier. After a year and half on the job, he ended up quitting LvlUp. “The pandemic, he says, “was a huge blessing for me,” he says. “It completely reset my career.”

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just means investing your own money,” he says. “I’d write $1,000 to $5,000 checks toward various startups.”

Big break No. 2 came around June 2020.

“I heard Sumeet Gajri, former chief strategy officer of Carta [a San Francisco-based capitalization table management software company with a market valuation of around $10 billion] and currently in the same role at Instabase [a startup aiming to “reimagine business apps from the ground up” with a

valuation of about $2 billion]. After listening to Gajri on an episode of The Twenty Minute VC podcast, talking about his portfolio construction, his new firm, and his investment thesis, Schlisserman cold-emailed Gajri with a critique of his thesis. Gajri responded by inviting Schlisserman to meet him in person in San Francisco the following week.

“We met up—masked, socially distanced, the whole nine yards—and spoke for nearly six hours,” Schlisserman recalls. Gajri wasn’t hiring at the moment but encouraged Schlisserman to share some of the deals that he wound up seeing. “A couple weeks later, I introduced him to the first deal that he would invest in that I sent over.” After that, Gajri introduced him to Arjun Sethi, a founding partner of Tribe Capital, a VC firm with more than $1.2 billion in assets under management.

“Meeting Arjun was a huge deal,” Schlisserman says. “Thirty minutes into the conversation, he tells me, ‘I’m in between raising funds. So, I can’t hire you, but send me what you got. Maybe down the line we can do something.’

“In October 2020, my third big break happened,” Schlisserman says—one that would give him the reputation he enjoys today. He became the second investor on the cap table for a company called Arctype— a modern, collaborative database client for developers and their teams. The company was founded by Justin de Guzman, whom Schlisserman met (surprise!) through Twitter. “I had conviction about him early on,” he says. “We built a relationship over six months and Justin did not want to fundraise for Arctype because he was afraid to. I told him, ‘You should fundraise. I’ll put your round together in less than two weeks.’ ” True to his word, he raised $3 million in that time frame.

“Arjun and Sumeet both caught wind of it,” Schlisserman recalls, “and one, they were mad that I didn’t refer it over to them. But two, they called me up and said, ‘Josh, you can come work for us one day. You’re doing deals —Arctype is going to be one of the most competitive series A’s [a company’s first major round of financing] a year from now—but you shouldn’t be working for a fund. You should be working for yourself. We’re gonna give you some money to invest on our behalf.’ ” With the Arctype deal, Schlisserman had also gained a reputation as the gatekeeper to

de Guzman, with whom he became close friends: “He was very thankful for me pushing him to raise.” But by January 2021, his own finances were getting tight. “I’d spent a lot on angel investing and pretty much had $0 in my bank account,” he says.

That’s when de Guzman told him about another founder he should meet—“one of the most in-demand founders in the valley.

I can’t tell you his name—he’s going to use a pseudonym—but I know you’re going to want to invest.”

Schlisserman wound up talking to the founder over Zoom—with no camera on— and 30 minutes into the conversation, “I realized: ‘Oh my God, I want to work for you.’ And I thought, ‘Uh-oh,’ because I just emptied $10,000 out of my bank account to start the fund. And I was in a predicament but the founder said to me, ‘You should start the fund. I’m looking to add someone on the team who invests as well. Just bring someone on as a partner or associate to help manage the fund.’ ” That conversation led to the creation of Behind Genius Ventures, which Schlisserman launched with Doherty, author of a children’s book for adults titled Seed to Harvest: A Simple Explanation of Venture Capital.

“Paige and I met three months earlier through Twitter,” Schlisserman says. “We talked every day. I was showing her the ropes of angel investing and we quickly became close friends.”

As destiny had it, Schlisserman wound up being the first company hire for Series founder and self-described “chief anime protagonist” Brexton Pham, “one of the most amazing individuals I’ve ever met,” he says.

Growing up homeless with a single mother, Pham took a job at Yik Yak as a software engineer after enrolling at Stanford, where he completed a B.S. in symbolic systems. He subsequently founded a startup, developed (and recovered from) Stage 3 lung cancer, sold his startup to Tinder, and angel invested for two years before launching Series in 2021.

“I’ve learned more in the last year from Brexton than I have in my seven to eight years being involved in the entrepreneurial world,” Schlisserman says. “He’s taught me everything about being an operator-investor.

We just raised, and will soon be announcing, a very large round of funding with some of the most recognizable names in the investor ecosystem. Having been employee No. 1 at Series, it gives me a lot of legitimacy as well.

“I’m a better investor than I was a year ago,” Schlisserman says, “and I’m super excited for what’s next.”

“In terms of Behind Genius Ventures, we ended up raising $5 million [from 120 limited partners] over a nine-month period”— the average fundraise takes from 12 to 18 months—“and we’ve deployed almost 70 percent of that capital,” he adds. “The fund is performing really well.”

Once Behind Genius Ventures finishes deploying its first round of funding, Doherty will be continuing that brand. Schlisserman, meanwhile, is launching a new VC firm this spring named Picks and Shovels VC. The new fund will include limited partnerships with Caffeinated Capital founder and managing director Ray Tonsing (“a legend in the VC ecosystem”), Gajri, Sethi, Zenda Capital founder Esteban Reyes, and a host of others.

Over the last couple of years, he says, “I’ve learned a lot about something called picks and shovel companies—businesses that build tools for a specific customer de-

mographic.” So, he’ll be managing Picks and Shovels while continuing in his role as chief of staff at Series, a crypto-enabled bank for institutional asset managers and corporations. (“Think JPMorgan Chase for crypto,” he says. “The business is a rocket ship.”)

All of this raises the question: When does Schlisserman find time to sleep? “I sleep 10 to 12 hours a day. That’s my secret. I probably work 10 to 12 hours, five days a week. I don’t really touch work on the weekends. And then I sleep another 10 to 12 hours each day.”

Five years from now, he adds, “I hope I’m ringing the bell on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange for Series. I want to ring the bell with our CEO and our COO. And I want to be managing over $100 million in assets through Picks and Shovels VC. That’s where I’ll be in five years, if everything goes right.”

Hey, who are we to doubt him?

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naugurations normally mark the beginning of something,” Harry J. Elam, Jr. says in his office in early March. “I’ve been here for almost two years, so this one will be different.

My innocence is long over now.”

In his 22nd month on the job, Elam will be inaugurated as Occidental’s 16th president.

Informing Elam’s inauguration speech—titled New Harmonies—will be a sense of how the College is emerging from the pandemic and “where we want to go from here,” he says.

“I believe this Inauguration can be about more than me; that it can be about the hopes and vision and relief that the Oxy community has after the last two years. That would make me happy.” As April 23 draws near, “I’m looking forward to celebrating Oxy.” Occidental: You spent your first year as president working virtually at a time when you normally would’ve been out meeting the Oxy community. Have you been able to make up for lost time this year?

Elam: Some, but I feel that I’ve got to be more deliberate in trying to meet students and to give them the chance to know me and vice versa. I’ve had lunch at the Marketplace, and we had a series of receptions and meetings with students in their dorms, but I’m looking to do even more.

Have you had any particularly memorable interactions with students on campus?

Homecoming was great fun—judging the car parade and speaking to our athletic teams and rooting them on.

There’s such energy there; sharing those moments with students is one of the joys of the job. In planning for Homecoming, we set up tables and umbrellas around the Quad.

After I talked to the women’s volleyball team, one of the players ran after me, shouting, “President Elam!” So, I stopped and she asked, “Can the tables and umbrellas stay?” I said, “Yes!” That generated more good feelings than just about anything since I arrived here.

What lessons did the pandemic teach us?

Number one is how much we all value the experience of being a residential campus and all that means to students, faculty, staff, and administrators. Second is the sense of resilience that was on display: faculty doing 14

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things differently in terms of how they taught; students in terms of changing how they had to perform and study; staff in coming together as a community while working remotely or dealing with furloughs.

Number three is the socioeconomic differences exacerbated by the remote experience. There were some students who could have a room of their own and reliable internet and all that they needed to study and perform. But others had none of that and encountered very different experiences in what

YEAR TWO

As Inauguration Day draws near, President Harry J. Elam, Jr. reflects on the lessons of the pandemic, the evolution of academic excellence, the future of strategic planning, and the necessity of a culture of care

By DICK ANDERSON Photos by MARC CAMPOS

it meant to study away. The unevenness of that educational experience and the emotional nature of returning to campus are hardships that we will continue to confront.

There are some good ideas to be taken away from the pandemic. The resilience I mentioned informed the development of hybrid classroom teaching that features some remote work as well as in-person discussions. When I asked both students and faculty what they wanted to keep after returning to campus, one of the experiences both groups mentioned was office hours over Zoom. They appreciated the ease of jumping online into a discussion.

Oxy’s operating budget was hit hard by the pandemic, resulting in reduced department budgets, reductions in staff, and extended furloughs. How are things looking now and what do you think the next fiscal year will look like?

We’re trying to build back to where we were in 2019. After the College pivoted to remote learning, we worked with the trustees and senior staff to make the budget cuts that needed to be made and still deliver the Oxy education that our students deserve. We felt as good as you can feel with a $30 million deficit in terms of ensuring the survival of the school. Then the stock market turned around and with the careful stewardship of our Investment Committee, our endowment is now hovering around $600 million—higher than it’s ever been. And there is hope that we can get it to over $1 billion in the not-too-distant future.

On the staff side, the great resignation has hit us, and we’re still figuring out if we want to be or can get to be back to 2019 staffing levels, or if our operating philosophy has changed since the pandemic. We are currently in the middle of integrated strategic planning, and there are some potential costs related to it that must be recognized and anticipated as well.

On the subject of integrated strategic planning, what makes us distinct and how can we further differentiate ourselves from our peers?

The immediate distinction that comes to mind is our location. When I asked a classroom of students how many of them came to Oxy because it was in Los Angeles, every hand went up. We have so many programs and partnerships happening in L.A., and we want to be even more intentional about it. What that means, what we do for L.A., and how we’re conscious of it is something we want to evolve further. For example, Warner Music Group is going to have an internship program that’s only open to Oxy students.

Another characteristic that makes us distinctive is a willingness to experiment— to take intellectual risks and try something different. Campaign Semester, for instance, offers a level of hands-on, experiential learning that is like nothing you’re going to find at other schools. The U.N. program also fits

top left: Elam listens to the concerns of residents of Chilcott Hall at an event last November. top right: Meeting with Obama Scholars and Fellows last October. above: In February, Enid Busser ’58, left, presents Michele and Harry Elam with a quilt crafted by members of the Oxy Women’s Club. right: David Carreon-Bradley, center, Oxy’s vice president for equity and justice, and Elam chat with members of the Asian American Tutorial Project at the College’s Involvement Fair last September.

this paradigm, as do the Oxy Immersives that our faculty created during the pandemic as a way of being innovative with first-year learning in that moment.

How do we define and maintain academic excellence?

The definition of academic excellence continues to evolve but it has three main and consistent factors. First, we want to hire and retain the best faculty. Their Oxy experience has to be one that keeps them here so that we have more professors like Woody Studenmund, who has been here for 52 years.

The second factor involves attracting an exceptional and diverse student body and understanding that students may start in different places academically, perhaps even more so because of the pandemic. How can we create a more equitable playing field and help those students who need it?

The third factor requires putting student learning at the center of all our endeavors.

How do we develop classes, projects, comps, 16

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and experiential learning activities that encourage and enable student learning? How do we structure learning goals and outcomes that help students discover their intellectual passion and to take the lead in determining their education?

You have spoken about the idea of creating a culture of care at Oxy, saying that we must make “the structural, social, and personal changes necessary to ensure equity and justice both on and beyond campus.” Can you elaborate on that thinking?

Many current students and Oxy grads have said that they found their people here.

Given that we have an affinity that lends itself to that, how do we make it so everyone feels like they’re valued, that they belong?

How does this relate to the experience of our alumni? I’ve heard from so many alumni who loved it here. How do we keep them connected to the living, breathing Oxy of today?

How do we encourage alumni to recognize that a culture of care involves them too?

More than a year since its announcement, how is progress coming on the Black Action Plan, and how does it relate to the Equity and Justice Agenda?

We have folded much of the Black Action Plan into the Equity and Justice Agenda and many of those priorities have been addressed.

Others are playing out now. Thanks to Chris Arguedas and the Intercultural Community Center, MLK Lounge has been renovated.

Students wanted themed housing and we have provided this both in Pauley [Oxy’s Multicultural Hall] as well as space in Berkus Hall. Thanks to the efforts of our faculty and dean of the College, Black Studies now is a department. That was a priority. One lingering critical agenda item is mental health support.

Mental health is a growing concern for all our students but particularly for BIPOC students.

We searched last fall for an additional therapist at Emmons and didn’t find anybody; we’ll search again this spring and also create other measures to address this vital issue.

With leadership from the offices of Student Affairs and Equity and Justice, we will also use time during Orientation each fall to educate and initiate discussions with our first-year students about the dynamics of race and racism, belonging and difference.

We will examine issues such as anti-Asian hate and antisemitism in ways that see connections but also see what makes them distinct. This will be an ongoing conversation that helps all of our students better negotiate differences and also know that they are valued and belong.

With regards to the anti-Asian texts from a student that surfaced on social media in February: How can the College address not only the safety but also the inclusion of its Asian community?

In a myriad of ways. If anything, this incident shook us into the reality that we have to do better in supporting Asian and Asian American students and in truly practicing equality and inclusion. As administrators, we need to take steps to be effectively proactive and collaborative and not simply reactive. As we think about the curriculum, what courses do we offer that address the Asian American experience? Jane Hong [associate professor of history] will teach a course on Asian American history next year. What related offerings can we create as well?

In terms of specifically responding to bias and hate, I hope that by the start of the fall 2022 semester we will have in place a program called BEST—short for Bias Education Support Team. It’s a way to address bias incidents that may be protected by the First Amendment or California’s Leonard Law that still do harm to the community.

BEST will mediate issues through education.

I believe we can and will find ways to reaffirm our community values and take a restorative approach to problem-solving. Together, we will continue to become the kind of anti-racist institution we want to be.

Turning to sports: What’s been the impact of the discontinuation of football and the creation of the Commission on Athletics?

One message that became evident to me last year is how invested alumni are in the legacy of Oxy football—there’s a great story there to tell. We need to tell it and celebrate it. Charlie Cardillo [vice president for institutional advancement] and I are working with Vance Mueller ’86 and Jeff Goldstein ’86 and others to create an event on campus for

former football players to come together, socialize, and remember. We will also build a digital archive dedicated to Oxy football.

Regardless of its future, we want to preserve that legacy and will work to do so.

The Commission on Athletics was helpful in giving us a clear sense of what we want to accomplish in intercollegiate athletics. We want to be more robust in all of our sports and to compete in the top three in everything we do in the SCIAC. That’s the goal.

We’ve had two strong recruiting classes over the last two years and we’re starting to see some success in terms of diversity in the student-athletes we are recruiting as well. The commission also addressed Oxy’s coaching needs so that we were able to add a number of new assistant coaching positions to help us with both recruiting as well as working with our players on the field.

Roxane Gay—the New York Times bestselling author and social justice commentator—is teaching in the Critical Theory and Social Justice Department this semester as Oxy’s first-ever Presidential Professor. Can you tell me how that came about?

It came about with a desire from the CTSJ Department to bring Dr. Gay to Oxy. Professor Caroline Heldman reached out to her and Dr. Gay was interested in coming here for a number of reasons. In order to bring her to the campus to teach for a finite period, we created a new position, the Presidential Professor. In the future, we will use the position of Presidential Professor, when appropriate, to attract other public intellectuals and renowned figures who bring something different to Oxy. Dr. Gay is teaching a course called Writing Trauma. Certainly this is a timely subject in our world today, given everything that’s happening in Ukraine as well as what’s been happening in the United States. Having Dr. Gay at Oxy was a great opportunity for us and for her. And it’s gotten us some recognition outside of campus. A couple of alumni have said to me, “Wow, I wish I was there.”

Will the Presidential Professorship be appointed on an ad hoc basis if another opportunity comes along?

Yes, but we need to think strategically about it. We want to build a more prominent national reputation. This is something that could potentially help us. So, when President Obama comes back to teach at Oxy, he will definitely be a Presidential Professor!

New Harmonies: The Music of Inauguration New Harmonies is the theme of President Harry J. Elam, Jr.’s Inauguration, to be held in Hillside Theater on April 23. In keeping with that spirit, music is an integral part of the ceremony, with contributions from Oxy’s music community.

At Elam’s request, singer/actor Lencia Kebede ’16 (above, performing at Apollo Night in 2016) will reprise her showstopping rendition of “I Know Where I’ve Been,” from Oxy’s 2013 production of Hairspray, with vocal support from the Occidental Glee Club. She will also join the Oxy Symphony Orchestra, Jazz Ensemble, and Glee Club for a performance of “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”

Since November, Orchestra members Leslie Garcia ’24 and Chester Cahill ’24 have been working on a special arrangement of “Lift Every Voice and Sing” for the combined forces of the three groups, says Chris Kim, Oxy’s director of instrumental activities. All 42 members of the Symphony, along with members of the Jazz Band and Glee Club, will be part of the performance, joined by members of Oxy’s applied faculty and a number of Eagle Rock High School students.

“Lift Every Voice and Sing” (written by NAACP leader James Weldon Johnson in 1900, with music by his brother, J. Rosamond) “is a significant part of American history,” says Désirée LaVertu, director of choral and vocal activities. “Because of the story the song tells, we felt it was appropriate for the inauguration of Oxy’s second African American president.”

The ceremony also will include an original composition by Associate Professor Adam Schoenberg for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, and piano. “‘Alone/Together’ is about the journey that most people endured when the world shut down in March 2020,” he explains. After a somber, reflective beginning, “The music evolves into something uplifting and optimistic as it captures the feeling of being able to gather again with our community to finally witness and celebrate President Elam’s Inauguration.

We’re very excited to have him here.”

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Personal

TOUCHSTONES

A look inside President Elam’s office tells his story in five artifacts

By JASMINE TERAN Photos by MARC CAMPOS

1. An internationally renowned theater scholar, Elam has written or contributed to dozens of books on the study of contemporary American theater and African American theater history. His books sit alongside those of wife Michele, including The Souls of Mixed Folk: Race, Politics, and Aesthetics in the New Millennium.

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2. After practicing law for 20 years, Harry J. Elam, Sr. was appointed as the first Black judge to sit on the Boston Municipal Court in 1971. Seven years later, he became the court’s first Black chief justice. “I like to have my Dad’s name plaque here so he can watch over my meetings,” President Elam says. (Elam, Sr. died in 2012.)

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3. In addition to his duties as vice president for the arts at Stanford, Elam still made time to direct; his last production, in 2018, was Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry. The play was staged at the Roble Studio Theater, which was renamed the Harry J. Elam, Jr. Theater in 2021.

“Directing students provides a unique connection to them, and it’s something I hope to do at Oxy, too.”

4. Founded in 1780 by John Adams, John Hancock, and 60 other scholarpatriots, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences is one of the nation’s oldest learned societies. Elam was elected to the Academy in 2019: “I will always remember Induction Day, when I signed my name in the membership book, where it now appears alongside historic figures.”

5. Younger brother Keith Elam, aka Guru, was a member of the pioneering jazz rap duo Gang Starr. (He died in 2010 from multiple myeloma.) Behind Elam’s desk hangs a framed poster for Keith’s 1993 concert in Berlin. “That same year, when Keith performed at Stanford, I walked into the auditorium, and instead of saying, ‘That’s Professor Elam,’ some of the students whispered, ‘That’s the Guru’s brother!’ ” SPRING 2022

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Lessons From

Woody Economics legend Woody Studenmund closes the textbook on a 52-year career

By DICK ANDERSON Photo by KEVIN BURKE

T

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his was how naive I was about the pandemic,” Woody Studenmund says. “I was teaching Econometrics in the fall of 2020—in the last few years, I taught one class a semester—and I didn’t want my last class to be remote.”

In adapting to remote learning, Studenmund converted a second garage at his home into a studio, brought in some whiteboards, and hired a crew of Oxy graduates to record his lectures. “I treated it like a regular classroom,” he says. They filmed me so that students could watch at various times and they would put in sound effects. If I told a joke, they’d add a laugh track, or if I said, ‘Let’s take a minute and think about that,’ they’d put in the Jeopardy! music while students were thinking. We tried to make it as much like a real class as we could.”

As generations of Oxy students will attest, there’s no substitute for the real Woody. Over the last 52 years, Studenmund has been the bedrock of the Economics Department. And while his retirement this spring, at 77, is not unexpected, it is decidedly the end of an era.

“Woody has a remarkable ability to challenge perceptions and engage students in a way that makes even the most complex topics approachable,” says economics major Alex Bozuwa ’16, who is now a program specialist with Grassroot Soccer, an adolescent health organization.

“His enthusiasm for life is infectious, and his willingness to support and advocate for people is tremendous.”

Studenmund “helped shape how I try to show up in every room I enter, engage with and take an interest in people, and have joy and passion for my work,” she continues. “This has formed the base of anything I have achieved since my time at Oxy. I will be forever grateful.”

After he delivers his last Managerial Economics lecture this spring—in person, albeit to a masked assembly in Fowler Hall—what will Studenmund miss most? “The interaction with the students, obviously,” he says, “and the interaction with the faculty as well.” Just don’t text him any well wishes: “I don’t carry a cellphone,” he admits with a laugh. “That’s how old I am.”

Much has been written in these pages about the evolution of the Economics Department and its resurgence, rivaling the glory days under 1917 graduate John Parke Young and Laurence De Rycke. A tiger’s share of the credit must go to Studenmund, who first became department chair in 1975 (and was named the De Rycke Distinguished Professor of Economics in 2007). “For a while I was the only tenure-track professor,” he recalls. “I had a chance to build the department from scratch, so I set out to hire the very best teaching economists I could find.”

Between 1977 and 1982, the department added three aces: Jim Halstead, who was considered one of the best economics teachers at Williams; Robby Moore, threetime honoree as best teacher of Harvard’s flagship Ec 10

(Principles of Economics) course; and Jim Whitney, who won five teaching awards at the University of Wisconsin.

By the mid-1980s, when the College’s most popular major was economics and the enrollment of women at Oxy began to outnumber men, Studenmund realized that he was “replicating the problems” of his predecessors in constructing an all-white male faculty. “To truly offer a good education to a broad group of students, we had to have a diverse group of faculty,” he says, “and today I would claim we’re the most diverse econ department at any coed institution in the country. Just as impressively, we continued to attract superb teachers as well, because it was easier to attract people to our department when they saw how successful we were.”

“Woody has had a profound effect on shaping and growing our department to the success it is today,” says Lesley Chiou, professor of economics and current department chair. “He has influenced countless generations of students and faculty by being a tireless advocate for their education and growth.”

A native of Cooperstown, N.Y., Arnold Harwood Studenmund is named for his uncle, his mother’s only brother and a lieutenant and fighter pilot in the Navy, who died following a midair collision in June 1944, less than four months before Studenmund’s birth. “My family made up ‘Woody’ as a nickname because they could not bear to call me by my actual first name—it reminded them of the man who was killed in the war,” he says.

Even after his family moved to Cresskill, N.J., Studenmund spent most of his summers in Cooperstown, home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. He lived two doors down from the hall’s director and played baseball “nearly every day” on Doubleday Field. “Back then, there was an annual Hall of Fame game,” he adds, “and kids could run on the field with their programs between innings and try to get players’ autographs, which was exciting.”

As a child, Studenmund learned to add and subtract even before he could read and write, and he spent three years as a math major at Hamilton College before switching to economics. The deeper he got into his studies, he says, “My econ classes took more aim at applying theory to the real world, and that became attractive to me.”

Studenmund ran track and field at Hamilton (“We set a school record in the relay that still stands”) and organized a grad track club at Cornell, where he completed his master’s and Ph.D. After he arrived at Oxy in 1970, he spent a year as an assistant to track and field head coach Dixon Farmer ’63. While he enjoyed coaching, “Being an official coach would limit me in terms of my teaching flexibility and research opportunities,” he says, “so I stopped after one year.”

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Assistant Professor 1970–75 Associate Professor 1975–83 Richard W. Millar Professor of Economics 1983–2007 Laurence De Rycke Distinguished Professor of Economics 2007–22

Chair, Economics Dept.

1975–80, 1986–87, 1993–96, 2000–03, 2011–15 Director, Core Program in the Liberal Arts 1983–86, 1988–90 Associate Dean of the Faculty 1987–90 Vice President for Student Services 1991–93 Director of Institutional Planning 1994–2004 Dean of Admission and Financial Aid 1996–97 Faculty Adviser, Veterans Program 2019–2022

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Over the next decade, Studenmund coached Oxy’s sprinters in their off-season workouts. He also organized a women’s distance running club, working with Oxy’s first national-class women’s track athlete, Pam Morris ’79, who would compete in three separate Olympic Trials.

In 1972, the ever-youthful professor was even cast as an extra in the Disney movie The World’s Greatest Athlete, which filmed its track sequences at Cal State L.A. “The filmmakers took one look at me and they decided I was a javelin thrower from Brigham Young,” Studenmund says. “If you look in slow motion, you can see me for about a tenth of a second.”

Having conquered the silver screen, Studenmund dipped his toes into the textbook industry in 1976, publishing the first of eight editions of Coursebook for Economics with Dryden Press. That would set the table for an even bigger foray into publishing, one that grew organically out of his Econometrics class.

“I started off writing a chapter for my students to replace one chapter in the book we were using, which was a famous econometrics text. The next year I wrote a second chapter, and I submitted those chapters to four publishers.”

The Studenmund Room in Johnson Student Center/ Freeman College Union was dedicated in 2013. Inset: The seventh edition of Using Econometrics.

In 1983, on sabbatical from Oxy, Studenmund was called to Washington, D.C., to work with the Federal Home Loan Bank Board to help with the savings and loan crisis (“You can tell how much help I was—we didn’t fix it”). It was in the Office of Policy and Economic Research that he met Henry Cassidy, the board’s director of general research and a professor at George Mason University, who had written an econometrics textbook that had not sold particularly well. In reading Cassidy’s book, “He had the right approach,” Studenmund says. And then an idea came to him: “If I added in examples, exercises, and practical stuff to his theory, the two combined would be a good text.”

When Studenmund returned to Oxy, he spent nearly two full years working on the first edition of the 440-page book. “My wife, Jaynie, was working long hours at a very difficult job, so I got a carrel in the library away from everybody and just cranked away on the 22 OCCIDENTAL MAGAZINE

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book,” he recalls. “We would both get home around 8 or 9 p.m., have some dinner, and go to bed.”

Using Econometrics: A Practical Guide was published in 1986 to modest initial sales. Over the next three years, however, sales increased year over year—defying the typical textbook sales trajectory, where the first year is the best before the used-book market eats into demand.

Following the publication of the second edition in 1991, with Studenmund as the sole author, “We were probably the No. 1 seller in elementary econometrics,” he says.

The seventh edition of Using Econometrics came out in 2016. The textbook remains a steady seller, and “we’re talking about an eighth,” Studenmund says. “Econometrics is an evolving field, so if a new technique came in, I wouldn’t put it in the book right away, except maybe as a footnote, until it became used by a majority of economists.” Conversely, he notes, “There’s a technique called generalized least squares, which used to be our top approach toward a particular econometric problem. Now it’s a footnote in the book.”

On the night of June 9, 2014, the unthinkable happened when 24year-old U.S. Army Special Forces Staff Sgt. Scott Studenmund— Jaynie and Woody’s son—was among five U.S. soldiers killed in Afghanistan, the victims of “friendly fire” from a U.S. Air Force bomber. Scott was buried a month later at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia alongside fellow Green Beret and Staff Sgt. Jason A. McDonald, 28, who also was killed in the incident.

Studenmund returned to teaching that fall, coming into the Fowler Hall classroom “with boundless energy, enthusiasm, and patience to teach us,” Kate Johnstone ’15 recalls. In accepting a posthumous honorary degree awarded to Scott from President Jonathan Veitch at Commencement in May 2015, Studenmund said: “I firmly believe that if each American did one more thing to solve our country’s problems, we could have the country for whose aspirations Scott was willing to die.”

In 2018, Studenmund discussed the circumstances surrounding Scott’s death for a story on 60 Minutes. “The first question [correspondent] Bill Whitaker asked was, ‘Tell me about Scott.’ And I refused to answer,” Studenmund recalls.

Whitaker rephrased the question twice, with the same results, before the segment’s producer told him to stop.

“What I was pointing out was our government killed these soldiers—Green Berets, people who had three years of intensive training—because of a mistake,” he explains. “That’s what the story was about. I felt if I talked about Scott from the perspective of a sad parent, the show would be pulled away from its true purpose.”

The response to the 60 Minutes story—which was seen by about 8 million viewers—was “overwhelming,” Studenmund says, with hundreds of emails and phone calls after the broadcast. “I caught up with people I hadn’t talked to in a long time. They all said more or less the same thing—that they were proud that I had done it and sad that it had happened.

“It’s not difficult to do something if you think it’s the right thing to do,” he continues. “I was doing what I had to do—the same thing that Scott did charging up that hill.”

‘He brought out the best in all of us’

Studenmund in his Fowler Hall classroom in 1975 and in 2016, right.

In November 2014, Clairbourn School in San Gabriel renamed its athletic field the Scott Studenmund Field, and two years later, Flintridge Preparatory School dedicated a memorial wall honoring four individuals, including Scott, for their lives and contributions. For 37 years, Woody was faculty adviser to the student-run Blyth Fund—and a former student who is now an entrepreneur is trying to set up a fund at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, similar to the Blyth Fund, named after Scott.

Of the many administrative roles Studenmund has held over his time at Oxy, the one he says he enjoyed the most was dean of admission and financial aid during the 199697 academic year. In the face of dire financial straits and a declining student population, Studenmund and his team were tasked with matriculating a larger-than-average class while maintaining the College’s standards.

“In my year, we brought in 440 students”—up from 270 the previous year—“which is my favorite number, because that’s the race I ran in track,” he says. The Class of 2001 also enjoyed one of the highest graduation rates in recent memory: “Not only was it a large class, it was a successful one.”

In addition to the prospect of an eighth edition of his textbook—“That’ll keep me busy”—Studenmund has a long list of things he’s looking forward to doing in retirement, from cruises and other travel to spending more time with his family.

He also will continue to coach soccer as an assistant at Flintridge Prep, having first worked with daughter Connell’s team years ago (he also coached baseball and track for the school for a number of years). “Our soccer team has won seven consecutive league championships,” Studenmund notes, “but even if we lost, it’d still be fun.

It keeps me young.”

Brad Fauvre ’87: It’s amazing that I sit here writing this tribute to Professor Woody Studenmund 35 years after I have graduated. Woody epitomizes my view of the value of Oxy as a liberal arts institution. He focused first on teaching his principle of critical thinking in his given field, for which he had just authored our econometrics textbook, constantly challenging and engaging us in class—not by telling us the correct answer but by showing us how to develop a logic to solve a problem that you needed to be able to defend verbally. He seemed to know when you were a little unprepared or slacking off, and would zero in on you with a tough question. We all quickly learned to be on our game in Woody’s class because we didn’t want to disappoint him.

His passion for economics in general and econometrics in particular was infectious, but his ability to focus on students individually and challenge them to be their best was for me his most impactful skill. I was asked by Woody to stay after test results were handed out at the end of class one day, along with some others who I was sure were struggling more than I was. He spoke to each of us individually and saved me for last when he told me with a strong sense of disappointment that I had gotten an 86 when I should have been in the 90s. His personal disappointment motivated me to never let it happen again, and I pushed myself to commit fully to the subject at hand from that day forward. He brought out the best in all of us.

I credit Woody with helping me choose my first job, with encouraging me to pursue graduate school, and with teaching me to never be satisfied with the minimum acceptable outcome.

What am I missing? What is the secondor third-order mechanism here? How will I communicate this effectively, verbally or in writing? His rigor in teaching instilled in me a continual desire to learn that stays with me today. I am forever grateful for Woody’s impact on me and the College, and I know that his example will inform the curriculum and spirit of teaching at Oxy for 52 more years at least.

Fauvre is president of Velocity Vehicle Group in Whittier and a past president of the Occidental College Alumni Board of Governors.

Kate Johnstone ’15: Before I ever had him as a professor, I knew Woody by his first name—everyone in the Economics Department did. This approachability is a key part of what makes Woody such an impactful and influential person in so many of his students’ lives. His energy was infectious, and he could make a

subject that seemed boring on its surface into one of the most interesting courses I took in college. While he had high expectations for his students, he dedicated extensive time and energy outside of the classroom to help us meet those expectations.

For all of the important knowledge that I gained from taking Econometrics, Managerial Economics, and an independent study course with him, I think a lot of the lessons I learned from Woody that have influenced my life, and will continue to do so, came from his confidence in me as one of his students and from observing his incredible character.

Woody has been an advocate for women in leadership roles, actively encouraging the relatively small group of women in our Managerial Economics class to imagine ourselves in leadership roles at companies or firms. He has continued his effort to encourage more women to join the Economics Department and pursue careers in business.

Although with a smile he urged me to consider business school rather than law school, he wrote my law school recommendation letter and helped me achieve my goal of becoming a lawyer.

He has a strong passion for helping students achieve the potential he sees in them, and that dedication to mentorship has made me strive to be a better mentor to people in my life.

For all the lessons I learned from Woody about economics and careers, I think the most important one was also the most simple: Lead with confidence and positivity (even when life isn’t going your way), and others will do the same.

Johnstone is an associate at Latham & Watkins in Los Angeles.

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Many Thanks

As five retiring faculty take their classroom curtain calls, we asked a few prized pupils to toast their Oxy mentors Edited by DICK ANDERSON Photos by KEVIN BURKE & MARC CAMPOS

Sycamore Glen, I feel like I am leaving behind a little part of me.”

Linda Lyke PROFESSOR OF ART AND ART HISTORY

Years at Oxy: 46 YOU MENTIONED THAT YOUR FAVORITE CLASS WAS PHOTO-PROCESSES IN PRINTMAKING. WHY?

“Many of our students come to college with an interest in photography but no knowledge or experience of printmaking. It has been exciting to teach Photo-processes in Printmaking and introduce students to the joys of printmaking using their photographs with the new techniques such as photo platemaking, solar plates, litho plates, photo silkscreen and digital media. I have enjoyed the printshop as a place where students can come and learn new technologies along with traditional printmaking processes, and be encouraged to experiment with their work and dream big. That, in turn, continues to resonate with me.”

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR RETIREMENT? “My

work has always been inspired by the close observation of nature and Oxy has been very generous in supporting my travels to examine plants and animals in places such as Yosemite National Park, Japan, Belfast, Melbourne, and most recently, Kenya. I will continue to travel and to create artwork that celebrates and ruminates on the natural world. I believe art is a regeneration loop—it both sustains me as a human and is vital to raising awareness and energy in the fight to save the biodiversity of the planet in the face of the climate crisis.”

ANYTHING ELSE YOU WOULD LIKE TO ADD?

“Occidental will forever be an indelible part of me. I raised my two daughters as a young mother on this campus. I’ve had the privilege of teaching an amazing, talented group of students, many of whom are now lifelong friends and incredible artists whose achievements fill me with pride. I’m immensely grateful for the camaraderie of my colleagues from administration, athletics, faculty, and staff, who make Oxy the wonderful place that it is. Seeing all the friendly faces who work for Campus Dining, Facilities, and Campus Safety always makes my day. Over my tenure, I have enjoyed being a faculty athletic representative. I strongly believe that the mission of a liberal arts college should include fostering student-athletes and encouraging all students to further their mind/body connection through arts and athletics. I have cherished my time at Oxy and I hope to see the collaborations I’ve helped foster between printmaking, book arts, biology, and poetry continue past my retirement.

Lastly, I am incredibly grateful for the commissions the College has given me. From the ceramic tiles on the side wall of the Arthur G. Coons Administrative Center celebrating the early history of Occidental to my piece LUCA (Last Universal Common Ancestor) at the culmination of the Fibonacci curve in

Bonus magazine content: For extended faculty Q&As, visit oxy.edu/retiring-faculty

Linda Warren ’81: As a freshman entering Occidental College, I had no way of knowing my choice to take Printmaking Fundamentals with Linda Lyke that first quarter would determine the direction of my career and passions. During my years at Oxy, many of the studio art classes were located in the Art Barn (now Samuelson Pavilion). The Art Barn was spectacular—a rambling wood atelier that smelled of sawdust, oil, ink, and the various machinery George Baker ’58 used to teach and create his magnificent sculptures. It was conveniently located between Clancy’s Dining Hall and Erdman, my freshman dorm. I passed many hours in the print studio—my respite as I adjusted to life at Oxy and in Los Angeles.

wavered and is still the common theme in my work. I am endlessly grateful to Linda for her hands-on approach, her ability to pass on knowledge with her passion, and her inspiration to create a career that stirs my soul.

Enjoy your next adventure, Linda. I look forward to our continued friendship and the opportunity to make art together again.

Warren is founder and creative director of Warren Group | Studio Deluxe in Los Angeles.

Kenturah Davis ’02: I first encountered Linda Lyke during one of my high school volleyball tournaments, where one of her daughters also played. She struck up a conversation with my mom and inquired about my plans for college. Mom told her that I wanted to be an artist and that Oxy was one of the schools I was considering for undergrad. It was impossible to predict how that first encounter would blossom into a lasting mentorship and friendship.

Professor Lyke showed me what true commitment and discipline for a lifelong practice as an artist looks like. I took every class she taught, and I marvel at the degree to which she nurtured my creativity. Although I knew I wanted to be an artist, she saw more than I could see in myself.

Her teaching and guidance has extended far beyond those four years, having written countless letters of Lyke in 1976 with student recommendation that helped build Nichol du Pont ’77. the artist career I currently enjoy.

In 2018, after I completed my Linda, also new to Oxy, was typically in MFA at Yale, she transferred her teaching hat the studio working with us one-on-one while to me, as she began to phase into retirement. guiding us in the importance of color and tex- Her invitation to come teach studio art ture, along with the nuances of lithography courses here at Oxy has really illuminated and printmaking. By my junior year, Linda the significance of the work she has done added a Papermaking class to her schedule over the last four decades, both as a teacher and the department acquired a new press. and an artist. Her vibrant and compelling Printing monographs on my own paper ig- work combined with her ability to bring her nited a spark that led to my lifelong relation- students’ potential to the surface is what I ship with paper, ink, color, process and hope to emulate. design. From Linda, I learned that art is freLinda, as you read this, I hope you feel quently not immediate, mistakes are often the profound gratitude I have for you. From gifts and the fun is in the exploration. Most your support in the classroom, to the houseimportant, she taught me to cast a critical sitting gigs at your animal kingdom, to helpeye, go back and dig deeper. ing me get my very first show, you have A few years after graduation, I opened my played a strong hand in helping me become graphic design studio in Los Angeles, a bold the artist and person I want to be. Thank you. decision for an English lit major. My appreciDavis is an artist working between Los ation of paper, color, and imagery has never Angeles and Accra, Ghana.

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Lynn Mehl PROFESSOR OF KINESIOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY

Years at Oxy: 45 WHAT WAS YOUR FAVORITE CLASS? “That’s like

choosing your favorite child. Over the course of 45 years I have taught a wide range of courses in both kinesiology and psychology. My favorites have been those crossed listed which has allowed for an interdisciplinary perspective. Developmental Motor Behavior (or some variation of the course title) has been taught since I first arrived in 1977. Before the creation of the Child Development Center, I used to recruit infants and children of my Oxy faculty and staff colleagues to visit class for ‘active’ learning.

Both my daughter and grandchildren were regulars in the class.”

Vance Mueller ’86: First, I would like to congratulate Lynn on a remarkable career.

Her work as a professor of kinesiology and psychology at Occidental has influenced countless young minds to challenge themselves to push and expand the boundaries of learning in an attempt to find what the body and mind are truly capable of achieving.

Her commitment to athletics and Title IX at the College have had an incredible impact on the growth and sustainability of our existing sports programs. Her efforts on the panel to reestablish the football program greatly contributed to football being brought back and to be seen as an asset to the College that should be fought for. I will forever be grateful for her positive encouragement in that very challenging debate.

Most importantly, I will be forever grateful for Lynn’s mentoring and guidance when I was a struggling young student looking for direction. Lynn introduced me to the science of kinesiology and forever changed my life.

My passion for learning accelerated tremendously and I found a field of study that has positively influenced my life and career choices over three decades. Lynn, thank you for all you have done for me personally and so many others. I am proud to call you my mentor and my friend. Enjoy your retirement, even though I don’t really see you not staying very busy in retirement!

Mueller played professional football for six seasons with the Los Angeles Raiders. He is the owner of Mueller’s Elite Training in Jackson.

Sue Bethanis ’82: I came to Oxy not long after Lynn did, and have kept in touch with her ever since. What a treat this has been for nearly 45 years (and by the way, that’s a 26 OCCIDENTAL MAGAZINE

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crazy amount of time). Not only did I get to study with Lynn at Oxy, I have had the pleasure of working with her in my role with Tiger Club just four years ago.

Lynn has been a true inspiration to me in so many ways. She combined the psychological and the physical in her teaching and research; and she was an athletics coach and administrator. Early in my career, I did the same at Colorado College and USF. At those institutions, my staunch dedication to what it really meant to be a “scholar student-athlete” comes from Lynn, first and foremost.

Likewise, knowing I could go for a doctoral degree in education while I was also coaching a Division I sport—no problem, that’s

what former scholar student-athletes do.

Again, Lynn was in the back of my mind.

Now, as part of my role as CEO of Mariposa Leadership Inc., I have the honor of coaching executives in high-tech companies.

In leading my company, and in coaching leaders, I get to apply years of learning the psychological and the physical. Yep, Lynn again. Her mentorship has been invaluable; I am so grateful for her presence in my life and proud of all she has accomplished at Oxy. She has had a profound effect on my life and career. Mahalo, my friend!

Bethanis played both volleyball and basketball for Occidental. She has served as president of Tiger Club.

Jennifer (Wright) Bea ’96: Dr. Lynn Mehl was a part of my college Lynn Pacala instructs Division III doubles experience from day one and has champion Wendy had a huge influence on my career Antisdel ’84 in 1983. and life since graduation. What made Lynn such a special instructor and mentor is that she cared about me as a whole person, not just a seat filled in a classroom. Oxy is magical that way and Lynn has been an integral part of that magic.

Sure, she ensured that I took the right classes, understood scientific concepts, and applied my learning (never forget the rotor pursuit project and bilateral transfer!) so that I would be successful. But she also attended Glee Club concerts, sponsored the Cheer Squad, and showed up at games to cheer me on. I know she did the same for What a blessing to watch Krissy grow, get many others in their various interest areas.

I can trace much of what I know about married, and have children. Seeing photos of teaching and mentorship back to Dr. Mehl: Lynn with her grandchildren in various locaCare about the whole person and provide a tions across the country brings a smile to my variety of opportunities. Her classes were face every time. I hope retirement brings filled with diverse activities, from videos, to many more smiles and family adventures.

It is hard to believe 45 years of service to readings, small- and large-group discussions, hands-on projects, and more. Every style of Oxy has already passed. May we all have such learning had a chance to thrive. Lynn also stamina for stimulating scientific curiosity, created space for being human and sharing hard work, and lifelong mentorship.

Bea is associate professor of health promoher life with us. She was a role model for balance as a professional, a teacher, and a par- tion sciences at the University of Arizona. ent. I have such fond memories of her young teen daughter wandering in at the start of Kirk Bentzen ’91: Coming across the country class to check in with mom before heading as a wide-eyed first-generation college stuout to “hang” on campus with the athletic dent, I had little idea what I was doing. I had trainer’s daughter. As our friendship grew, hit a huge roadblock in organic chemistry the Lynn offered me a job babysitting her daugh- same semester I had discovered kinesiology. ter Krissy when she would travel.

Lynn Mehl’s gentle influence helped me One of the most important pieces of ad- tremendously. My double major of kinesivice Lynn ever gave me, and I put it here for ology and psychology became the perfect others to benefit, was that you don’t have to launch point into a profession of service and pay for a Ph.D. There are grants that can pay caring as a physical therapist. From observfor tuition and salary. Not only was I able to ing elementary school children in motor detake advantage of that advice, but I am now velopment to mirror tracing tasks in motor in academia myself and able fund others and learning to advising my senior comps repay Lynn’s advice forward. search on bilateral transfer of learning, As an associate professor, I also have to Lynn’s courses were foundational and fun! balance my research, teaching, service, and Lynn’s own service and caring of myself motherhood, as Lynn did. Lynn is still there as one of her students became a model of as a mentor and friend. She has counseled me mentoring compassion that I carried through during career transitions, sends students to my master’s and doctoral education as a my cancer prevention and control summer physical therapist, into my clinical practice research program, and sends holiday cards with patients, and eventually into my curwith pictures of her and the grandchildren. rent leadership role as the clinical manager

and residency program director at Adventist Health Therapy and Wellness Center in Glendale, a mere mile away from Oxy. Unsurprisingly, Lynn continued to be a significant influence on my professional endeavors when she invited me to become a community member on Oxy’s Human Subjects Institutional Review Board. Within a few years of reconnecting on the IRB, Lynn and I developed together the incredibly successful physical therapy internship within the kinesiology department as a partnership between Oxy and the Therapy and Wellness Center. Lynn then invited me to join her as a part-time professor in kinesiology teaching anatomy, labs, and the introduction to kinesiology course when the department had a need. What a joy it has been to become a colleague in the department (and with the mentor!) that has meant so much to me for so long.

Even in the middle stages of my career as a therapist and educator, Lynn encouraged me to go back and finish the Ph.D. that I had talked to her about wanting to do when I was in my early 20s. With her mentoring and guidance, this dream culminated this past August where I successfully defended my dissertation. My life has had Lynn’s handprint on it every step of the way since my first year at Oxy. She has become so much more than a professor or a mentor. She is a wonderful friend.

Bentzen joined the Oxy faculty as an adjunct professor of kinesiology in 2014.

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Burkdall at his home in Healdsburg, about 75 miles north of San Francisco; inset, reading a poem by 1905 graduate Robinson Jeffers in October 2009.

Thomas Burkdall ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF WRITING AND RHETORIC

Years at Oxy: 31 WHAT ATTRACTED YOU TO OXY? “Having both grad-

uated from and taught courses at Pitzer, I was eager to continue being part of a small liberal arts college community. The small courses, the opportunity to work with and mentor students throughout their undergraduate years appealed to me. I also arrived at the College shortly after John Brooks Slaughter became president and looked forward to participating in the type of diversity initiatives I had taught at UCLA during my graduate work.”

WHAT WAS YOUR FAVORITE CLASS? “My favorite

class evolved over the years—with emerging technology and its cultural transformations. What began as a course on writing and issues in cyberspace and virtual reality became one addressing 28 OCCIDENTAL MAGAZINE

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how to communicate through Web 2.0. Upon our world adapting to the instantaneous, social media environment, I choose to revise the course into an exploration of visual rhetoric: considering how to argue and persuade with images, often with accompanying words. I appreciated the freedom that the College offered me to update the curriculum to our fast-changing times.”

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR RETIREMENT? “I plan

to write a mystery, travel, read whatever strikes my fancy, cook, bake, and enjoy the views from our hillside home. I’ll also keep singing in a chorale, something I started at Oxy about 20 years ago.”

Kathryn Tucker ’00: “Around 350 words” for a tribute to someone whose influence on my life has been sweeping meant I had to write out everything, then cut till what’s left are (I hope) the best parts. Luckily, that’s something Dr. Tom Burkdall taught me.

I met Professor Burkdall when I interviewed to become a writing adviser in what was then the CAE (Center for Academic Excellence). The required writing tutor training course he and Deb Martinson offered provided a solid theoretical and practical foundation for my time as a peer adviser and beyond. Thanks to Tom, I knew how to talk to writers about their writing before I taught writing as a UCLA grad student.

While Tom’s mentorship started while I was at Oxy—talking me through working with first-year and multilingual writers, wrangling my application of Bakhtin’s heteroglossia to Virgil’s Aeneid in my English honors thesis—his support continued through graduate school and beyond. When, Ph.D. in hand, I applied for a job at Oxy, he hired me as a faculty writing specialist, establishing me as a writing studies practitioner-scholar.

He participated in my summer writing group, a mix of academics and creative writers trying to make some progress with the help of supportive readers. He prepped me for the interview that led to a tenure-track job with advice I give students today: Stop talking while you still have something to say.

Tom is a friend and colleague who has been there through successes and tragic losses. I last saw him in person in Columbus, Ohio, at a 2019 conference. Tom doesn’t really text, but we do phone calls, and we hope to see him and Lisa and their new deer friends in Healdsburg this summer.

He has given so much to Oxy’s writing culture and to students like myself who were fascinated by rhetoric before we knew there was a word for it. There are more stories I could tell—about his work with the Cultural Studies program, with colleagues using writing to teach, about cats and dogs—but I’ll stop while I still have something to say.

Tucker is the Seider Chair of Writing and associate professor of race and ethnic studies at the University of Redlands.

Lois Brown ’01: Tom Burkdall came to my rescue when I transferred to Oxy in my junior year. I’d arrived thinking that I knew how to nail an essay. The ECLS Department soon put an end to that delusion and sent me over to the Writing Center. Thereafter, I spent several hours a week conferring over my

essays with Tom, and with his co-adviser and our mutual friend, the late and wonderful Deborah Martinson.

Tom never attempted to rewrite my essays for me. He is a first-rate teacher, so he did something far more enduring; he taught me the skills I needed to become a competent, analytical writer, and to find my own voice in the written word. It wasn’t easy going; I struggled considerably during that first year at Oxy. Thank goodness for the tin of Altoids that Tom kept on his desk; if I had difficulty unclogging my writing during our tutorials, at least I could unclog my sinuses with Tom’s supply of supersonic mints!

Tom gave me much advice, but to this day, the piece of advice I use most frequently is to check my writing for any form of the verb “to be,” and wherever possible, to replace it with a more carefully considered verb. “Using ‘to be’ is, more often than not, just lazy thinking,” Tom declared. And he was right; between that and teaching me to annihilate passive voice in my essays, Tom helped me to become an adept writer.

But Tom became much more than a writing adviser. He encouraged me to go into teaching after graduation, which led to two happy and successful years at an L.A. high school, where I was able to pass on to other students the skills Tom had taught me.

Tom and I remained friends after I left Oxy, and I had the pleasure of meeting up with him and his wife, Lisa, during their trip to England a few years ago. I still have the traffic ticket, complete with a caught-in-theact CCTV photo I received after driving us in the wrong direction down a one-way street. Now that Tom’s retired, I’m hoping that he and Lisa will visit more often, and I pledge to chauffeur them more competently next time.

With Tom’s retirement, Oxy is losing a superb professor. His gifted teaching, endless patience, and constant encouragement were abiding gifts that he offered to all students who wanted to become better writers and analysts. It is impossible to imagine Tom in retirement, but I’m certain that he will continue to be a gift to those with whom he shares his life.

Thank you, Tom. It was an honor to be your apprentice; in teaching me to craft the written word, you’ve given me a lifelong gift.

Brown is a freelance writer and artist living in Liverpool, England.

Susan Gratch PROFESSOR OF THEATER AND PERFORMANCE STUDIES

Years at Oxy: 37 WHAT WAS YOUR FAVORITE CLASS? “I’ve had many

classes (such as Scene Painting) for which I have enjoyed both the topic and the students greatly. But perhaps my favorite class occurred in surprising circumstances. I found myself teaching Period Styles for Stage and Screen in spring 2021, when all courses were taught remotely. In light of the pandemic and the efforts of the department to reconceive our curriculum, I revised the course so that it looked at a mixture of live performance (using virtual or recorded performances, photographs, and descriptions) along with film and TV. We looked at a range of work that included Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom by August Wilson (the 2020 film directed by George C. Wolfe and the 2016 Mark Taper Forum stage production directed by Phylicia Rashad); Romeo and Juliet (the department’s live virtual pro-

duction edited and directed by Will Power and Baz Luhrmann’s 1995 film); an episode of Westworld set in Shogun World (with guest speaker Laura Wong ’08, our costume designer for R&J and a specialist in Japanese kimono who was a consultant on that episode); and the 2018 film Black Panther.

We endeavored to understand how humans make meaning from everyday objects, clothing/fashion, architecture, furniture, and their display. How do designers use research to inform their choices to illuminate the story being told? How do designers such as Black Panther’s Hannah Beachler build such worlds? I reminded myself how exciting my work as a designer can be, and enjoyed every moment as the students explored the material along with me.”

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR RETIREMENT? “In

addition to having time to visit the Pacific Northwest more regularly so that my husband Patrick Gleason and I can see our daughters and grandson, I hope to be able to spend much more regular time with my family (mostly in the Midwest and along the East Coast). Freelance scenic design is something I hope to be able to continue as well.”

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Photo by Craig Schwartz

Adrian Jones ’93: I arrived at Oxy having spent most of my high school career doing technical theater. But with few structures in place for learning craft, history or technique, I was largely left to my own devices. When I took Susan’s “Drawing for the Theater” class in my freshman year I knew I had finally found the right class and the right teacher.

Susan not only taught us how to conceive, collaborate, and realize designs for the theater, she also demonstrated the curiosity of a lifelong learner, and the consummate professionalism of a working artist.

Susan’s classes in theater history, scenic, lighting and costume design all opened my eyes to the many different modes of storytelling, and gave context to the rich traditions of live performance all around us.

Whether it was on an evening excursion to the Mark Taper Forum, or on a late-night paint call at summer theater, Susan was an enthusiastic audience member and vocal advocate for her students.

During my four years at Occidental, Susan was a mentor, friend, and accomplice as I discovered the world of stage design that would eventually define my career. Those four years culminated later in my time at the Yale School of Drama with another Oxy alum, Ming Cho Lee ’53. My time with Susan at Oxy not only prepared me for the rigors of that master’s program, and my career beyond, but also showed me the generosity of spirit that defines a life well lived. All the young artists like myself that Susan helped nurture, and the world of theater, owe her a debt of gratitude. Thank you, Susan.

Jones is a professional scenic designer in New York City.

Courtney Dusenberry ’09: When I was a freshman at Oxy, Susan Gratch wasn’t my adviser, but we clicked immediately because it had been a while since she’d met a student who was into set design. I wasn’t sure I was “into” it, to be honest—I enjoyed painting a few sets in high school and Susan was a delight to chat with. She spoke about her scenic painting class, mentioned color theory and the different tools and techniques to create textures. Her nonchalant pitch worked well: I wanted to take the class as many times as I could, and Susan excitedly agreed! Now, I don’t think those who know her would say that Susan is a “boisterous” or “loud” person, so when I tell you she was excited, I refer to 30 OCCIDENTAL MAGAZINE

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Gratch designed a Fibonacci sequence floor for Dusenberry’s production of Macbeth at A Noise Within during the 2013-14 season.

the sweet essence that a person emanates when they find another soul who shares their passion. Susan made sure I was able to take Scenic Painting as soon as possible, by going above and beyond in helping me plan my complicated course schedule.

Little did she (or I) know—she was building the foundation of my first career with that course load. Scenic artistry was my senior thesis, with Susan as my adviser, and became my profession for 11 years—including multiple times as a painter on professional shows designed by Susan. She has this wealth of knowledge about color and shape—and how those tools of design evoke emotion or support the story. But she also has this amazing quality as an educator where she imparts that knowledge as if you, the recipient, already knew it and could find the answers within you.

Later in her Oxy career, Susan didn’t slow down—she took on more and led by example as department chair. She advocated for the Theater Department and made sure all students at the College could have the most opportunities and superb professors up at Keck.

I’m truly honored to be writing this tribute, to someone I love and appreciate so much. Someone whose advice I needed in undergrad, and who is now a treasured design confidant in my professional life. That’s who Susan Gratch is: a spark of inspiration, an all-time collaborator, and a friend.

Dusenberry is project manager at Mattel Inc. Tradeshow Services in El Segundo.

Aubree Day Cedillo ’95: I have enjoyed the unique gift of Susan Gratch’s mentorship and support for over 30 years—well beyond

the time I spent as a theater major at Oxy. When I took my first class with Susan, Intro to Design, I was excited by the combination of creativity, practical math, and drafting skills required to be a theater designer. I vividly remember the excitement of buying a drafting table (on sale at Swain’s) that would fold up for storage in my dorm room, handdrafting my assignments on large sheets of pristine vellum paper, formulating set ideas in Susan’s classroom to the sounds of the classical music she would play through a boom box for inspiration, and spending late nights building conceptual models with my classmates in what is now Treehouse South.

Susan ignited a spark in me and kindled the idea that I might one day become a designer.

I had no idea that her influence would lead me to design professionally for clients such as UNICEF and the Princess Grace Awards.

In my role as technical director for the Theater Department, I have physically realized over 50 of Susan’s beautiful designs (both scenic and lighting) on the stage of Keck Theater. I’ve observed and admired how Susan sees and celebrates students for who they are and takes a genuine interest in fostering their own path rather than trying to mold them into her own ideal. Whether they realize it or not, every student who has passed through the doors of Keck Theater has been enriched by her imprint, whether they were inspired by her scenic and lighting design courses, acted in a show that featured her boundlessly creative sets, or benefited from the countless hours she devoted to bringing in guest artists to diversify our department’s offerings and nurturing relationships with donors who provided financial support and professional opportunities for our students. As steady a presence as Susan was, she approached every interaction with thoughtful humility and worked through every challenge as a champion of inclusiveness, giving voice to each member of our department—faculty, staff, and students.

I credit Susan’s encouragement of my work throughout my student and professional careers with my personal fulfillment as a technical director and success as a stage designer. It has been a privilege to have made a living in the arts in collaboration with Susan and the theater team she has cultivated. Susan’s nurturing gave me wings.

Cedillo has been technical director for the Occidental Theater Department since 1996.

Dennis Eggleston PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS

Years at Oxy: 35 WHAT WAS YOUR FAVORITE CLASS AND WHY? “I’ve

taught almost every course in the physics curriculum and enjoyed them all but I favored the ‘classical’ courses most: Mechanics, Electrodynamics, and Waves. These are the ones I use most in my plasma physics research. I also have a special place in my heart for Electronics, a subject I learned after coming to Oxy. I taught the course and its associated lab many times and eventually wrote a textbook for it.”

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR RETIREMENT? “We’ll

see what opportunities present themselves and what life allows. I hope to: continue some scholarly and scientific work, maybe write a second edition of my textbook; enjoy some of the activities I put aside during my time as a professor; better understand my faith; try to finish well.”

Kayla Currier ’17: When I first met Dennis in Introductory Electricity and Magnetism, I was thinking that physics might not be the right place for me, and to be honest, after that semester I still was unsure; E&M is hard.

However, I decided to take one more physics course before giving up. That course was Modern Physics, which also happened to be with Dennis.

Though the material was a lot more exciting than E&M, it was ultimately the patience and enthusiasm with which Dennis taught the course that helped to solidify my decision to stick with physics.

I remember a time I asked Dennis a question in class and he was unsure of the answer. Instead of trying to give a hand–wavy answer he simply stated that he did not know. However, later that evening I received an email from him explaining the answer. He had not only remembered my question and made sure to find an answer, but the way in which he did not try to hide that he was unsure made him much more approachable to a young physicist, which is rare in a field that has many big egos.

I worked in Dennis’ lab after my sophomore year. Coming from a non-academic family, I had no clue what performing scientific research was like. I remember reading the word “azimuthal” in one of the papers Dennis referred me to and thinking I was way in over my head. But Dennis served as an amazing mentor and I learned how to be a scientist that summer. He encouraged me

Eggleston fabricates a flange for an experiment, left, in an undated photo.

to continue to pursue physics, and even nominated me for the Goldwater Scholarship, which I would have never received without his guidance.

I am currently in a Ph.D. program at one of the top physics graduate programs in the world, and I can confidently say that I would not be here without Dennis. In a field as tough as physics, I was lucky to have a mentor that was patient, encouraging, and approachable. I will always be thankful to him for making me the scientist I am today.

Currier is a doctoral student in the physics department at UC Berkeley.

Finn O. Rebassoo ’03: Dennis Eggleston had an integral role in helping guide and mentor me during my time at Oxy as well as after.

He was my academic adviser, teacher for an electronics course, and mentor for summer research. My summer doing plasma physics research with him was my introduction to science research and really provided the spark that led me to want to pursue a Ph.D. in physics. In it I learned how to run experiments, analyze results, and most importantly, how to explore and persist on difficult research problems. It was amazing at a small liberal arts college to be able to run experi-

ments with his Malmberg-Penning Trap in Fowler Hall. This was the perfect setup to introduce and excite students about physics research. As I was applying to graduate schools, Dennis gave me advice on different schools and research, and wrote me letters of recommendation. I do not know where I would be without my introduction from him to physics research (possibly doing something else besides physics).

In addition to my research experience, I have great memories of his enthusiasm for helping students, whether it was at office hours in Fowler or periodic meetings as my academic adviser. He taught me important lessons in problem solving that I carried on with me into my graduate and postgraduate career. And though we haven’t talked much lately, it turns out that a student who recently did research for him at Oxy, Quinn Taylor, is going to be doing research on a project of mine this summer. So, the family tree of those he has influenced has now been connected in other ways. Here’s to Dennis and hoping that retirement is halfway as fulfilling as teaching and doing plasma research.

Rebassoo is a staff scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory at UC Santa Barbara.

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31

OXYTALK Photos courtesy John Callas M’75

above: With the Rolling Stones’ Bill Wyman on the set of Wyman’s music video. left: Behind the camera. below: At his home in Santa Monica. opposite: Callas’ memoir, When the Rain Stops.

John of All Trades John Callas M’75 built a Hollywood career by saying “Yes” to new opportunities—but he had to overcome trauma to get there

From an early age, movies provided an escape mechanism for John Calley M’75. In the summer of 1963, home from his first year at military school and determined not to return, he took refuge at the cinema: The Nutty Professor, Lord of the Flies, Beach Party, and The Great Escape—the last of which gave him ideas of how to go AWOL. “But after thinking about it, it just seems pointless to dig a tunnel when I can just walk off campus,” Callas writes in When the Rain Stops, a raw, deeply personal memoir of his struggles as an adolescent—attempting suicide at 15 by jumping into a partially frozen lake—followed by depression issues. It is perhaps the least commercial endeavor in a career that has encompassed film, television, music, advertising, and home video—nearly every post along the media landscape over the last five decades. “If I save one person’s life,” he says, “I’ll feel like I wrote a best-seller.”

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“This is not a book about a movie star, a famous athlete, a celebrity, or a hero,” Callas writes in the preface. “I’m just a guy living day to day who survived childhood traumas that cut deep and left permanent scars.”

Talking from his home in Santa Monica, When the Rain Stops was half a century in the making, Callas says. He was 17 or 18 when a therapist said, “Why don’t you write down some stuff that happened to you so I can get a sense of it?” “I sat down and wrote about 30 pages from the beginning of when the trauma started,” he recalls. “After that, I just kept journaling in a sense.”

A lot has happened over the last 50 years.

Callas worked in a professional theater as an undergraduate at Loretto Heights College in Denver (which closed its doors in its centennial year in 1988), in an individualized program, University Without Walls. After an internship with the Williamstown Theater

Festival in Massachusetts, he sought out a master’s degree in theater, and ultimately wound up at Occidental, where Professor Omar Paxson ’48 “took me under his wing and we had a really good time,” he says.

After getting an “A” for a documentary short from experimental filmmaker and longtime Oxy professor Chick Strand, Callas shifted his focus from acting to directing. For his master’s project, he staged a full-length play (The Informant,

by Bertolt Brecht), and wrote his thesis about the process, which he presented in a threehour meeting with Oxy’s Drama Department. “That last part had me sweating like crazy,” he says. “But when I walked in the room, the first thing they did was offer me cookies and milk or coffee.

From there, it was very informal and easy.”

While he was blocking out the play in a small cafe, he struck up a conversation with an unnamed patron he describes as “a baldheaded man in a white suit.” Callas told him about the play, and the two remained in touch after that. As it happened, his new friend was an art director in the film business; he secured Callas his first job on a feature, director Paul Bartel’s 1976 film Cannonball, as a pyrotechnics assistant to special effects coordinator Harry Woolman.

Callas wound up doing a number of films with Woolman, gradually working his way up from the art department to dialogue director to assistant director. Producer Peter Locke hired Callas as a unit production manager and first assistant director on The Hills Have

OXYTALK

Eyes, Wes Craven’s sophomore directorial effort and a box-office sleeper in 1977.

That opened the door to work producing commercials and music videos. In the mid1980s heyday of MTV, Callas worked on more than two dozen music videos, including Bow Wow Wow’s “I Want Candy,” Sammy Hagar’s “I Can’t Drive 55,” Glenn Frey’s award-winning “Smuggler’s Blues,” and “True Men Don’t Eat Coyotes,” the 1984 debut video by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Another career highlight was a much-sought after job producing a full-length Styx concert for Kramer/Rocklin Studios in 1984.

Soon after, Callas’ day rate for commercial work soared to $350. “That was on the higher end of the scale back then,” he recalls.

“I started screaming, ‘Oh crap, I’m rich!’ ” But almost as quickly, the work dried up. “I took a job as a waiter because I had to feed myself and pay my bills,” he says. One customer—a production manager whom he had worked with—offered him a job as a prop master on a film that was going into production a week later. “You know I’ve never been a prop master,” Callas told him, to which his friend replied, “You’re smart —you figure it out.”

After that, Callas always said “Yes” whenever a new opportunity presented itself.

He worked with Hollywood A-listers, from Eddie Murphy and Mel Gibson to Jack Nicholson and George Burns, on everything from teaser trailers to title sequences. He produced the live-action segments for 80 episodes of Bobby’s World, the Howie Mandel-created FOX children’s series.

While working in a number of industry managerial roles in the early 2000s, including Ascent Media Group (overseeing a $40 million account with the Walt Disney Co.), Warner Bros., Technicolor Creative Services, and TiVo parent Rovi Corp., Callas turned to writing as a way to express himself creatively. He has published five books—four novels and the self-explanatory First Time Parents Survival Guide to Avoid Unnecessary and Wild Spending.

“I’d love to say that I write every day but I don’t,” Callas admits. “I have four or five plates going all the time. Sometimes I have to put my total energy into one area because it’s the hot plate, so to speak.”

In the case of When the Rain Stops, the writing came in waves. “Different events in my life would trigger something and I’d want to write it down and start building it,” he says.

“There were times that my wife would come by my office and I’d be crying like crazy.”

When he completed the initial draft, he shared it with his wife and a writer friend, both of whom “started screaming at me,” he recalls. Their objections were not to the content, but to his choice of writing his life story as a character—not himself. “That marked a real change in direction,” Callas says.

Has he considered turning his memoir into a film? “I wouldn’t object to it,” he says.

Right now, Christmas Voices—published in 2017—is the one that he’s trying to finance.

The story of a successful businessman who has lost the values he grew up with, “It’s a cross between It’s a Wonderful Life and A Christmas Carol,” Callas explains. “I really feel the moral compass of this planet has completely gone off the charts. What we need is something uplifting.”

Tonally, Christmas Voices is light years away from Callas’ 2015 feature film, No Solicitors (which is currently streaming for free on Amazon Prime and Tubi). “That’s an interesting story,” he says with a laugh.

“One day, I was having lunch with a buddy I had worked with at Warner Bros., and he said to me, ‘You’re in a weird mood.’ I said, ‘These idiots keep ringing my doorbell, and I have a sign on my door that says No Soliciting. Sometimes I want to kill them.’ And he replied, ‘Why don’t you write a screenplay?’ ” After surveying the horror-film landscape, Callas landed on a darkly comic premise that could be described as Norman Rockwell meets Wes Craven. No Solicitors stars Eric Roberts as a renowned brain surgeon with a picture-perfect family and a private practice with a basement. “If you ring the doorbell and you’re a solicitor, you’re free game,” he warns.

We won’t spoil the rest for you, but let’s just say that Roberts and his family disposed of their victims in a sustainable way. Making the movie “got it out of my system,” says Callas, who published a novelization of the film in 2017. “But a lot of my friends watched it and said, ‘I’m not coming over your house for ribs, that’s for sure.’ ” —dick anderson

SELECTIONS FROM A SIZZLE REEL

“Smuggler’s Blues”: Glenn Frey snagged a MTV Video Music Award for Best Concept Video in 1985 and inspired an episode of Miami Vice.

Callas served as a producer on the video, working alongside director Duncan Gibbins.

Caught in the Act: Working with an eightcamera setup, Callas and his team shot over a million feet of 16mm film to capture lead singer Dennis De Young and the grand theatricality of Styx’s Kilroy Was Here concert tour in 1984.

“May the Schwartz be with you”: Callas worked with Spaceballs director Mel Brooks on a teaser trailer for the beloved Star Wars spoof.

Tri-Star Pictures: Armed with a $1.7 million budget, Callas was co-director and producer on the logo through his company, The Production House: “I’m proud to have done an iconic piece.”

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PAGE 64 Photo credits: Joe Friezer (below left), Jim Block (below right)

tions” in response to the psychotherapy that emerged around that time. Occasionally, he would ask these questions in the classroom: “If you were to become an animal, what kind would you be, and why?” “Even if a student tried to be funny,” Cole told the Redondo Beach Daily Breeze in 1962, “his answer might give insight into his personality.”

In retirement, Cole found great satisfaction volunteering for the Sonoma Valley Museum of Art. He also took up race walking and in his 80s achieved elite status in his age group. Dave and Dorothea often dressed up in costume for races close to home, with Dave pushing her wheelchair along the courses.

Anything But Typical Professor of Psychology Emeritus Dave Cole M’48 brought personality to the classroom and beyond above left: Cole in a 1974 photo. above: Like a Far Side cartoon come to life, Dave and wife Dorothea dressed as “Holy Cows” for a race.

At the end of each semester, during finals week at Occidental, Professor of Psychology David Cole M’48 and his wife, Dorothea, would open their Eagle Rock home to psych majors for a “come as you are” meal. “The occasional student would show up in pajamas and there was always something wonderful to eat,” says Jean Wu ’66 of Sacramento, who served as Cole’s exam reader her senior year.

Dorothea often made her famous PorkAlmond Casserole, sharing the recipe with Dave’s students—Chris Sorensen Byrd ’66, for one, has prepared the dish many times.

And up until his passing, Dave—who died February 9 in Sonoma, at age 99—kept in touch with some of his former students through his annual letter. “No matter what was going on in the world, he could find 64 OCCIDENTAL MAGAZINE

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something positive to say,” recalls Wu, who spent more than 40 years in varied administrative roles for the state of California.

A Glendale native, Cole earned his undergraduate degree at UCLA, his master’s at Oxy, and his Ph.D. at Claremont Graduate School. He joined the Oxy faculty as a graduate assistant in psychology in 1947 and worked his way through the academic ranks to full professor. He was awarded the College’s Faculty Achievement Award in 1968 and the Donald R. Loftsgordon Memorial Award for Outstanding Teaching in 1973. A longtime chair of the Psychology Department, he retired from teaching in 1984.

As personality tests came into vogue in the 1950s, Cole and some of his professional peers devised what he called “Two Magic Ques-

For the 3-kilometer Human Race in Santa Rosa in 2004, Dave transformed himself into the Wicked Witch from The Wizard of Oz, with Dorothea going along for the ride dressed at Dorothy—ruby slippers and all. “I don’t think we’re very typical 81-year-olds,” Cole told this magazine in a Summer 2004 story in which he dressed as a cow. “Maybe we like humor because we feel young.”

Dave was preceded in death by Dorothea after 62 years of marriage and is survived by daughters Linda, Shirley, and Joyce and their families. In 2012, rather than throw a party for Cole’s 90th birthday, his daughters invited some of his former students to submit letters instead. “One alum wrote that Dave defined what it meant to be a psychologist,” Wu says, “and he became a psychologist.”

OXYFARE Alumni Seal Awards to Decorate Eight During Reunion Weekend Volume 44, Number 2 oxy.edu/magazine OCCIDENTAL COLLEGE

Harry J. Elam, Jr. President Wendy F. Sternberg Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the College Charlie Cardillo Vice President for Institutional Advancement David T. Carreon Bradley Vice President for Equity & Justice Rob Flot Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students Amos Himmelstein Vice President & Chief Operating Officer Maricela L. Martinez Interim Vice President of Enrollment Marty Sharkey Vice President for Communications and Institutional Initiatives Jim Tranquada Director of Communications editorial staff

Dick Anderson Editor Marc Campos College Photographer Jasmine Teran Contributing Writer Gail (Schulman) Ginell ’79 Class Notes Editor SanSoucie Design Design DLS Group Printing

Brad Fauvre ’87, president of Velocity Vehicle Group, a privately held commercial vehicle dealership, will be honored as alumnus of the year at Reunion Weekend as part of the 2022 Alumni Seal Awards. Woody Studenmund, Laurence De Rycke Professor of Economics, will receive the faculty emeritus Seal Award. Other honorees include Jake Stevens ’08, vice president of Faring, a progressive real estate firm based in West Hollywood (Erica J. Murray ’01 Young Alumni Award); Luis Céspedes ’74 M’81, judicial appointments secretary for Gov. Gavin Newsom (professional achievement); Lt. Dawn (Gruber) Callahan ’09, group surgeon for Commander Naval Surface Group Middle Pacific in the U.S. Navy (professional achievement); Ray Yen ’82, past Board of Governors president and co-chair of the Oxy Fund executive and leadership gift committees (service to the College); Clarissa Martinez de Castro ’89, deputy vice president for policy and advocacy at UnidosUS, the nation’s largest Latino civil rights and advocacy organization (service to the community); and Eddie Gorton ’01, principal of Colfax Charter Elementary School in the Los Angeles United School District (service to the community).

Back on campus! June 10-12

Alumni Reunion Weekend 1972

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Welcome the Class of 1972 into the Fifty Year Club!

Celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Class of 1997!

Please join us in Eagle Rock June 10-12 for Alumni Reunion Weekend 2022.

Come back to campus and revel in rich Oxy traditions, honoring this year’s Alumni Seal Award recipients and commemorating your milestone reunion.

Witness the induction of the Class of 1972 into the Fifty Year Club, and celebrate FYC awardees Charles McClintock ’68 (Auld Lang Syne) and Professor of Cognitive Science and Philosophy Lynn Mehl (Io Triumphe).

Reunite with your classmates and celebrate Oxy. This year, our milestone reunions are graduating class years ending in 2 and 7, but all alumni are welcome to celebrate Reunion. Our three days of activities will include both live and virtual events and plenty of opportunities to reconnect with your Oxy family.

To learn more and register, visit alumni.oxy.edu.

Access & Opportunity Reception, February 27

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Amy Munoz, retired Associate Vice President for Hospitality Services, and family Standing: Alex Ringold ’14 Sofie Munoz Ringold ’14

Seated: Richard Munoz P’10 ’14 Amy Munoz P’10 ’14

Alex and Jonathan: Occidental College T-shirt EZ100 Tee in dark orange or heather black. Sizes S-XXL. $17.95 Sofie and Chelsea: Occidental College script short-sleeve crew T-shirt in heather apricot or heather graphite. Sizes S-XL. $26.95 Richard: Occidental Dad T-shirt in dark orange or heather black.

Sizes S-XXL. $17.95 Amy: OXY tackle twill crewneck sweatshirt in graphite or black.

Sizes S-XXL. $49.95 Maia: Toddler/youth full-zip orange sweatshirt. Sizes 6 months to 5T/6T. $37.95

Standing and seated: Jonathan Williams Chelsea Munoz Williams ’10 Maia Williams, age 1

Occidental College Bookstore oxybookstore.com To order by phone: 323-259-2951 All major credit cards accepted.

Published quarterly by Occidental College Main number: 323-259-2500 To contact Occidental magazine By phone: 323-259-2679 By email: oxymag@oxy.edu By mail: Occidental College Office of Communications F-36 1600 Campus Road Los Angeles CA 90041-3314 Letters and class notes submissions may be edited for length, content, and style.

Occidental College online Homepage: oxy.edu Facebook: facebook.com/occidental Instagram: instagram.com/occidentalcollege TikTok: occidentalcollege Twitter: @occidental Cover photo by Sam Bhang Oxy Wear photo by Marc Campos

2,022 Ways to Mark Oxy’s Big Day Occidental will commemorate its 135th birthday —April 20, 2022—with the third annual Day For Oxy! With the support of 2,022 members of the Oxy family on this day, a new chapter will begin in the life of the College. Your APRIL 20, 2022 generosity on Day For Oxy supports students, faculty, staff, and a host of academic and athletic programs. If you’re reading this after April 20, thank you for your support! (You know who you are.) If you haven’t make a gift yet, there’s still time to support the College before the end of the fiscal year. Visit givingday.oxy.edu for the latest Day For Oxy updates.

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1. Patrice Cablayan, director of gift planning and stewardship, with Oxy parents and grandparents Bill Holmes and Christine (Ray) Holmes ’59.

2. Siddharth Saravat ’15 catches up with Annemarie Schnedler ’16. 3. Tents and tables adorned Sycamore Glen for the luncheon. 4. Ryan PrestonRoedder, Obama Scholars Program faculty adviser and associate professor of philosophy, with senior fellow Micah Wilson ’22 and Advisory Council co-chair Hector De La Torre ’89. 5. David Abernethy ’59 and Carole Abernethy ’59. 6. Alan Freeman ’66 M’67 and Kathie Freeman ’65 M’72.

7. Karen van der Baan ’67 chats with Brighten Winn ’22 and Tye Hernandez ’23.

alumni.oxy.edu

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Nonprofit U.S. Postage Paid Occidental College

Josh Schlisserman ’19 Brings Crypto to the Masses

President Elam’s Inauguration Goals

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Last fall, attorney Michael White ’76 read a Los Angeles Times story about USC’s plans to award diplomas posthumously to 120 Japanese American students deprived of a USC degree during World War II. The story prompted him to research Oxy’s own wartime efforts, when President Remsen Bird wrote prospective colleges and offered letters of hope and encouragement to the six Japanese American students enrolled at Occidental in 1942. Bird also had the foresight to persuade College librarian Elizabeth McCloy to store more than 500 letters relating to his efforts, along with various other documents: “How we have behaved toward these people should be known and carefully recorded for future reference,” he wrote.

Today, Oxy’s Japanese American Relocation Collection houses 3,200 documents, including articles, pamphlets, reports, newslet-

Professor of Chemistry L. Reed Brantley confers with Ted Tajima ’46 (standing, left), Iko Tanzawa ’42, John Nishiyama ’43, and Mary Kariya ’45 in April 1942.

Photo courtesy Occidental College Special Collections

ters, issues of relocation center and campus publications, and proand anti-Japanese media. A digital archive, launched in 2005 with the support of the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation’s Archival Grants Program, offers a representative selection of these historic materials online for research.

As a board member of the Grace Nixon Foundation in Walnut Creek, White has the discretion to make a small annual grant to a nonprofit of his choice. Citing Nixon’s own life experiences during WWII—when her studies as a music major at San Diego State University were interrupted in 1942 by President Roosevelt’s executive order authorizing the internment of Japanese Americans— White reached out to associate professors Jane Hong and Alexandra Puerto in Oxy’s History Department about designating his gift to support the College’s curation of its Japanese American Relocation Collection. Consequently, the foundation’s generosity will underwrite the work of a student intern on the collection this fall.

The digital archive was the first of its kind for Oxy’s Special Collections, and Dale Ann Stieber was hired to be the project’s manager and digital archivist, working under Mike Sutherland, the College’s longtime Special Collections librarian. (Sutherland died in April 2005, months before the online project’s unveiling.)

According to Stieber, the digital archive comprises only about 3 percent of the College’s relocation holdings. “This project has always embodied for me what makes Special Collections so integral to the student experience,” says Stieber, who retired in December after 17 years at Oxy. “Michael White and the Grace Nixon Foundation have given us the opportunity to build a true collaboration between faculty, students, and Special Collections.”

“I am very excited to see how the internship benefits students and raises awareness of Japanese and Asian American histories among the wider College community,” Hong says. Her enthusiasm is echoed by Puerto: “We look forward to developing this exciting and timely initiative, which will offer high-impact opportunities for our students and raise consciousness about Japanese American history, and Asian American studies at large, across campus.”

oxy.edu/magazine

Occidental College Office of Gift Planning M-36 | 1600 Campus Road Los Angeles CA 90041-3314 | Phone: 323-259-2644 Email: giftplanning@oxy.edu | oxy.edu/giftplanning | facebook.com/BenCulleySociety

ALUMNI TRIBUTES TO SIX RETIRING FACULTY /// JILLIAN HOPEWELL ’89 DELIVERS HEALTH CARE TO UNDERSERVED MIGRANTS

Building on Oxy’s Digital History

ICON of Econ

After 52 years at Oxy, what’s next for Professor Woody Studenmund?