COMMUNITY ALUMNI | CLASS NOTES
6 Morgan Harris ’04 graduated Cum Laude from Emerson College in 2008 with his B.A. in Theatre Performance, and minors in directing and marketing. Morgan moved immediately to NYC to pursue a career in acting and found relative success, earning his SAG card, performing in off-off-off Broadway Theatre, as well as small appearances in advertisements. To pay the bills, Morgan worked as a bartender primarily in wine bars, discovering a new professional calling. After a making wine at a 3-month harvest internship in Walla Walla, WA, he decided to pursue a career in wine full-time. Since 2011, Morgan has competed five times in multiple national-level sommelier competitions and was voted by his peers as a Wine and Spirits Magazine Best New Sommelier in 2012. He has also been featured in the Esquire Network’s reality series “Uncorked,” which follows the lives of 6 sommeliers as they prepare for the Masters Sommelier exam. Currently, Morgan is working as the senior sommelier at Michelinstarred Aureole Restaurant in NYC’s Time Square. In addition to sales and service for a 1500+ reference wine list, leadership of the front-of-house team is a key facet of his day-to-day work. He also writes and edits for Seattlebased wine blog, WineFolly, as well as other wine-related publications. He hopes to spend his career advocating for wine as one of the planet’s finest agricultural products. 7 Ross Peizer ’04 got married last summer to Rachel Laing in New York City where Rachel is from. They met in New Orleans in 2010 while working at nonprofits through Avodah: The Jewish Service Corps. From New Orleans, Ross moved to Oregon to get a Master’s Degree in Urban Planning with a focus 94
6 on sustainable transportation. Rachel joined Ross in Oregon a year later to get her Master’s degree in Education. Upon graduating, Ross landed a job in Portland at a transportation management association and Rachel as an elementary school teacher. After two years in Portland, Ross and Rachel and their newly adopted dog, Beignet, moved to Seattle this July where Ross is working as a Transportation Demand Management and Outreach Specialist with Community Transit in Snohomish County. They are living in Northgate and are happy to be close to family and friends in the Puget Sound region. Kathy Altman ’05 graduated from Stanford University in 2009 with her Bachelor of Science in Biology. While at Stanford, she was a member of the women’s crew team and was named captain her senior year when her team won the NCAA Division I National Championship. After graduation, she moved back to Seattle and worked as a Clinical Research Assistant at Asthma Inc. and Research Study Assistant at the University of Washington. In 2010 Kathy returned to school, attending the Boston University School of Medicine and is now working as a Resident Physician in Internal Medicine at the University of Washington Medical Center. Max Barrett ’06 and Celeste Willis Chalett ’07 Max graduated from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 2010 with his B.A.S. in International Affairs. After college, worked in Business Development and Account Management with marketing and
7 advertising firm, BAMKO. He then worked as the Director of Sales for Gratafy, an experiential marketing platform “that brings brands, merchants, and consumers together inside of restaurants and bars.” In February 2015, Max co-founded FUNBOY, a company that creates luxury inflatable pool toys. For each FUNBOY float that is purchased, the charity partner RainCatcher provides one person in the developing world with one year of access to clean drinking water. Max married SAAS alumna Celeste WillisChalet ’07 this past summer. Celeste graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2011 with her B.A. in Media Studies and Fine Art. While at Boulder, she spent a summer studying photography in the picturesque Italian city, Florence, and a semester abroad studying Fashion, Photography, and Art History at the CEA: Global Education in Paris. Celeste worked for Los Angeles-based global lifestyle interior design brand, Kelly Wearstler, before becoming a fulltime FUNBOY employee and member of the company’s management team alongside her husband. Celeste is also pursuing her Master’s Degree in Interior Architecture at the UCLA Extension Architecture and Interior Design program. 8 L i z D o n a h u e ’ 0 6 g ra d u a te d from SAAS in 2006 and relocated to Olympia to attend The Evergreen State College. During her time in college, she studied creative writing and the political economy of the