CLASSNotes Mathematical Association of America, hosted at Ripon College by the Department of Mathematical Sciences.
RACHEL BERK BATA ’97 and her husband, Dan, of Saint Charles, Illinois, have a son, Alexander Brian Bata, born Sept. 18, 2014.
ERIC ATKISSON ’94 of Alexandria, Virginia, retired from the National Guard in May 2014, 25 years after enlisting in the Army Reserves and 20 years after commissioning as a second lieutenant at Ripon. Overall service included combat deployments to Saudi Arabia in 1991, Kuwait in 2003 and Iraq in 2010-11. He retired a lieutenant colonel. He now is indulging his creative side. He has had five short stories published and was a background extra in the pilot episode of “Point of Honor,” a Civil War TV drama filmed in Virginia and now available on Amazon. He continues to work full time as a public affairs specialist and speechwriter at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in Alexandria, Virginia.
JOSEPH KRONCKE ’97 of Neenah, Wisconsin, has been inducted into the Ripon College Athletic Hall of Fame. As a defensive lineman in football, he graduated with the fifth-most quarterback sacks in school history (11) and the third-highest single season total, seven in 1996. D.J. CURRAN ’98 of Madison, Wisconsin, is a product manager at PDS.
RYAN FERCHOFF ’98 of Honolulu, Hawaii, opened an alternative cancer treatment and retreat center in Sedona, Arizona, (sedonawellnessretreat.com) in 2012. It is an extension of a retreat he operates in Honolulu.
KATHERINE PAWLIK JOHNSON ’98 of Nokomis, Illinois, is an associate council for the Illinois State Police, Medicaid Fraud Control Bureau
MICHAEL BERENS ’99 of Port Orchard, Washington, has opened a private practice law firm.
RACHEL THOMPSON CASEY ’99 of Saint James, Minnesota, graduated from Southwest Minnesota State University with a master’s degree in science in education. She teaches English learners in grades 6-12.
Affairs Coordinator at NBC Universal for the USA and Syfy networks. Her husband, WADE PACKARD ’93 assists the EVP at Warner Horizon Television Business Affairs. They live in Los Angeles. She also teaches spin class at 24 Hour Fitness and was trained to teach Les Mills RPM classes.
JOHN HINDS ’96 of Seattle, Washington, writes, “After five years at Starbucks, I took a new job at Banfield pet hospitals (a subsidiary of Mars) as their senior manager of learning technology. I now split my time between Seattle and Portland.”
HEIDI HITCHCOCK MARKS ’96 of St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin, who teaches at St. Croix Falls High School, was recognized as outstanding Wisconsin teacher of mathematics at the spring meeting of the Wisconsin
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NICOLE BAUMANN-BLACKMORE ’01 of Verona, Wisconsin, is chief of the Division of Pediatrics with Meriter Medical Group. She also sees pediatric patients at Meriter Hospital. Her husband, DEREK BLACKMORE ’01, is the support manager at WTS Paradigm. JASON BECK ’01 of Neenah, Wisconsin, is president of TotalMed Staffing in Appleton, Wisconsin.
Ranch, Colorado, is a nurse at the University of Colorado Hospital.
AMY LETCHER ’99 of Wadsworth, Illinois, married
REBECCA PROVENCHER CRIOLLO ’01 of Chicago,
Jeff Wasil, Oct. 11, 2014.
KIM CONROY ’94 is a Business
Kentucky, have a daughter Veronica “Vera,” born in August 2014. Dmitri is a pilot for Delta Airlines, based in Atlanta and flying the Boeing 717. Marina homeschools their three older girls and teaches excellence in writing to middle-school children and music appreciation to grade-school children in their local home-school co-op.
An article about MARK BECKER ’01 of Darien, Wisconsin, and a partner who founded Geneva Supply was published Jan. 7, 2015, in the Gazeteer of Janesville, Wisconsin. The global wholesaling company grew rapidly in five years by helping manufacturers sell products more efficiently to Internet retailers, big box stores and other distributors.
MARY ROSE GRAGIDO SIVIK ’99 of Highlands
MICHELLE BENEDICT ’94 of Honolulu, Hawaii, is the aquarist at Dolphin Quest. She is responsible for Hawaiian green sea turtles, Hawaiian brown stingrays and a variety of reef fish, caring for them, maintaining their habitat and training them using positive reinforcement.
DMITRI SMIRENSKI ’00 and MARINA ANTIPOVA SMIRENSKI ’00 of Burlington,
The 2000s Connected by Ripon SARAH HOFFMAN KRAMER ’02 of Grafton, Wisconsin, was hired by US Bank in 2007. “A few years later, a manager in my area said that she was hiring someone who had gone to Ripon College, wondering if I knew him,” she says. “FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ ’07 graduated from Ripon the year that I started working at US Bank, so we did not know each other, but a couple of years after he started he actually moved over to my team! Soon after, KEVIN BRAUN ’08 and ELYSE BEINE ’11 also started working in our office.”
PATRICK J. CASEY ’00 of St. James, Minnesota, has started a new law firm in Mankato, Minnesota, with partners. LINSEY CROWNINSHIELD ’00 of Highwood, Illinois, married Quinn Ryan, Sept. 20, 2014. She is assistant director of the Civic Education Project at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
Illinois, writes: “I married Sergio Criollo in 2012. I had a daughter, Katia, on May 12, 2014. After 10 years of teaching in a Chicago public school, I’m taking some time off to be home with Katia and working part-time teaching university classes for pre-service teachers and supervising student teachers.”
SARAH NEUMEYER ’01 of Seattle, Washington, works for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for the Alaska fisheries science center, helping to keep Alaskan fisheries sustainable.
JACOB SUMNER ’01 of Salem, Oregon, leads the chain of Chipotle restaurants in France, the United Kingdom and Germany.
ELIZABETH WEBB BEELES ’02 of Salem, Oregon, is the publications and web coordinator with the Oregon State Department of Agriculture.