Volume 86 Issue 2

ALUMNI MAGAZINE

VOL. 86/NO. 2

Alumni show that when it comes to serving others, THE SKY’S THE LIMIT Brent Bishop ’84 fights for the great outdoors. p. 48

INSIDE: LYLS Survey Results, p. 44 | Class of 1992 Haiku, p. 108 | Quakers Rule Football, p. 18

contents 79 33 Photo of Brent Bishop ’84 climbing in the Southern Alps of New Zealand by Jake Norton/Mountain World Productions. Photo on p. 48, shot in southern Utah outside of Moab, courtesy of the Brent Bishop Collection.

Mary K. Carrasco, Director of Institutional Advancement Jackie Conrad, Director of Communications Loren Hardenbergh, School Archivist and Web Strategist

Jackie LaFrance, Digital Specialist Anna Lindel, Young Alumni Coordinator Maria Mihalik, Content Manager Melissa Prather, Director of Development

EDITORIAL BOARD John Dickerson ’87, Cate Livingston Fernandez ’76, Margaret Wilner Hut ’64, Peggy Smith Luthringer ’55, Peter MacDonald ’78, Eliza Lowen McGraw ’90, Joan Reinthaler, Philip Terzian ’68 DESIGN Mari Foret, Foret Design & Marketing LLC

ALUMNI MAGAZINE  VOL. 86/NO. 2

Do I remember that it is the spirit of my service that makes love visible?

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~Query from Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, revised by Oread Friends Meeting, Lawrence, Kansas

COVER STORY 47 . . . Alumni Find Meaning through Nonprofits

FEATURES 30. . . Students in All Divisions Learn to Serve 44 . . . The Results Are In: The “Let Your Life Speak” Survey 68. . . “Dude! Where’s My Paper?” A Very Late Assignment

DEPARTMENTS 3 . . . From the Head of School

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4 . . . Editor’s Page 5 . . . Sidwell Scene

• • • • •

Football: That Championship Season!

Homecoming Bob Mankoff, Rubenstein Memorial Guest Artist Summer Course: Uruguay The Jamaica Library Project

73 . . . Alumni Action

• Alumni Bookshelf • 10 Minutes with Two Alums • Alumni Events

87 . . . Class Notes 116 . . Pop Quiz

Contact Sidwell Friends Alumni Magazine at: 202-537-8444 alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu Sidwell Friends Alumni Magazine 3825 Wisconsin Avenue NW Washington, DC 20016 www.sidwell.edu/magazine

PHOTO BY JENNI VOORHEES

Lila Hutchins ’24 enjoys the giant kaleidoscope at the Lower School Science Festival.

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› HEAD OF SCHOOL

Decades of Caring In the late spring of 1998, Earl Harrison, who was completing his legendary tenure as Head of Sidwell Friends, invited me to his office. He must have had more pressing matters to address than making time to talk to a part-time teacher just completing his first year, but the School had offered me a full-time position, and Earl wanted to share some advice before his departure.

PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

That was the first time I stepped into the Head’s office. I can recall few details from the conversation, but I have a clear sense of its tone, which left a lasting impact. An outstanding teacher, Earl created an atmosphere of trust and openness, demonstrating a palpable patience and genuine curiosity, conveying a deep intelligence and wisdom. We spoke for an hour and a half, beginning a conversation that, after I became principal of the Upper School, continued over several lunch meetings.

Those formative conversations were sadly truncated when Earl passed in 2004. His memorial service was filled with heartfelt messages about his leadership and friendship, humor and kindness. Hours after this tribute, in a moment that was neither explicable nor believable, I returned home and opened a copy of New England Yearly Meeting’s Faith and Practice, serendipitously turning to an excerpt from one of Earl’s speeches.

“In a Friends school, human development and human excellence take precedence over academic excellence,” he wrote. Elsewhere, he explained that great schools require “decades of caring. A wise and resilient faculty must be capable of delivering both academic subjects and what I call the ‘invisible curriculum,’ which shapes the school’s ethos.” For Earl, an essential component of that curriculum was demonstrating “that love is possible in a group significantly larger than the family.”

As I enter Zartman House, I am grateful to previous Heads and to generations of faculty, staff, administrators, students, parents, alumni, trustees, and friends for promoting human and academic excellence, for the thoughtfulness with which they have cared for the School and shaped its ethos. I am honored to care for their labors and legacy of love, and remain awed by the grace and intelligence with which they have navigated challenge, embraced opportunity, and nurtured the institution.

As we consider the challenges that face educational institutions today, SFS, the largest Friends school in the country, has an obligation to lead the conversation, to insist that the pursuits of human and academic excellence are not mutually exclusive, and to demonstrate that positive relationships between students and faculty are fundamental to learning. We have a mandate to prepare our students to engage in intelligent and principled discussion; to teach them to use technology innovatively and responsibly, to care about one another, to prize diversity, and to create a more just and peaceful society; and to engender, as Thomas Sidwell wrote, an “atmosphere of sincerity, simplicity, and friendliness” that encourages “the open mind, love of truth, and international understanding.”

We are fortunate that so many have cared for this community for so long. I am grateful to be part of the conversation again and, over the next months, look forward to listening and learning. Together we will, in the spirit of continuing revelation, nurture our tradition of excellence, enable Mr. Sidwell’s “Friendly influence” to flourish, and enable our faculty to care for our School and its students for decades to come.

Bryan Garman, Head of School ALUMNI MAGAZINE

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› EDITORS PAGE

Zeidman Fellowship Deadline The Alumni Magazine of SFS is truly a major piece of work; beautifully laid out, and usually full of quite inspiring stuff—not only about the School itself, but about matters of the world. Amazing that those 15-year-olds came out and made a contribution to the anti-apartheid movement. [Spring 2014, page 28.] And some of them are still pursuing these kinds of missions.

—Henry “Hank” Holmes ’53

The Chinese Studies Program is seeking qualified alumni applicants for the John Fisher Zeidman ’79 Fellowship Program for the 2015/16 academic year. The program sends two alumni to a Chinese university for a year of language study. To qualify, candidates must have graduated from Sidwell Friends after 2001, taken either Chinese language or history courses while a student here, and formally studied Chinese language for at least one year. Some students make this program a gap-year opportunity, while others choose to apply for the fellowship after graduation from college.

For more information, contact John Flower (flowerj@sidwell. edu). Applications are due by March 2, 2015. Decisions will be announced by March 9. Final application materials are due to the Chinese Embassy no later than March 20.

Share your story in Alumni Magazine!

ALUMNI MAGAZINE

SPRING 2014

Following are subjects being explored for future editions. If you or a classmate have an interesting story—from Sidwell Friends days or after—related to one of these topics, please contact alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu.

Risk takers (next edition—contact us asap!)

Comedy Dress code School dances (including the prom and homecoming) Dual-alumni marriages “Makers” (builders, handcrafters, metalworkers, woodworkers, and so on) The road less traveled (the unconventional) The arts (performance and visual) Sports

Alumni Magazine Current and past editions of the Sidwell Friends Alumni Magazine are available through the Alumni portal on the website, sidwell.edu/magazine, and on the Alumni App. The Alumni Magazine welcomes letters from alumni and friends on any subject of interest relevant to the School. Letters must be signed and include the writer’s class, home address, phone number, and e-mail address. Letters are subject to editing. Send letters to:

SFS keepsakes and treasured mementos

alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu

Class Notes

or to

Class Notes for the next edition are due to class correspondents or to the Alumni Magazine by February 3, 2015.

Sidwell Friends School Editor, Alumni Magazine 3825 Wisconsin Ave. NW Washington, DC 20016

Correction: Hailey Blain ’14 interned with AYUDA for her senior project, while Izi Cai ’14 interned at an architecture firm.

[Vol. 86/No. 1, page 14.] We regret the errors. —Ed 4

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Foreground, from left: Karenna Warden ’21, Ally Wilkerson ’21, and Charlotte McGuire ’21

› SIDWELL SCENE

“Hands up. Don’t shoot”: On September 12, 2014, students rallied to protest the killing of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.

AFTER FERGUSON STUDENTS SHARE THEIR CONCERNS AT A TOWN HALL MEETING

By Nicole Profit ’15 On October 1, the Sidwell Friends campus community held a town hall meeting about recent events in Ferguson, Missouri, police brutality, and racial biases among police officers.

Ground rules, such as reflecting on the opinion of others before speaking, were established up front to ensure that the conversation would be respectful. Then, the officers of the Black Student Union (BSU), who hosted the meeting, explained the origins of the unrest in Ferguson.

The cause can be traced to the shooting of the unarmed black teenager Michael 6

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Brown; however, as a community, Ferguson has a history of racial tension.

While 67 percent of Ferguson’s residents are black, 50 members of the town’s 53-officer police force are white. The BSU officers then reminded those in attendance that this discussion extends beyond Ferguson. In August 2014 alone, at least four other unarmed black men were killed at the hands of police. In each case, eyewitnesses reported that the victims were willingly complying with police officers, had their hands up, or were trying to communicate a message of surrender. These names include Eric Garner, John Crawford, Ezell Ford, and Dante Parker.

Less than a year ago, a movie called Fruitvale Station was made about a similar instance of police brutality against

Oscar Grant, another unarmed black teen.

David Connell, Sidwell Friends’ community service director, referred to his experience as a teacher at the Arlington, Virginia, county jail over the past 15 years. He talked about how African American inmates have comprised about 90 percent of his students during this period, while only 9 percent of county residents are African American, which suggests racial biases within the criminal justice system.

Every 28 hours, police kill a black man.

› SIDWELL SCENE

■■■ The meeting was then opened up to the diverse crowd of nearly 30 students— many of whom are not BSU members— and about 10 teachers to discuss two queries: Should we be invested in issues that have little to no effect on our daily lives?

What can we do to raise awareness?

At first, few people knew how to respond, so BSU officers asked attendees if they had any personal connections to what happened in Ferguson.

A freshman then told a story about his cousin who was nearly choked to death by police and was sentenced to 10 years for marijuana possession. It was later found that the conviction was unjust, but the man is still serving the term.

A BSU officer then mentioned a startling statistic: Every 28 hours, police kill a black man. While this statistic includes combative criminals, the point was made that it is horrifying to realize that the shooting of unarmed black civilians, whom eyewitnesses cite as having been compliant, occurs on a monthly basis in America.

In response to the first query, one student said that we should care about these issues because they indirectly affect our perceptions of each other and of black males in particular, and if we do not bring these heartbreaking occurrences to light, people will rationalize them.

To this, a senior expressed his doubt that much progress could be made toward solving this problem. He believes the country is making slow progress against racism. His great-great-uncle, Shadrack Thompson, was the last man to be lynched in Virginia. This tragedy happened in 1932—two generations ago. The senior said that even today, he

feels people’s racial biases by the way they look at him when he exits a car with his friends—tall, black basketball players like him.

The community then discussed possible solutions to police and racial bias— requiring cameras on cop cars, for example, or requiring self-awareness training for officers.

A black BSU officer talked about how her mother would not let her older brother hang out with his friends late at night because she feared these incidents. An underclassman then told a story about how a police officer made her brother show him his ID because he was walking around a campus late at night and the officer did not believe he was a student.

Afterward, as if anticipating her brother’s response, the officer said, “You must think I’m such a jerk for stopping you.”

A senior cited the fact that while a significant portion of people see incidents such as Michael Brown’s death as a proper response to criminals, they ignore the fact that the lack of a strong education and secure employment drive people to be criminals, and that these issues go beyond one instance in Ferguson.

parents have on the same situation. She held the position that in her experience, the white “response” to these problems was preaching color-blindness, which would not solve the issue. People need to acknowledge their nuanced racisms and discuss them in a productive way so that we as a species can begin to understand each other.

In the last personal anecdote shared, a student told about a year that a Muslim holiday fell on 9/11, and how she feared getting killed because she was openly praying outside with her family.

While she can take off her scarf, she noted how sad and hurtful it was that today, people are still worried about dying because of their race.

A junior ended the meeting by saying that because the country has a black president, there is some unspoken doctrine that disallows people from speaking about race; however, the fact that our president is black does not instantaneously end racial prejudice.

The consensus was that the meeting had been respectful, productive, and thoughtprovoking. Many students expressed the desire to hold another.

People need to acknowledge their nuanced racisms and discuss them in a productive way.

Someone else said how unfair it is that ending discrimination seems to be the responsibility of the victim.

A non-BSU senior talked about the problem in terms of the way parents raise their kids. She alleged that too many white parents tell their kids not to go out at night because it’s dangerous, without considering the perspective that black

Thomas Kohn, parent of Ethan Kohn ’16 and Grace Kohn ’18, took his children and brother to Ferguson in the days after the grand jury decision. Watch a video he took at http://on.fb.me/1BkHre4.

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› SIDWELL SCENE

GAMETIME! A new way to cheer on varsity teams kicked off during the fall semester with GAMETIME!, an initiative created and run by the Parents Association. Each week, the entire School community is encouraged to come out and support a different team in the spotlight, with cookies and beverages and fellowship for added enjoyment. Spectators also have a chance to submit one of their photos from the event for School publication. In the photo above, the SFS 1st grade soccer team, coached

by Upper School history teacher Darren Speece, had the thrill of playing in front of the crowd during a varsity soccer match. (Or was it that the crowd had the thrill of watching the 1st graders?)

Look for the announcement of the GAMETIME! game of the week in the division newsletters throughout the school year.

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FIVE ALUMNI CAME TO CAMPUS September 27 for a query-centered discussion focused on Sidwell Friends School as experienced by black alumni. The panelists, invited by the Parents of Black Students alliance and the Upper School Diversity Committee, talked about the challenges they faced and how having been an SFS student has affected their academic and professional careers.

They also offered strategies for success to current students and parents. Pictured from left: Nasser Muhammad ’05, Lauren Brownlee ’01, Destiny Franklin ’13, Upper School Diversity Coordinator Hayes Davis, Ericka Blount ’90, and Mark Chichester ’86.

› SIDWELL SCENE

FERRETING OUT FAKERS When is the last time you thought someone was lying to you? An hour ago, perhaps? Most of us encounter nearly 200 lies a day, says Pamela Meyer ’76 in her 2010 book, Liespotting. The bestselling author, who is a certified fraud examiner and expert at detecting deception, was guest speaker at Collection for National Library Week.

“Who here thinks they’re good at detecting a lie?” Pam asked. She had disappointing news for the half of the students who raised their hands. “The more confident you are in your ability to tell when someone is lying, the less effective you really are.”

She and her staff at Calibrate—a leading “deception detection” training company based in Washington, DC—would be an exception to that rule, however. “People who are trained to detect lying are 90 percent effective,” she said.

That detection, Pam said, focuses on the fact that “when we bluff, the cognitive load is so high in our system that we actually leak verbal and nonverbal indicators.”

She promised to make students better at ferreting out fakers by giving them a “quick system in 20 minutes” on how to do it.

To begin with, she advised, learn to recognize the telltale signs that come in verbal and nonverbal form. If you detect two or three “clusters” of both forms of communication, you may be dealing with a liar.

VERBAL CUES Someone who is not being truthful will telegraph dishonesty by speaking with: • Noncontracted denials. Did not, could not, and would not instead of didn’t, couldn’t, wouldn’t. “Someone who is

over-determined in their denial will resort to formal language,” Pam said.

• Distancing language that unconsciously distances themselves from a person.

I did not steal that boy’s iPod, versus Jason’s iPod, for example.

• Precise denials versus categorical denials. “Truth-tellers will say, ‘I never stole anything in my life,’” Pam said.

A liar might say, “I didn’t have a date with that girl last Friday.”

• Qualifying language. “To tell you the truth…”

• Religious references. “I swear to God I didn’t do it.”

• Detours. Straying off topic when answering a question.

NONVERBAL CUES According to Pam, Sigmund Freud believed “no mortal can keep a secret.

If his lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips.” In other words, “People will show what they are thinking with their body language,” she said. However, she cautioned that it’s essential to have a “baseline” assessment of what is normal for someone before identifying their body language as a sign of lying—lip biting is one such clue, but it may also be someone’s innocent habit. Look for:

• Grooming gestures (dusting lint off a jacket, for instance).

• A lowered voice.

• Stiffened versus slumped posture. It’s a common tactic for an FBI interrogator to say that the interview is over (which often results in the suspect relaxing and slumping), only to suddenly reengage to see if the person immediately stiffens back up.

• Smiling. A liar may be secretly enjoying the feeling of “getting away with a whopper.”

Pam stressed that lie detection “is not a parlor trick. You need to pursue facts, not people, or you will lose rapport. And you don’t want to falsely accuse someone.

“Observe more carefully, and listen more carefully,” she advised. (The CIA calls this “L squared,” for looking and listening.)

You’ll be less likely to be fooled by a liar, she said, “and your life will get more interesting.”

• A “frozen” upper body. It’s a myth that fidgeting is always a sign that someone is uncomfortable and lying.

• Excessive eye contact. The belief that a liar will avoid looking their accuser in the eyes is also a myth. “The average person will overcompensate,” said Pam. • A fake smile. “You can fake a smile with your cheek muscles, but a real smile is in the eyes” and in how the corners wrinkle during a genuine smile, she pointed out.

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PHOTO BY BRIAN STARK

› SIDWELL SCENE

BIASED BEHAVIOR The next time you make a choice—even something as innocuous as changing lanes while driving—ask yourself: Was it a conscious decision, or one determined by a hidden bias?

Front to back: Andrew Rosenthal ’25, Billy Walsh ’23, and Jessica Lucas ’24

CLASS CLOWNS How to reinforce basic French for Lower School students? Send in the clowns.

During an October assembly, students belly laughed through the classic (and educational) performance of the two-clown act Pinot and Augustine, created and performed by Happenstance Theater co-directors Mark Jaster (a former protégé of world-renowned clown Marcel Marceau) and Sabrina Mandell. (Mark is also the parent of alumna Emma Jaster ’03.) The duo, who have entertained at venues from the Kennedy Center to the Smithsonian’s Discovery Theater, performed in the traditions of the late-1800s—the “golden age of the circus.”

Mark’s clown character, Pinot, spoke only French to Sabrina’s Augustine and to the audience. While she translated for the students, for much of the act it wasn’t necessary: Thanks to Lower School French language lessons, they were able to follow along and even sing an entire song that Pinot led.

To augment what students learned from the assembly, faculty prepared vocabulary lists and follow-up discussion topics such as, “What illusions did the clowns use?” and “Which character was the protagonist?”—making for one seriously fun lesson.

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NPR science correspondent Shankar Vedantam thinks it’s likely the latter. “Our unconscious biases affect every aspect of our lives,” he said. “It’s in everything from how we act toward one another based on race and gender, to how an umpire might behave during a World Series baseball game for fear of making a mistake.”

Shankar, author of The Hidden Brain, gave his thoughts on humans’ unconscious biases at an October 27 talk for the Sidwell Friends community. Citing a host of research studies and his own interviews, Shankar revealed that people quite often can think they’re consciously doing one thing when they’re actually unconsciously doing another—and those unconscious decisions can have negative effects.

Take, for example, knee replacement surgery. “Doctors are 22 times more likely to prescribe knee replacement surgery for men than for women,” Shankar said.

“Is that because men are 22 times more likely to require knee replacements, or have some sort of deficiency in their knees? Or, is it because they have a hidden bias that says, ‘Men are more

› SIDWELL SCENE

PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

athletic than women, so they’ll need new knees to keep competing?’”

What makes hidden biases so pernicious, Shankar told the audience of approximately 150, is that people often don’t mean to be biased. “If you ask people if they’re biased against, say, women, 100 percent will say no, of course not,” he said. “But it doesn’t mean the consequences aren’t real for education, race, and the judicial system. Our hidden biases carry huge consequences.”

The effects of hidden biases are everywhere, according to Shankar: • In the classroom, when math and science teachers may call on female students less often than on male students • In policing, when police may negatively profile African Americans • In politics, when voters may perceive women as being unfit to serve as president of the United States “I would be surprised if you don’t see this in all professions,” he said.

Shankar stressed that hidden biases cross all racial, gender, and cultural boundaries—research has found they are as strong outside of America as in it. “It just takes on different forms elsewhere,” he said. “India, where I’m from, has the caste system, for example.”

So what can people do to combat a hidden bias? Shankar drew a lesson from his hosts. “It’s like the Quaker moment of silence,” he said. “You need to stop, slow down, and think consciously.”

Jet Wah ’24, Audrey Acres ’24, Anya Capoor ’24, and Keya Krishna ’24 dish out a major portion of cuteness at the Lower School’s annual Halloween parade, a favorite tradition not just with students but with parents and faculty as well. See more photos at sidwell.edu/pics.

There’s no simple solution to hidden biases—and Shankar argued that legal remedies are not the answer. “But if you leave here tonight thinking, ‘I have work to do,’ then that is a tremendous start.”

—Ira Apfel, parent of Isabel Apfel ’22 and Sophie Apfel ’19 ALUMNI MAGAZINE

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› SIDWELL SCENE

STORIES ON STAGE For the past six years, Vertical Voices Playback, the 8th grade drama troupe, has traveled to perform for students at Milton Hershey Middle School in Pennsylvania, a cost-free, coeducational home and school for children from families in need. The troupe and the trips are led by Middle School drama teacher Tim Reagan, who took up the reins from graduated parent Barbara Mulitz.

This unusual form of theater, in which audience members share a brief personal story which is then acted out by the troupe, strikes a chord with students. “Playback Theatre is about storytelling and story listening; it honors the give-and-take of community so that one’s inner teacher can speak,” says Tim. “The troupe members take their role replaying personal stories very seriously.

I integrated this service learning opportunity into the curriculum with the hope of expanding the way students think about service.

This demonstrates their ability to use their time and talents in a way that benefits others.”

Troupe member Ilana Panth ’18 reflects on her involvement at Milton Hershey: “Although many of the students were a little shy at first, they all became more comfortable as the performance progressed, and people were soon sharing stories freely. Before we knew it, people were retelling touching personal stories as well as sharing many funny experiences. The entire experience was one I’ll never forget, because I felt as though we made a connection.”

Nicole Sosnik ’25 and Ava Strong ’23

SCIENCE FESTIVAL Sound sandwiches and rockets were just two of the experiments that sparked students’ imaginations at the Lower School Science Festival, whose primary catalyst was parent volunteers.

The youngest students were paired with older student buddies while they moved from station to station at their own pace: • Carbon dioxide film canister rockets shot up when vinegar propellant was added to a baking soda paste. Students tested how to maximize the height of the rockets by varying the amount of each substance. “Mine went up in the clouds and didn’t come down for four minutes,” said one student.

• Wind tunnels tested the flight capabilities of objects that students constructed from recycled materials. One student gave his flying object a name, cheering, “Go, Fred!”

• Sound sandwiches filled the cafeteria with kazoo-like buzzing thanks to creations that turned tongue depressors, bits of a drinking straw, and rubber bands into a noisemaker that works like a reed instrument.

• Wonder bottles reigned as a favorite activity for students excited to mix oil, beads, and colored water to create their own wavingmotion bottles of, well, wonderment.

See more photos at sidwell .edu/pics.

Zachary Foxx ’25

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PHOTO BY SUSAN HENRY SHAFFER ’69

› SIDWELL SCENE

STICK WITH IT Olympic field hockey coach Nate Franks ’03 likely owes his successful career in sports to his parents saying no and a coach saying yes. As a Middle School student at Sidwell Friends in 1995, rotating through the P.E. curriculum’s sampling of sports, he was taken with football—but his parents punted on the idea of him ever joining the team. He tried cross country, but called his one day of essentially running in circles “the stupidest thing in the world.”

The sport that really sparked his interest, field hockey, came with one big hurdle: It is a girls’ sport.

It was also, however, Nate’s. He asked then-coach Anne Monahan if he could play. She not only agreed, “she took very good care of me for the six years I was here,” Nate says. And even though league rules meant that Nate—the only boy on a high school field hockey team to be found anywhere—could play in only four non-ILS games in high school, he still developed skills that would one day earn him a spot coaching both the women’s

and men’s United States Field Hockey Association teams. (The men’s national team is the only officially sanctioned outlet for males, and there is only one feeder league, in Southern California.)

Nate shared his story with a very excited girls’ varsity field hockey team after a home game in September and coached them on pulls, pops, posture, and other essential skills.

Head varsity coach Becky Iseman was happy to have Nate’s help coaching. “I can tell the girls something a thousand times, but if he says it, it’s gospel,” she says jokingly.

NEUTRALIZING GENDER “It’s a major bummer that people think it’s weird that guys want to play field hockey,” Nate admitted to the varsity athletes on campus. After high school, however, he had no time for stigmas.

He was a women’s field hockey team student coach during his undergrad days at Princeton, and then an assistant coach at American University and Bucknell University before returning to Princeton

as assistant coach. He also played on the Men’s First Team at the Clontarf Hockey Club in Dublin, Ireland.

Nate was part of the team that helped get the women’s USFHA team to the 2012 Olympics in London, where he served as a performance analyst, and to the 2014 World Cup in The Hague, Netherlands, where they finished an impressive fourth.

Today, he continues to work as a full-time performance analyst at USA Field Hockey covering the men’s national, women’s national, and junior national teams.

“I’ve made a lot of friends, and I’ve managed to make a living out of [field hockey],” he says. “It has taken me to more than 60 countries. So it worked out okay.”

To see more photos of Nate coaching the girls, go to sidwell.edu/goquakers.

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PHOTO BY BURT NADLER

› SIDWELL SCENE

TWO SIDES TO EVERY COIN Each week, more than 60 7th and 8th graders on the Middle School debate team hone the skill of looking at both sides of an argument under the tutelage of Middle School social studies teacher and team advisor Burt Nadler. Students select their own teams of three and work together on research, strategy formation, and argument development.

The debaters opened the 2014/15 season by hosting the DC Urban Debate League tournament on October 25. More than 160 debaters on 53 teams from 11 different schools made their case on two compelling topics: • Resolved: Inaction in the face of injustice makes an individual morally responsible.

• Resolved: Vocational education classes should be viable alternatives to core graduation requirements for all student groups.

Sidwell Friends fielded 47 debaters (more than half of whom had not performed in a tournament before) and 16 teams.

They fared very well, taking the first place 14

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trophy for total number of team wins as well as the first place trophy for winning percentage.

In team rankings, SFS had five undefeated teams who took the first five rankings in the tournament. In first place overall was the team of Rama Somborac ’19, Nicholas Spasojevic ’20, and Sophie Horst ’19; second place went to Lauren Adler ’19, Oliver Bass ’19, and Mitchell Jubeir ’19. The team of Chiara D’Andrea ’19, Toby Dorfman ’19, and Erica Wang ’19 placed third, while Claire Choi ’19, Ellie Ihegihu ’19, and Patrice McGloin ’19 took fourth and Olivia Choi ’19, Rebecca Fried ’19, and Lily Swaine-Moore ’19 captured fifth.

Individual debaters also took six of the top 20 spots in speaker point awards, with Sophie Horst claiming first place overall. Other winning debaters included Oliver Bass, fourth; Nicholas Spasojevic, fifth; Rama Somborac, sixth; Alex Sundberg ’20, 12th; and Mitchell Jubeir, 19th.

Congratulations to all of the debaters.

WHAT’S IN A NAME? Cherokee Indian storyteller and educator Joseph Stands With Many enlightened Middle Schoolers about traditional Cherokee ways, the preferred name for people of his heritage, the reason he finds the Washington Redskins name offensive, and other topics at an October assembly.

Joseph, whose grandmother and greatgrandmother were also storytellers, was given his name by a medicine woman in his clan. “She said, ‘Your name is Stands With Many…and I don’t mean living. I see so many behind you.’

“So I look behind me,” says Joseph, “and see no one. She said, ‘Think ancestors.’”

Joseph shared the history of the Cherokee Trail of Tears. This forced relocation of Indian tribes from their southeast homeland to territories west of the Mississippi River around the 1830s

› SIDWELL SCENE

resulted in a quarter of the Cherokee nation dying from starvation and disease.

“Any Indian—I always say Indian instead of Native American, it’s a generational thing, and actually it’s now American Indian—knows that we didn’t own the land, but it was our territory. It was where we farmed, lived, and hunted. For my people, land wasn’t something you owned, but it was something for your use,” he says.

Today, “there really are not any [Cherokee] reservations, but the Cherokee people have been trying to buy up land in a specific area to create a Cherokee land again. In 1924, the Indian Citizen Act granted citizenship to all Native Americans born in the US, so we are all citizens.”

Joseph addressed the controversial issue surrounding the name of the Washington Redskins. “I don’t like the name. It was a derogatory name, and it still is. When a minority people say that it’s offensive, take them at their word.

“The image bothers me because it bothers young children who are Indian. I know and have talked to other Indian kids, and they don’t like it.

“And when people try to justify it and say, ‘It honors your warrior spirit,’ I point out that we lost. Put yourself on [the logo], make yourself the mascot—you all were the winners.”

To learn more about Joseph Stands With Many, visit standswithmany.com.

PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

“Back in the day, a lot of reservations were fenced in, and you couldn’t leave without a pass. If you violated the law, they put you in the stockades,” he explains, noting that although not everyone agreed they should be treated this way, “it takes just a few people in power to mess it up for everyone else.”

MORE THAN JUST MUSIC

By Stephanie Everett ’15 I was unprepared for the incredible music that floated through the meeting room on November 2. It’s not that I didn’t know my notes or words, no. I just was not ready to turn the fangirl in me off when the Washington Opera’s Domingo-Cafritz program opera singers opened their mouths for the first time. Despite excellent coaching from Mr. Touchton, I was not the only one whose jaw dropped in admiration instead of dropping in song.

This was the second year that we had the privilege of singing with these Kennedy Center greats and the Apollo Orchestra. (The latter features young musicians from around the globe and here in DC; most are conservatory graduates who haven’t yet joined a major orchestra or opera company.) Both groups were the very image of professionalism and hard work. Seeing how much they all cared about music was an incredible experience in and of itself, and I think seeing that level of performance was a great model for our chorus, especially for people who are new to the group.

With 93 singers in chorus this year (20 more than the chorus has ever had), we had a lot of ground to cover in a short amount of time. The performance was our second in three weeks. It was a huge confidence boost for the entire group to perform at the level that we did in front of a packed meeting room. Fans of the Apollo sat alongside our parents, offering the same praise and approval to us that they did to the professionals in the room. Every student in our ensemble found a new appreciation for opera music through this uncommon and remarkable experience. I feel so lucky to have taken part, and thank Mr. Touchton and Sidwell Friends for consistently offering such life-changing and memorable opportunities.

Event photos are at sidwell.edu/pics.

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FALL SPORTS ROUNDUP FOOTBALL, GIRLS’ VARSITY SOCCER, and VARSITY VOLLEYBALL took home championship banners all within the span of a single weekend! Congratulations to all of the Sidwell Friends athletes and coaches for such an outstanding showing. (See p. 18 for football results.)

GIRLS’ VARSITY SOCCER won the championship tournament game 2–0, with Nicole Willing ’18 scoring both goals. This win gave the team a share of the banner for the AA division. In the semifinals, Lucy Fredell ’17 scored an overtime goal. Yasmin Siahpoosh ’15, Stephanie Everett ’15, Julia Horwitz ’15, and Nicole made the All-League team.

VOLLEYBALL, which was perfect in league play, also won the ISL Championship, defeating St. Stephen’s & St. Agnes 3–1, and advanced to the quarterfinals of the DCSAA tournament, where they defeated St. Andrews 3–1. The team was led by cocaptains Joelle Jackson ’15 and Nicole Profit ’15. The team received three All-League players: Joelle, Nicole, and Allie Littleton ’16.

BOYS’ CROSS COUNTRY, led by captain Jake Gosselin ’15, won every head-to-head meet, along with the Maymont Invitational. The team finished second in the MAC and won the DCSAA championships, where Jake finished second and Christian Roberts ’17 came in third. Jake also medaled at the DC Private School Championships. The team had three All-League runners: Jake, Christian, and Sam Blazes ’16.

GIRLS’ CROSS COUNTRY finished third in the DCSAA championships, with Taylor Knibb ’16 finishing first and setting a course record. Additionally, Taylor and Ellie Leape ’17 got All-League honors. Taylor capped off the season with an 18:25 5-kilometer time, setting a new School record and winning the DC Private School Championships. Ellie medaled at the DC Private School Championships.

GOLF, spurred on by strong senior leadership, enjoyed an extremely successful season with a 13–1–1 finish. The team placed second in the MAC Championships, shooting a School record 317, six strokes better than the old record. The lowest team aggregate score was 150 (37.5 stroke average). Matthew Nicoletti ’15 shot the second-lowest score in the history of the MAC tournament with a 1 under 70; Jordan Bessalel ’17 made All-League with a score of 78.

GIRLS’ VARSITY TENNIS had a 9–6 record, finishing sixth in a strong ISL AA division. Caroline Monahan ’16 was All-League, and Alexandra Zhang ’18 was honorable mention All-League.

1. Nicole Profit ’15, Jenna Jubeir ’17, and Joelle Jackson ’15  2. Annie Boasberg ’18  3. Jake Gosselin ’15, Sam Blazes ’16, Amal Mattoo ’17, and Christian Roberts ’17  4. Max Strickberger ’17 (center) and Cana Anduze ’15  5. Ali Ahmed ’15  6. Many Carter ’17

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Football:

That Championship Season!

By Gabby Birenbaum ’17

T

he sense of anticipation was palpable as the clock ran down in the fourth quarter of Sidwell Friends’ November 1 football game against Flint Hill. With a 13-point lead and two minutes left to play, it was clear that both the players and fans were appreciating the significance of the moment.

Sidwell Friends was two minutes away from an undefeated conference season. As the fans cheered uproariously from the stands, the players paced the sidelines, keeping their emotions in check, and Coach John Simon couldn’t help but smile proudly. When the last second passed, the players took charge of the victory celebration. Celebrating was definitely in order: Sidwell Friends had won the MAC for the first time since 2005, and its first outright championship since 2004. The win was clearly a long time coming.

Sidwell Friends football, now in its 18th year with John Simon as head coach, was dominant in the early 2000s. The Quakers won six consecutive championships from 2000–2005. When they fell from the top, however, they fell hard. The worst was in 2010, a year before the current seniors entered high school, when the team posted a winless season. Throughout the second half of the 2000s, attendance and interest dwindled as play worsened. After that record low, five of the current seniors began their SFS football careers as freshmen, and the team began to see slow improvement. By 2012, Sidwell posted a winning record of 6–3, but MAC hopes were derailed after late season losses, including one to Flint Hill, who had been dominating the MAC while SFS struggled. Another blowout loss came in 2013 to Flint Hill, and no banner. Entering the 2014 season, it was do or die for the seniors. “We were all very focused, and well prepared by the coaches. We had an understanding of what we had to do, and we did it,” said captain George Marcou ’15.

From the beginning, it was apparent to Miles Brown ’15 that if any Sidwell Friends team could finally break through, it was this one. “It’s hard to describe, but there was something that just clicked with us,” he explained.

The season started off with a bang, as the Quakers defeated Randolph-Macon Academy 64–6, highlighted by four touchdown passes by Ted Hefter ’16 and an incredible six sacks for LinDon Harris ’16. The success continued with four blowout wins. One, a home game against rival Maret, with tons of Sidwell fans cheering the team on, ended in a 50–6 rout of the Frogs, with Hefter posting a phenomenal QB rating of 158.6. However, the win came at a price. Talented running back TJ Horne ’16, suffered a season-ending injury, and his skills were severely missed as the team lost the next two nonconference games.

Recovering from the consecutive losses was no sure bet, but the team was confident. Miles said, “We knew the feeling of losing two big games, and we knew we couldn’t allow that to happen again.”

“I am proud of this team because we recovered from two losses, one being a homecoming game, and

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PHOTOS BY SANDI MCCOY

Opposite page: Oscar Boochever ’15 Right: Coach John Simon Far right: Fans storm the field Below: Oscar Boochever ’15, Mark Chichester ’18, and Dylan Greynolds ’17 See more photos at sidwell .edu/goquakers.

We were all very focused, and well prepared by the coaches. We had an understanding of what we had to do, and we did it. —Team captain George Marcou ’15 got back on track to win the two most important games of the season,” agreed Coach Simon. Those two games would be against St. James and, of course, Flint Hill. A 30-point win against St. James, highlighted by major accomplishments

by Brown on both offense and defense, secured at least a share of the MAC title.

The seniors, however, wouldn’t settle for that. “I know all of the players and coaches were determined to finally bring home the MAC, and it wasn’t an opportunity that anyone wanted to miss, especially the seniors,” explained George. “The kids kept telling me, ‘We’re not going to share it, Coach.

We’re going to win it,’” Coach Simon echoed. “They were just determined.”

On a blustery fall day, Sidwell Friends traveled to Flint Hill. George called it “easily…the most important game of my career.” Nobody on the roster had ever beaten Flint Hill.

There was nervous energy in the stands as the Quakers took the field, but as it turned out, there was no need for concern. In a dominant showing, Miles Brown scored six touchdowns, Mark Chichester ’18 had 290 all-purpose yards, captain Oscar Boochever ’15 caught nine passes, and Miles and JonJon Streat ’15 finished with nine tackles

each, culminating in 88 total tackles for the Quakers. For the first time since 2004, 10 long years ago, the Quakers were the sole possessors of the MAC championship.

Words cannot describe how much the victory meant to everyone on the roster, especially for the seniors and Coach Simon. “Every player contributed to the team’s success,” stated Coach Simon. “For the first time in recent memory, the MAC banner resides at 3825 Wisconsin Avenue: something every Sidwell Friends student, alum, teacher, and administrator can be proud of.”

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Seth MacMillan ’10, interim Upper School Principal Mamadou Guèye, and Karen Levy ’85 PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

The irresistible tradition of Homecoming drew a great crowd to campus October 18. Fans got to celebrate wins by the boys’ soccer, girls’ tennis, and boys’ cross country teams while consoling the varsity football and volleyball teams. (Varsity girls’ soccer tied.) Alumni fanned their School spirit at a halftime reception, while the Upper School Jazz Ensemble made it a party.

More than 20 clubs and affinity booths cast their nets for prospects; the crew team held a timed rowing competition with an indoor rower; the 8th graders’ annual bake sale blew a record number of diets; 4th graders offered popcorn; and, with a spectacular finish, the four-day Next-to-New sale closed out at the end of the day with more than $92,000 grossed—$27,000 more than last year and a new School record! A big thank you to the 265 adult volunteers, student volunteers, event co-chairs Melanie Jacobsen and Felice Roggen, and everyone who donated items to this event for student scholarships. This achievement is even more remarkable in light of the fact that we sent nearly one ton of clothing and more than 400 boxes of unsold items (as well as furniture and electronics) to 15 local charities, recycled more than half a ton of textiles unfit for sale to local recycling centers, and still had enough left over to kick-start a metal recycling program!

PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

COMING

Students from the Jazz Ensemble program lent the right note to the day. Front to back: Spenser Hyun ’17, keyboards; Kaoru Yamazaki ’15, guitar; Setfan Morgan ’17, bass; Jordan Bessalel ’17, guitar; and Jazz Ensemble instructor David Merlin-Jones, saxophone.

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PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

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PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

Jesse Cowan helps the bling ring up sales.

PHOTO BY FREED PHOTOGRAPHY

The boys’ soccer team ruled at the pep rally.

Audrey Boochever ’09 joins her dad, John Boochever, in an unmistakable display of support for her football-playing brother, Oscar Boochever ’15.

Rich Foley ’73 and Guilford Queen ’72

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Humor as an Art Form Bob Mankoff, The New Yorker cartoon editor, is the 2014 Rubenstein Memorial Guest Artist.

Each year, as part of the Rubenstein Memorial Guest Artist Series, a prominent artist is invited to exhibit, lecture, and conduct a workshop for students. On September 10, the School welcomed Robert “Bob” Mankoff, cartoon editor of The New Yorker, as this year’s Rubenstein Guest Artist. Inspired by one of his favorite pieces, his presentation was titled, “How about Never? Is Never Good for You?: My Life in Cartoons.”

At Upper School Collection and during a reception later that evening in the Daryl Reich Rubenstein Gallery, where examples of his work lining the walls showed the evolution of his spare, pointillist style, Bob gave an inside look at what it takes to produce the popular cartoon feature for the venerable magazine each week—something he has been doing since the 1970s. He also shared insights on the history and principles of humor in general, and explained what sets The New Yorker-style cartoons apart from other kinds of visual humor.

The New Yorker has spawned more than 80,000 cartoons since 1925, and some 950 of them have been Bob’s. Each week, Bob and other editors review about 500 submissions from artists around the world. Once a week, he meets with hopeful contributors in person. Most of what he sees he gives what he calls a “pleasant but blunt” rejection.

The animated artist, a Ping-Pong “fanatic” who always travels with his paddle, enjoyed playing against students during his visit.

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“The New Yorker is a serious magazine, so we are making fun of ourselves with these witty jokes,” he said. The right kind of cartoon for the publication has “something incongruent, something that is off or doesn’t fit. You need something wrong, or something odd.” Another trait: “Saying something rude politely.”

According to Bob, the phrase “sense of humor” didn’t even exist until the 1870s-—and was actually considered vulgar by many. “Think about the response” when we laugh, he said.

“We cackle, we make bizarre faces!

Why is that? Why do we have that response instead of cool finger clicking, for instance?”

He talked about how it’s considered an insult to say that someone has no sense of humor. “Aren’t you saying something more about them if you say that? It’s not just that you’re not entertaining. It says that you take yourself too seriously; you could never see what’s ridiculous about yourself.”

We need humor, he added, as a way to bond with others, and as a signal of goodwill. We also need it as a counter to the constant tension from cooperating and competing we’re under. Humor can serve as a form of “fake fighting” or teasing in which we can insult someone but then “take it back.” Clever insults, in fact, used to be somewhat of an art form called repartee.

At the evening reception, Bob signed his latest book for parents, students, and friends with the caveat, “If over time my drawing becomes more valuable—then I want it back.”

The day after Collection and the reception, Bob visited several arts classes and spent time answering questions, including those about the intriguing Google Glass he was wearing.

Q&A with a Cartoonist Q: ARE FUNNY PEOPLE BORN FUNNY, OR DO YOU LEARN TO BE FUNNY? A: I think everyone is born kind of funny looking.

Q: CAN YOU WORK AT IT AND GET BETTER? A: Your ability to be funny is something that happens early in life and is environmental, not in your DNA. Something needs to go a little wrong [in your upbringing]. If you are perfect—great mom and dad, [top score] on your SATs—you’re not going to be funny.

You can learn it and work on it, but it largely depends on your propensity to laugh.

Q: HOW HAVE CARTOONS CHANGED WITH POLITICAL AND CULTURAL CORRECTNESS? A: Sometimes we won’t publish certain potentially funny cartoons due to sensitivity around a terrible event. Some of the very good cartoons have never been published because just the idea of a joke at a time like that would be offensive.

Q: ANY ADVICE? A: Keep being curious. Don’t worry about what others think—they don’t actually care. And we’re always looking for new, young cartoonists.

ABO U T TH E D A RY L R E I C H R U BE N S TE I N GA LLE RY AN D GU E S T A RTI S T P R O GR A M The gallery and program were established in 1981 and are named named in memory of Daryl Reich Rubenstein, mother of Barton Rubenstein ’81, Beth Rubenstein ’77, and Amy Rubenstein ’84.

Daryl was passionate about the arts. She From left: Barton Rubenstein ’81, Bob Mankoff, and served as a curator at the Lee Rubenstein.

Smithsonian Institution, was an art historian, and was a generous patron of the arts. Daryl was also an active member of the Sidwell Friends community: she taught speech in the Middle School, and organized photography competitions and exhibits of photos and prints. Barton and his father, Lee Rubenstein, are the benefactors of this program.For more photos, go to sidwell.edu/pics.

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Reducing the distance by going the distance PHOTO BY MATEO RUEDA ’16

Through a donor-supported Faculty Venture Grant, Sidwell Friends Upper School history teacher Gail Krotky launches a for-credit summer course abroad—in Uruguay.

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t was not your ordinary summer vacation: A group of Upper School students, led by history teachers Gail Krotky and Shields Sundberg, spent three weeks continuing their history studies by enrolling in the new for-credit course Uruguay Summer Study. Gail conceived of this class to enhance learning by experiencing the country, culture, and people firsthand. Her aim was to “reduce the distance” and understand the country through the lens of its people. “Knowledge from individual voices adds a richness and a depth often missed in textbooks,” Gail explains.

“In studying Latin America, there are regional trends we discuss. However, each country is unique.” The media tends to highlight challenges with corruption, underdevelopment, and violence. Gail’s purpose was to look at a country, in this case Uruguay, and uncover its success stories: tremendous interest in politics by young people, the emergence of a successful threeparty democracy, high literacy and graduation rates, and active human rights efforts. Most recently, Uruguay has been making news as the first country to establish a state-regulated legal marijuana market with the goal of driving out drug traffickers by fixing prices artificially low.

Modern Uruguay demonstrates stability, progress, and peace, says Gail. Students absorbed the warmth, beauty, and vitality of Uruguay by immersing themselves in the geography and culture while traveling throughout the country.

“This ‘sense of place’ study deconstructs the relationship between Uruguay’s past and present to understand not only the complexity of Uruguayan society, but also how the country is helping redefine perceptions and misconceptions of Latin America in the 21st century,” Gail explains.

PHOTO BY SHIELDS SUNDBERG

As part of the class, students completed photographic essays that included personal reflections.

Excerpts are shared on the following page; complete blogs are at sidwell.edu/uruguay.

Uruguay Summer Study students from left: Josh Zinger ’16, Jack Tamar ’16, Emma Walsh-Alker ’16, Katie Johnson ’16, Charlie O’Mara ’16, Mateo Rueda ’16, Nicholas Suardiaz Boitel ’16, Kosta Baranov ’16, and Carolina Hutt-Sierra ’16

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PHOTO BY JOSH ZINGER ’16

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“I chose not to focus on the juxtaposition of traditional and modern subjects, but rather the coexistence.”

—Katie Johnson ’16

PHOTO BY JOSH ZINGER ’16

“This experience allowed me to take everything I’d learned about Latin America throughout the year and apply it to real people and places. I gained insights into concepts that are relevant worldwide, including human rights, progress, and democracy.”

—Emma Walsh-Alker ’16 “Uruguayans create their own communities to represent their lives and country, such that the best way to understand and appreciate Uruguay is to try to understand and appreciate its people.”

—Carolina Hutt-Sierra ’16 “On this trip, we wanted to experience Uruguay from the inside out, a unique perspective typically reserved for those who live there.

Uruguay is a country rooted in its traditions, but it is also always moving forward and progressing.”

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“I sought to understand an enigmatic country defying the stereotype of an impoverished Latin America. [My experiences there] impressed upon me the continual struggle to find balance between respecting the past, embracing the present, and looking toward the future in Uruguay.”

—Charlie O’Mara ’16

“It has been our great pleasure to shepherd the Trust that established the Faculty Venture Grant Program.

This year we transferred the Trust to the SFS endowment in order to create The Faculty Enrichment Fund. We’ve entrusted this named endowed fund to the School to support the Faculty Venture Grant Program going forward.

We are confident that the School’s investment of these assets and careful stewardship will result in continued growth of this program.” ~Anonymous Donors

ADVANCING FRIENDS

The Impact of Philanthropy at Sidwell Friends Gail Krotky, Upper School history teacher, applied for a Faculty Venture Grant to develop a new for-credit summer course in Uruguay.

I wanted to develop an in-country case study where students could further their passion in a region by traveling to the country and coupling their academic knowledge with experiential knowledge of the place.

The grant allowed me to explore and research what it would take to create the best transformative academic experience possible.

The Faculty Grant allowed me to create a very meaningful program that will run for its second year in summer 2015.

In 2014, nine students participated in the course Uruguay Summer Study— Redefining Latin America in the 21st Century.

See photos of the trip, read the class blog, and watch a video of Gail talking about her experience at www.sidwell.edu/advancingfriends.

WHAT’S YOUR IMPACT? This is just one of many stories about how philanthropy makes an impact at Sidwell Friends. Continue the conversation at www.sidwell.edu/advancingfriends.

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PHOTO BY SHIELDS SUNDBERG

Jack Tamar ’16 looks out over Uruguay during Sidwell Friends’ new for-credit summer course in June 2014.

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THE JAMAICA LIBRARY PROJECT:

A Journey Toward Literary Justice

By Angela Smith Lower School Librarian and project founder and leader I was drawn to the Sidwell Friends School Lower School librarian position 10 years ago by the opportunity to help create the change I hoped to see in the world. I was committed to creating and curating texts and resources that were the best in the classics, as well as what was new in children’s literature. With the support of a very literary community, we soon established a well-stocked and well-circulated library.

In a meeting with former Lower School Principal Rich Lodish, I was asked if I ever thought about the issues of literacy justice beyond the walls of Sidwell Friends. He said that for just about the same amount of money it would require to attend a national conference, I could travel to a school in an area of the world that did not have all of the resources required to create opportunities for students to experience literacy success.

education rattling around in my brain, it seemed like kismet when I met Peter Williams and Gina Green, parents of Wyatt Green Williams ’17. They had an idea to build a partnership with schools in a rural community outside of Montego Bay where their family had farmed for centuries. Thus was launched a seven-year journey to develop the Jamaica Library Project.

which serve the children of Bethel Town in Westmoreland. As they work to provide students with a quality education, we are providing them with necessary resources that just can’t be supplied by the government or the local community.

The Jamaica Library Project also engages Sidwell Friends Upper School students to create a person-toperson service learning experience that provides opportunities for global citizenship competency. Students work locally prior to traveling to Jamaica to gather 1,000 pounds of dignity-condition books that are needed to sustain a well-stocked elementary-school library. Meanwhile, they read accounts of Jamaican history, discuss both the danger of the American lens as a sole point of view as well as the concept of a single story to represent a culture, and explore the Quaker tenet to bear witness. They are encouraged to explore their own literacy privilege by reflecting about who in their lives

“To see that our partnership was impacting and inspiring students brought even greater meaning to our work.”

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The endeavor began as an idea to provide Jamaican schools with books, but, with a growing level of support from Sidwell Friends administration, it is becoming so much more. We have built strong relationships with the administrators and teachers of New Castle and Kew Park schools, both of

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provided early literacy skills and resources in their formative years, and how that impacted their academic and life success.

The Sidwell Friends students fly down to Montego Bay with only carry-on luggage for their 10-day journey because their checked bag is a large box of books. Delivering these books is a joyous occasion celebrated by students and teachers from both communities.

Everyone works to unpack, sort, and add a range of material to the shelves.

Then there is time to read together, play soccer or cricket, and share songs and performances. This past summer, work also included transforming a shipping container into a library space for the New Castle school. Additionally, students are introduced to my counterpart, librarian Dorothy Gooden, who is able to offer the Kew Park School her services because of funds raised by the Jamaica Library Project.

Ms. Dorothy and I share a passion for literature and the thrill of putting the right book into the hands of the right reader at the right time. Throughout the year, we work with Dorothy to determine which books are most needed. She also manages the local community library, so we are delighted to help bring her expertise right to the students several times a week and further her connection with these young readers. This year she sent along great news ahead of our arrival: a Kew Park student had won a regional reading and book competition and was advancing to the next level in the contest. We were able to meet this young lady on a sunny afternoon and applaud her success in person. To see that our partnership was impacting and inspiring students in such a way brought even greater meaning to our work.

As they cool off from hot days filled with physical labor and the excitement of working with younger children, Sidwell Friends students are reminded

Jamaica Library Project founder Angela Smith and her counterpart, librarian Dorothy Gooden

that this trip happens every year as a collaborative development project and partnership with this community.

There are long-term relationships here that they are expected to respect and participate in, as opposed to this being a one-off service experience or book drop. Surrounded by the misty hills and lush landscape of the Jamaican countryside, we spend a lot of time reflecting on site and participating in the Quaker practice of shared silent worship. Global citizenship, intercultural skills, world travel savvy, equity challenges, community infrastructure issues, and self and cultural awareness are just a few of the learning opportunities that arise over the journey.

about proper nutrition and crowded classrooms. They empathize with the pressures of state-mandated, highstakes testing in the early elementary years, and they imagine the divergent paths of those who do well and those who do not. The existence of global inequalities is inescapable; yet by bearing witness to both the signs of poverty and hope for a better life, there are rewarding opportunities to engage and work for greater justice. As Clara Molot ’17 wrote after her trip, “It is ‘easier’ to not know that this world within Jamaica exists, but, as I learned quickly on the service trip, it is imperative that programs like Jamaica Library Project exist, even if they change the trajectory of only one child.”

Though the surroundings are beautiful, students are confronted with information and images that contrast deeply with their own lives. They question why some students come to school without shoes or live in little more than wooden shacks. They wonder

As we seek to deepen these relationships and ensure the project’s sustainability by bringing together a welcoming rural community, service-minded students, and a fine selection of children’s books, we hope to foster literacy justice in Jamaica for years to come.

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Learning to

S E R V E It was a homeless shelter.

Near First and P streets.

With a playground.

It was a decade ago, but Mamadou Guèye remembers it. And he’s sure that the Sidwell Friends alumni who were students in his advisory at the time, there with him to do community service in the severely challenged Washington, DC, neighborhood, remember it, too.

The idea that people were homeless mere miles from Sidwell Friends—that little kids were homeless—was not just hard for the students to believe. It was impossible to ignore.

And that’s the whole point.

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“We want our students to ‘decenter,’ to get out of their comfort zone,” says Mamadou, now interim Upper School principal. From the time they chop their first “veggies” in Lower School for feeding the hungry at Martha’s Table, to the group service outings they participate in during their Middle School years, and straight through the required 60 hours of individual community service of their choice in Upper School, Sidwell Friends students learn that they have the ability and—as espoused in Quaker philosophy—the responsibility to give of themselves for the benefit of people and places in need. And the best way, the most genuine way, to learn this is by making connections and forming relationships with the recipients of their efforts.

“We want students to learn to be meaningful to the people they’re giving help to, even when those people and their circumstances are very different from what they are used to,” Mamadou says.

In most cases, he adds, students discover that they themselves have been changed by the process as well.

“Sidwell Friends is committed to helping students understand that you help yourself by helping others. You learn as much about yourself as you do about the people you are meeting.”

The following are just a few of the many voices of students, faculty, and alumni that have a different, deeper timbre as a result of having learned to serve.

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SERVICE LEARNING AT LOWER SCHOOL:

Integrating Service Into the Classroom Curriculum

By Jenni Swanson Voorhees, Director of Lower School Academic Technology and Angela Smith, Lower School Librarian If you visit Lower School on a Wednesday morning, you will find 50 students happily wielding small knives to tackle cutting boards full of fresh vegetables.

The chopped vegetables are collected in buckets and transported to Martha’s Table, a provider of food, clothing, and education for families in need, to become soup, stir-fry, or whatever dish their cooks choose to make. Our weekly

daily classroom learning.

In the last few years, we have made the transition from “community service” to “service learning.” Service is now integrated into our classroom curriculum, giving context to the experiences students have with service, and connecting them to the people they hope to impact, thus deepening their under-

Service is now integrated into our classroom curriculum, giving context to the experiences students have with service and connecting them to the people they hope to impact, thus deepening their understanding of the Quaker testimonies. vegetable cutting for Martha’s Table dates back nearly 30 years and was once Lower School’s primary experience with “community service.” Lower School then began to work with Bethesda Cares, an organization that serves the homeless in Bethesda by baking apple crisp and delivering unserved food from our lunches. These service projects were isolated experiences for our students; they understood the purpose and had some idea of where the food was going, but there was little connection to their 32

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standing of the Quaker testimonies.

Martha’s Table and Bethesda Cares are now clearly connected to discussions of food justice. Classes discuss equity in terms of housing and clothing, wondering where our clothes come from and who made them, and working with A Wider Circle, which provides furnishings and clothing to families transitioning from shelters to a home. Some of our 4th graders are learning about literacy justice by reflecting on their own journey into reading while working with PK

students on beginning literacy skills.

These students will participate in the Free Little Library program and collect and sort books for donating to a school in Jamaica through Sidwell Friends’ Jamaica Library Project. [See p. 28.] Our younger students will focus closer to home, thinking about how to make the lives of those around us better, improving and take care of our green space, composting waste, and growing food to share with the School community.

Service learning takes place in special classes as well. Sam Francis’s science curriculum for 3rd grade includes lessons on recycling. Students bury a collection of daily trash for a few weeks, then dig it up to see what decomposed and what remains intact. They take a tour of the Montgomery County Recycling Center, then become “The Green Team,” for which they are trained to check the recycling bins around school to make sure they are being used properly. They also teach others best practices in recycling. Art teacher Sabreena Jeru-Ahmed leads a collaborative art project with 3rd graders based on the symbol of the “empty bowl.” They each create a ceramic bowl to remind us of those in need, and create artwork for our walls. These collaborative art projects help us reflect and connect with our understanding of the importance of service in our daily lives.

See the Lower School service learning video at: sidwell.edu/LSservice

Marne Manoukian, 4th grade teacher, and Krish Batra ’25 chopping veggies

SERVICE IN MOTION:

Capturing Lower School on Video Sidwell Friends’ service and Quaker values are what influenced my decision to choose the School for my family. My nephew and niece are both recent Sidwell Friends graduates. Over the years, I’d heard about their experiences here and the values they were taught to understand and live by. Of course, their parents get lots of credit for the terrific young adults they are, but their Sidwell Friends education was a significant part of their formative years. They have both grown into people who care tremendously for others, and they continue to use their talents and skills in service work as alumni. Watching them develop into kind, thoughtful, aware young adults made it clear for us that we wanted to apply once our daughters were old enough to attend.

Last year, I was asked to be the Service Learning grade representative for 2nd grade. Up until that point, I had focused only on what service activities my daughter, Maya, was involved in during her first two years at Sidwell Friends.

Once I became involved with the Service Learning Committee, I realized how much was going on in all of Lower School. It occurred to me that if I didn’t have a sense of how many other activities were part of the curriculum and the plan for the older grades year by year, other parents might not know, either. It’s easy to have tunnel vision and just focus on what your child is doing at that moment.

I decided to create a short film to document the many facets of Lower School service so parents or those outside the School (such as families applying to attend) could know what goes on here. My hope was that it would foster excitement about how much the kids are doing on a regular basis, how many activities exist, and how much the students really get from the service learning program. I wanted people to realize that what the students are doing has meaning for them.

Anne Dickerson (parent of Brice Dickerson ’20 and Nan Dickerson ’22) co-

By Jessica Stockton Clancy

produced the video with me.

Before making this video, I had never thought about what would be next for my daughter regarding service. For example, I’d seen kids wearing the Green Team hats around campus but didn’t know what that was about. I enjoyed being able to zoom out (literally and figuratively) and look at Lower School as a whole. The range of projects—from helping provide food to those in need to sorting household goods to recycling—and the learning that goes on through field trips was inspiring. I really enjoyed interviewing so many students and also talking to Lower School Principal Shereen Beydoun about the programs. I got the sense the kids really understand the importance of what they are doing, both in the moment they are doing it and in the larger scheme of Quaker life.    Jessica Stockton Clancy, parent of Maya Clancy ’24 and Keira Clancy ’28, is founder and producer of Truth in Motion Films.

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Serving Others Adds Up in Middle School

By Ethan Merlin, Middle School Service Learning Clerk

I’m not surprised that I chose a career in math teaching. After all, I created my first math worksheets when I was in elementary school. My 8th grade math teacher asked me to review several possible new algebra textbooks. As my senior project in high school, I taught a unit to a 7th grade math class.

The biggest surprise to me, though, as I have taught math at three schools over the last 12 years, has been how excited I have been to realize that teaching Middle School students isn’t only or

take responsibility for their education as much as achieving new depths of mathematical understanding.

At Sidwell Friends, I’ve been increasingly drawn to exploring the interrelation of intellectual growth and character growth beyond the math classroom. As the clerk of the Middle School’s Faculty Service Learning Committee, I’ve discovered that how students learn from service experiences is strikingly parallel to how they learn in my classroom. Most class periods,

Ultimately, we hope that students steeped continually in service learning will grow into adults who bring their intellectual powers to bear on societal problems, letting their learning and lives speak.

even primarily about teaching math; it’s at least as much about helping students find their place in the world, and learn to be good citizens of their communities. The very structure of math class, with its emphasis on daily practice, teaches students to assess a situation (their mastery of the skills and concepts), address any gaps in their understanding, and continue reassessing as they progress. I love supporting students in learning how to 34

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I pose questions that challenge my students not only to discover new concepts but also to revise some of their prior conceptions. Students grow intellectually when they discover that their old ideas are insufficient for addressing new challenges.

Similarly, when students serve meals in shelters, prepare furniture displays for families in need, read with kids who are struggling in school, or play with children whose parents are in line

at a community health center, their ideas about how the world works are challenged and revised. Seeing some of the ways that our society struggles to honor “That of God” in every person leads students to ask new questions: How should we respond to inequality?

What can I do about injustice? I have seen that regular service experiences help Middle School students not only to ask good questions upon their immediate return to campus, but also to repeatedly and deeply question whether the world they see is as it should be.

As a kid, I knew teachers made worksheets; now, through my work with the Service Learning Committee, my understanding of the interconnectedness of intellectual growth and character growth continues to deepen. Study and activism, I am learning, can form a virtuous cycle, with each leading to and reinforcing the other. Middle School faculty members try to be ever vigilant to keep service tied to learning and vice versa so that each informs the other and so that service is not merely “tacked on” to our academics. Ultimately, we hope that students steeped continually in service learning will grow into adults who bring their intellectual powers to bear on societal problems, letting their learning and lives speak. It’s exciting to be involved in this work at a school that values growing citizens as much as it values teaching students to solve equations.

Hungry to Connect

By Grace Kohn ’18

For a number of years, I was given the honor of working with some of the incredible, bright students at Hearst Elementary School in Washington, DC. On my first visit, I worked in a class with young children with autism. The dedication and love that the teachers put into working with their students was evident from the moment I walked into that classroom.

I shared this room with two other girls from my grade, and we spent the day aiding the teachers and playing with the children. We danced, played with sand, taught them about the alphabet, drew pictures with them, and chased them around the playground.

There is one day in particular that I will never forget because of the connection that I built with one little girl. She was constantly being brought to a health specialist. She was a very picky eater, and she refused to try almost everything. Every day she was brought a specially prepared meal. Her teachers would try to feed her tiny pieces of chicken, which she hated. They never succeeded in getting her to eat any, but I did. Honestly, I’m not quite sure why this is so, but the excitement and the joy that I felt in making an impact on that child’s life, no matter how small, has truly stayed with me.

HELPING THE KIDS NEXT DOOR Mentoring students from underserved communities is a favorite service learning endeavor for Middle Schoolers. Two students, Grace Kohn ’18 and Joey Romansky ’18, are in Upper School now but carry fond memories of the children they bonded with over the course of several years at Hearst Elementary School.

Because I was lucky enough to return several times to Hearst, I was able to build strong bonds with many of the children. Seeing their faces light up with large, luminous grins upon my arrival and knowing that I was brightening their day made their joy infectious.

I was able to learn about more than just the surface details about each child. I learned about their hobbies, their family situations at home, what they aspired to be, who they hoped to become, and little details like what pets they had and what languages they could speak. Sometimes they would even come to me for advice or invite me to their sports games. My experience at Hearst became more than just a service trip. It created another family for me.

The Cool Kids

By Joey Romansky ’18

In 7th and 8th grade, I periodically went to help out at Hearst Elementary School along with some classmates. We had the extreme pleasure of working with the same group of kids each year. We would arrive at the school and immediately be broken up into small groups of about two or three and head to a classroom. I went to a room consisting of a dozen 3rd grade students.

When we walked in, the kids immediately erupted into huge smiles. They thought it was the coolest thing ever that these middle school kids were with them in their classroom.

I distinctly remember one instance where I was helping a girl with some math. They were filling out the 12 by 12 multiplication tables, and I could tell that she was really struggling with it. I sat down with her and tried to help. We got through the first four or five columns quickly, and then it got very challenging for her. She kept asking to check the book of answers so she could simply copy them in. Another classmate of mine and I encouraged her to fill in the table by herself. With a little bit of explaining and help, she did.

When it was completed and her teacher came over to check it, she proudly proclaimed that she had done it with no help from the book. She had a huge smile on her face. Not only did that experience make her feel great, but also it had the same effect on me.

The young students always wanted us to help them with their reading or their math, and they especially were keen to play basketball with us during break. It made me appreciate how cool it must have been for the students to have an older kid take an interest in them.

Through helping these kids and making their day better, it truly made my day a million times better, too.

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: A Long-Range Priority SERVICE LEARNING

By David Connell, Upper School Director of Service Learning Recently, the board of trustees identified service learning as one of the core Long-Range Priorities. At Sidwell Friends School, we define “service learning” as service that occurs in the classroom or as part of the curriculum (as opposed to “community service,” which occurs outside the classroom or curriculum). As a result, service learning often allows work to develop over a longer period, resulting in stronger, deeper relationships and more effective service work.

The focus of the Upper School’s Service Learning Program is to create an environment where long-term personal and institutional relationships can flourish. These relationships exist at the

people with whom we are working. The quality of relationships and community building are as important (if not more important) than the actual work or “service” that is occurring. As a result, it is important to focus on the quality of these relationships in the design of our program.

Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania have shown that service to others is an extremely powerful human motivation. I often hear the words “transformative” or “life changing” from students and parents when describing the effects of these experiences.

Our students will be facing serious environmental, economic, political, and social challenges in their lives.

These challenges will require creative, proactive, interdisciplinary problem solving. As a Quaker school, we should be providing students with the leadership, advocacy, communication, and cultural literacy skills that they need to be effective social change agents.

Recent developments in neuroscience are also showing the benefits of service learning. Through service learning, students process information both cognitively and emotionally. Brain research is beginning to show that students use and develop more of their brains when learning in this way; they also retain the information differently.

This process helps the students attach greater context and meaning to the information that they learn in class.

Observing the effect well-conceived service experiences have had on our students over the past 15 years has shown me that students develop confidence, empathy, and motivation to want to make a difference in their communities. heart of our program, and our students gain the greatest benefits from the service experience when personal and emotional ties can develop between our students and the people that they are working with.

Service learning is a pedagogy that helps our students acquire these skills. It also gives them a real-world understanding of current problems and issues that they need in order to be effective problem solvers.

“Service learning” implies a mutually beneficial relationship—service and learning. Relationships are collaborative and address community needs as determined by these same community members. We usually get as much or more out of our partnerships than the

Observing the effect well-conceived service experiences have had on our students over the past 15 years has shown me that students develop confidence, empathy, and motivation to want to make a difference in their communities. Recent studies at the

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I believe that our School can improve in educating our students around economic and cultural diversity. Often the best way to do this is to get our students interacting with people of different economic and cultural backgrounds. A well-designed service learning program can accomplish this goal. Through service learning, students can integrate various perspectives on the same issue, develop mutual respect, and replace stereotypes with accurate information.

For all of these reasons, I think that service learning is a superior pedagogy in educating our students for the challenges that they will face in the 21st century. I hope that the entire Sidwell Friends School community embraces the board of trustees’ charge to make service learning an integral part of our approach to education in the future.

Two Trips to Appalachia The opportunity for students at Sidwell Friends to fulfill community service requirements by participating in service trips nationally and internationally is one that should not be missed.

Big Creek People in Action is an anti-poverty agency located in Caretta, McDowell County, West Virginia—the sixth-poorest county in the United States. Sidwell Friends students have been traveling here each summer since 2000. My experience at the Appalachian Workcamp taught me not only about the importance of community service, but also about myself and what should be important in life.

REAL LEARNING THROUGH REAL EXPERIENCE I originally decided to go on the trip out of a desire to learn about a culture I knew very little about. At the start of the nine-hour bus trip, I knew only that the main goal was to renovate houses in the greater McDowell community. I had no idea that my whole perspective on the meaning of privilege and the world I lived in would shift. As we pulled into Caretta that first afternoon, I remember thinking that the small town lived up to its poverty ranking. The run-down diner, abandoned buildings, and deserted streets were proof that I was in a place very different from what I knew.

By Kyndall Ashe ’14 We reconstructed the kitchen floor of a low-income family’s house. Despite their modest means, this family treated us with unmatched kindness and generosity. When I went on the trip the next year, we rebuilt the back wall of a house being prepared for resale. Both years, there were several cultural activities in the evening, including community barbecues, tours of coal mines, and performances by local musicians.

Both experiences were eye opening to say the least. They allowed me to strengthen bonds with friends—new and old—while working on projects to help the community.

During Meeting for Worship at the workcamp, I realized that the experience had changed me in a positive way. As I stood to deliver my message, with a beautiful West Virginian starry night as my backdrop, I shared that my time in West Virginia had taught me that helping others can be mutually fulfilling and that caring relationships are what truly matter in life.    Kyndall Ashe ’14 is a freshman at Amherst College, where she enjoys studying math, psychology, and French.

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PHOTO BY MENGESHA GIDAY

Building Better Worlds, Abroad and in Students’ Hearts

By Gaby Grebski, Upper School Counselor Interest in international service trips, especially to developing countries, has skyrocketed, and for many good reasons. In an ever-increasingly global community, I believe exposing high school students to the issues facing the world at large is fundamental to their personal growth and education. However, there is significant controversy over the rise of poverty tourism, as people of means travel to developing countries to observe what “real” poverty looks like before setting off on a safari or zip-line adventure.

Tokenism, or putting forth a perfunctory effort to help a community in need, also is not particularly effective or helpful. I increasingly struggle with these issues and am concerned about the influence this kind of travel has on local communities.

At the same time, the travel I have done with Sidwell Friends students to countries such as Zambia, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Guatemala has been heartwarming and gratifying. There is no doubt that exposing students firsthand to global issues is more powerful and effective than anything they can read in a book, listen to, or watch on a screen.

In organizing and co-leading such trips, I have learned how important it is to be mindful of the needs of a local community, of developing relationships and working closely with its leaders. Finding the appropriate in-country partners is essential to creating an experience that mutually benefits both the local people and our students.

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Opposite: Upper School counselor Gaby Grebski traveled to Debark, Ethiopia, with Sadie Lansdale ’08 to deliver running shoes and clothes to the Simien Girl Runners so that they can continue their training. Through their running, the girls earn scholarships through the Girls Gotta Run Foundation to stay in school and avoid early marriage and childbirth.

The services Sidwell Friends students have provided in their travels have achieved this balance. Along with painting murals, planting vegetable gardens, building furniture, and building bikes to help girls get to school, we have worked in many communities to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS and other health issues.

developing countries by building schools, training teachers, working with parents, and building school libraries. This past year Sidwell Friends students traveled to Guatemala, where they helped build one of these schools in a rural community and provided some much-needed school supplies.

I believe it is imperative to work with an organization within the United States that understands this balance between aid and education. I have been fortunate and privileged to work with several organizations that strive to achieve that balance, such as LearnServe International, Kenya Educational Service Trips (KEST), Girls Gotta Run Foundation, and School the World.

LEARNING THROUGH VOLUNTEERING

HELPING HANDS FROM SOUTHERN AFRICA TO SOUTH AMERICA I have spent several summers in Zambia through LearnServe International, a nonprofit organization based in Washington, DC, that teaches students about social entrepreneurship and organizes service trips to Zambia, Paraguay, and Jamaica. LearnServe Zambia introduces students to an array of issues, including urban and rural poverty, lack of education, lack of access to clean water and transportation, and HIV/AIDS. Through KEST, another DC nonprofit, I have had the opportunity of introducing students to the Nyumbani Children’s Home, an orphanage for HIV+ children, and the Nyumbani Village, a selfsustaining rural community supporting orphaned children and elders left behind by the “lost generation” of the AIDS pandemic.

Most recently, I was involved with School the World, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving education in

How do these four organizations achieve this important balance? For starters, the volunteer work focuses on the universal theme of promoting education.

Additionally, these organizations have an ongoing relationship with their in-country partners for years at a time. For example, School the World remains in communities

to become an HIV counselor in her rural community. Fundraising lasted four years, an investment effort that changed the course of a woman’s life as she was given the resources to find a way to support her family and community.

Such trips affect different students in different ways. The hope is that they will be inspired to become more responsible and engaged global citizens who are empowered to make real change. To that end, it has been heartwarming to see some students wrestle with the realities they witness. Some choose a path in development work or major in international studies in college. Others have continued to raise awareness of

Along with painting murals, planting vegetable gardens, building furniture, and building bikes to help girls get to school, we have worked in many communities to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS and other health issues.

for up to five years to ensure that the schools they build become viable centers of learning.

LearnServe Zambia and KEST are especially insistent that participants continue their efforts to support the people with whom they work. Taking this to heart, Sidwell Friends students who traveled to Zambia devised an action plan in which they raised money to pay the tuition fees for a Zambian teacher

such issues as AIDS and women’s rights.

Seeing students struggle to find their role in the bigger picture, and being a force of encouragement to help them develop their own ideas about global citizenship, makes the work and inevitable challenges that come from planning these trips meaningful and worthwhile.

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From left: Akilah Institute co-founder Elizabeth DearbornHughes, Naomi Weiner ’15, and Nadine Niyitegeka, who graduated from and now works at Akilah, earning a salary that supports her, her mother, and three siblings.

Rwanda: Shattering Stereotypes When I told friends that I’d be flying to Rwanda by myself to spend my summer in Kigali, they asked if I would be safe, connected to Wi-Fi, or living in a hut.

Even though I’ve been trying to change my friends’ stereotyping of Africa for several years, they still see Africa as an impoverished “country” notable only for its need for Western aid. To many peoples’ surprise, I was neither living in a hut nor walking three miles every day for clean water. Rather, I worked for five weeks at the Akilah Institute for Women, East Africa’s only accredited women’s college.

A JOURNEY TO WITNESS REBUILDING In 10th grade, I took a class called “20th- Century Africa” taught by Shields Sundberg. I wrote a paper for the class about Rwanda’s economic turnaround since the genocide, challenging the all-too-common notion that Rwanda’s transformation to one of Africa’s fastestgrowing economies was a “miracle.”

Instead, I found that the nation’s ethnic groups had worked to put an end to decades of conflict so they could build a 40

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By Naomi Weiner ’15

shared future implementing world-class economic policies.

French, the students welcomed me to their country and even into their homes.

I decided that I had to find a way to travel to Rwanda to witness the changes about which I had written. I found out about Akilah from a web search and learned about its incredible results educating hundreds of Rwandan women, most of whom are the first in their families to go to college. I went to an event where I met the founder and eventually asked her about the possibility of interning there. I convinced my parents, and a few months later I boarded my flight to Rwanda.

One of the first things I noticed in Kigali was how welcoming and friendly the people were, characteristics not immediately associated with the people of a country just 20 years out of genocide.

Kigali is also incredibly clean; it’s cleaner than areas near where I live. Shattering yet another stereotype, crime rates are extremely low in Rwanda, and I felt safer walking down the dirt path back to my house at night than I do in downtown D.C.

A THRIVING COMMUNITY At Akilah, I worked with college-aged women and helped them develop their English skills. I loved being the youngest person on campus, because the students didn’t treat me as their elder or superior, nor as a “muzungu”—their word for the stereotypical hapless, privileged Westerner oblivious to African reality. Although we had some trouble communicating perfectly in English or

What impressed me most was the process of unification and reconciliation. I saw tremendous civic pride, new schools, and a very bright future built on vision and determination, not on “miracles.”

By witnessing for myself the vitality of a country I once knew only in books, I validated my still-unconventional belief that a Rwandan model of development could change the face of Africa in my lifetime. After five weeks, I didn’t want to leave Rwanda, and I hope to be back soon.

First Learning, Then Leading Natalie Vicas ’12 I chose to go to Zambia for service twice.

The first time was because I had traveled to Zambia before with my family, and thought this trip offered a unique opportunity to gain an introduction to humanitarian aid and to meet new people.

The trip sounded like a different approach to international service, and I was excited to get to know Zambia in a new light. This trip seemed to perfectly balance service and sight-seeing in a way that would paint an accurate picture of the country.

I met amazing people who broadened my view of the world and fostered my love of Africa that still follows me today. I was able to spend more time learning about different organizations and initiatives enacting change there. I learned that there’s a balancing act to how effective international aid is and how much organizations can accomplish. It is imperative to educate students through programs like LearnServe to teach high school students about other cultures and what they can do to help.

I decided to return as an assistant co-leader to gain a new, administrative perspective—I wanted to learn what it was like to lead and organize a trip like this and how nonprofit management worked. I now know how much work goes into budgeting, organizing, and keeping the trip fun and safe for students.    Natalie Vicas ’12 is majoring in international studies with a minor in economics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.

From left: Destiny Franklin ’13, Natalie Vicas ’12, history teacher and trip leader Gaby Grebski, Jane Lipscomb ’16, Julia Benson ’14, Kaoru Yamakazi ’15, Camilla Collingsworth ’15, and Lauren Berkman ’15

Echoes of Zambia Attending Sidwell Friends was an eyeopening experience for me, one that forced me to step out of my comfort zone.

I was the only student from my parochial elementary school to attend Sidwell Friends, I knew only a handful of students, and the whole Quaker environment was foreign territory. The unique, interactive relationship between the administration and student body and the engaged, curious, and globally oriented student population were novelties. However, the large words written along the hallways— Justice, Community, Stewardship, Peace—were values I related to. I had traveled outside of the United States only once and had the acute sense that I had stepped outside of a bubble. I applied to the LearnServe program primarily for an intercultural service experience driven by my curiosity to travel, learn more about another culture, and experience something distinctly foreign.

During one of my first LearnServe orientations, a former volunteer spoke to the newest LearnServe class, saying that you cannot simply open your mind to different experiences, but you also must open your heart. I left the auditorium thinking about those words, with no idea what they meant.

But the words could not have been more accurate. LearnServe was more

By Elizabeth Cunningham ’12

than just a cultural service experience for me. I learned more than I could have imagined during my three weeks in Zambia. I learned how to open my heart.

I learned the importance of establishing a connection with people despite wildly different life experiences. More important, I realized that the established and continued connection between LearnServe and the communities would last far longer than three weeks.

In Zambia, we worked with organizations dedicated to public health issues, education, micro-finance, clean water, and intercultural communications. We worked with a few different schools, including the Chickumbuso Orphanage, the Malambo School (a rural farm school with limited resources), and the David Kaunda local high school in Lusaka, the capital. I also had the opportunity to work with World Bicycle Relief to build bicycles and deliver them to a local village during a ceremony the following day. We organized field days, painted class rooms, and taught English and math.

We spent about two or three days with each community, which allowed students to form relationships with the local Zambian students and surrounding communities.

After I came home, the lingering effects of my experience were not lost on me. I knew

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I wasn’t going to change the world in three weeks; I also knew that I wasn’t going to return to the United States a completely different person. But I began to see little changes take root. My experience in Zambia influenced the classes I took, my extracurricular activities, the things I cared about, my perspective on certain issues, and my college search.

Part of LearnServe’s program to Zambia includes a long-term action plan to maintain connection and empower students to solve problems and take initiative. One of LearnServe’s mottos is, “The world is big—think small.” The Sidwell Friends team decided to continue a project from our trip—to raise money to fund a beloved teacher, Loveness, through graduate school. Throughout the year we held bake sales, sold donuts, and set up homecoming booths. It was in continuing this action plan that I realized my experience was not over, and I didn’t want it to be. I wanted more of a connection than simply raising money. I wanted to go back and see Loveness and see what good the money was doing for her. So I returned to Zambia as an assistant co-leader.

FALLING WATER, RISING CONNECTIONS During my first trip to Zambia, one of the tour guides at Victoria Falls said that once you feel the mist of the falls, you will always want to come back. While Victoria Falls is one of the most beautiful places, I cannot say it was the mist that brought me back. For me, the most important part of my experience was the relationships that we formed, both with organizations and people. We established lasting connections.

Now, about five years after my first trip to Zambia, I still see how my experience has guided my choices, such as my college major, course selection, and internship search.    Elizabeth Cunningham ’12 is in her junior year at Georgetown University majoring in government and Spanish. She spent the fall studying political science at the University of Buenos Aires.

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Liz Cunningham ’12 working with students at the Malambu School in Monze, Zambia. Says trip leader Gaby Grebski: “The headmaster asked us to introduce the children to a typical American meal. So we made pancakes. We also had a science teacher on the trip who helped lead a hands-on lesson about electricity [top photo].”

From Carrots to Katrina Lifer and Sidwell Friends Assistant Director of Admissions Allie Levey ’05 traces his service learning footsteps with students in New Orleans.

In 1991, in the Sidwell Friends Lower School’s “Middle Room,” I was one of many cheerful 4- to 6-year-olds chopping carrots and celery for our weekly soup submission to Martha’s Table.

My teachers supervised the tables, ensuring we were properly chopping vegetables and using our tiny knives with caution.

The activity was not without value-based instruction. My kindergarten teachers outlined the mission of our work and the importance of giving back to others. I like to think that, even at that early age, we students internalized these values.

A SCION AT SCI Nineteen years later, I accepted the position of inaugural director of college counseling at Sci Academy, an open-enrollment public charter school in New Orleans’s Ninth Ward. Sci Academy’s average student came into 9th grade reading at a 4th-grade level.

Ninety percent were living at or below the poverty line. Ninety percent would be the first in their family to attend college.

The school believed in a set of core values, and lessons and activities were carefully aligned to them. Students getting off the bus were greeted by principal and founder Benjamin Marcovitz with a firm handshake and a smile. They proceeded to their homerooms, where advisors met them and asked, “Why are you here?” The students replied, “To learn.”

Then the advisor would ask, “What will it take?” The students responded with, “Achievement, respect, responsibility, perseverance, teamwork, enthusiasm.”

School. I noticed the language that the teachers used in their lessons. The teachers were delivering the same messages they did when I was a student.

In the spring of 2014, David Connell invited me to attend the New Orleans Quaker Workcamp, an annual service trip planned in conjunction with the William Penn House of Washington, DC. I asked if we could bring these students to Sci Academy. I was eager to see how the Sidwell Friends students would respond to the stark contrast in privilege and classroom environment.

In March, we arrived at the Sci Academy campus, a collection of modular classrooms in an area of New Orleans that had been swallowed by nearly nine feet of water during Hurricane Katrina. Our students engaged in a host of activities from campus improvement to tutoring. The most popular was what they deemed “cultural observation.”

I led five students into a classroom, where Ben Ifshin ’05 stood at the board. Ben cold-called students on the phases of mitosis.

The first student was unprepared, but stuck with it. Several students wiggled their fingers to send positive waves of support

Our students engaged in a host of activities from campus improvement to tutoring.

Students received daily reports on how they had performed in accordance with these values on the previous day. They would see a note from their math teacher saying that they had exhibited great teamwork, or a note that they had not shown perseverance when they had put their heads down during an assigned reading period. These reminders were aligned with a system I had internalized from my own school days: your actions are the message. In other words, let your life speak.

During my two years at Sci Academy, I helped 94 percent of students enroll at four-year universities. The first class of 50 students earned nearly one million dollars in merit-based aid. Sci Academy did not believe in excuses, only hard work.

HELPING HANDS IN NOLA In August 2013, I returned to Sidwell Friends as the assistant director of admissions and financial aid for the Upper School.

Each day I came face-to-face with the policies that guide the

to their classmate. The resulting answer was close, but not deadon. Another student refined the response, and all the students snapped their fingers to indicate agreement and appreciation.

The Sidwell Friends students in the back of the class beamed.

They began snapping along.

Later, in a group discussion, the Sidwell Friends students discussed their desire to show more support for their own classmates. They raved about the impact that overt actions of affirmation can have on a community’s spirit.

“WE’RE NEVER DONE” My favorite Sci Academy motto was, “We’re never done, and we’re never finished.” At Sidwell Friends, students are able to grow alongside peers with different talents and passions.

As I help shape future classes at Sidwell Friends through the admissions process, I intend to identify the desire to consider and serve others as a key piece of the fit for prospective applicants.

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THE “LET YOUR LIFE SPEAK” SURVEY:

Sidwell Friends Alumni Speak Out

By Clint Wilkins

Everywhere I turned, there were Sidwell Friends alumni changing the world.

I ran into Jonathan Schorr ’86. He was starting a new kind of school with a handful of other enterprising young educators (he’s now with the U.S. Department of Education). . . . I visited with Eric Adler ’82, who had recently opened the nation’s first charter boarding school in DC. . . .

At the Skoll World Forum in Oxford, I ran into Phil Auerswald ’83, who had just published the first edition of Innovations, a cutting-edge journal out of George Mason University. . . .

I cheered on our former babysitter, Bill Strathmann ’85, as he created the charitable giving site Network for Good. . . . I was inspired by the work of Davis Guggenheim ’82 in An Inconvenient Truth, a rallying cry to heed the science behind global warming. . . .

During my 12 years (1975–1987) at Sidwell Friends, I got to know a truly remarkable group of young people through my roles as history teacher and lacrosse coach, and then Upper School dean of students and principal. After leaving, I’ve followed the careers of many of them as they have become change agents, educational leaders, and social entrepreneurs.

I often wondered why so many Sidwell Friends alumni choose this path in life. What sparks the passion, the initiative, and the drive of so many to dream big and take the kind of risks to start new organizations and initiatives? Is it through Quaker values?

Is it due to powerful role models? Was there something “in the water?” I was determined to find the answer.

So, two years ago I embarked on my own journey to understand this inclination.

With the School’s support, I met formally with alumni, both individually and in groups on both coasts. I gathered a mountain of qualitative and quantitative data through what we called the “Let Your Life Speak Survey” sent to all alumni in the fall of 2013. And, I received much needed perspective and guidance from an astute alumni advisory committee.

I had built a career around encouraging teenagers to give voice to their innate sense of idealism in making their school communities more just and fair, not only because it inevitably results in a more responsive and vibrant school culture, but also because it is this idealism, once encouraged, that becomes the very fuel that sustains us through adulthood as responsible, even innovative citizens. By more formally engaging Sidwell Friends alumni, I could learn where their own need to bring about change came from and share my findings with the larger community of educators nationwide.

What’s this phenomenon all about?

What’s happening at Sidwell Friends? I had to know.

Clint Wilkins (left) is now launching his “encore career” creating innovative social and emotional programs for schools and youth organizations through his new initiative, enCourage, which instills in young people the skills and confidence to be effective change-makers.

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A Shift in Perspective THE RESULTS ARE IN… The survey results were most encouraging, and the 630 respondents were enough to ensure “statistical significance.” We were inspired by the care that respondents took in addressing the narrative topics. And the evenly distributed responses from each decade, going back to the ’50s and ’60s, only added to their validity.

As I delved deeper into the data, I became more and more impressed.

Whatever their current stage in life, Sidwell Friends alumni seem to carry with them throughout their lives a diversity of experiences from their years on campus. Among the influences are the power of Quaker values, the intellectual dynamism in the classroom, inspiring mentors, and the influential interactions students had with each other—what I often call “positive peer pressure.” (In addition, my hunch about giving students a voice in the community also seemed to be holding up.)

As I further reflected on the survey results, a prescient query made months before by Anne Popkin ’83 (see box, top right) came to mind, for it was she who initially shifted my perspective from focusing solely on a handful of prominent alumni to embracing a much larger cohort. For every social entrepreneur who had first caught my eye, there were many more alumni who are putting their core values into action on a daily basis—leading lives of service and social change through their families, in their communities and in the way they run their businesses.

Now we have the evidence. For them, there is no better way to capture that evocative Quaker adage, “Let Your Life Speak.”

I held a session during Reunion Weekend in 2013 in which reflections and perceptions about what Sidwell Friends alumni do in life were shared. Anne Popkin ’83, president of Symphony Asset Management in San Francisco, had an important query. “Of course Sidwell Friends alumni are engaged in social change, but aren’t we looking at it through a rather narrow lens? Isn’t there more to social change than prominent social entrepreneurs? Isn’t positive change effected in corporations and organizations of all kinds? Running my business is a life of service, putting into practice a value system that affects everything we do. I’m constantly asking, ‘Am I being fair and equitable? Do we have enough diversity? Do we treat each other with mutual respect? That’s positive change.’”

At that point, my journey just got a lot more interesting, a lot more nuanced, and a lot more universal.

THE JOURNEY CONTINUES There is much about a Sidwell Friends education that is unique. In particular, students are supported by a rich mix of community leaders and other accomplished individuals who embrace public service and social innovation.

But that doesn’t mean that certain aspects of a Sidwell Friends education can’t be transported.

Here are a just a few examples mined from the survey data: • Values matter, especially if they are authentic to students, staff, and parents alike.

• Academic excellence and diversity are natural allies, especially if you give students a meaningful voice in their school as a community.

• Moments of quiet reflection are increasingly essential in our information-cluttered world. Such moments need to be woven into the routines of any school anywhere, whether public, independent, or religious.

I do hope that the School will be able to share the powerful stories of alumni

making positive change. These stories are begging to be told. And that’s not just me talking: 84 percent of survey takers said they want to hear them!

[Shameless plug: please e-mail yours to alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu.— Ed.] Furthermore, I would even go so far as to say that the School has an obligation to share this work that has the ability to connect and inspire others.

Finally, here’s some “friendly advice” to the School from alumni on what’s most important for the students of today to become the change makers of tomorrow.

They would like to see students: • Continue to get into the community to serve others through hands-on experiences; • Learn from different cultures in deep and meaningful ways; • Become more aware of their own privilege and the responsibilities that come with it; • Deepen such inner qualities as humility, empathy, compassion, and mindfulness.

I can’t think of a better way to capture the essence of my two-year journey.

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thirty red and d n u h Six ok the ants to particip ords w ; their survey with s e 0 pag 5 2 d e fill ments. ful com t h g u o th

In Your Own Words SIDWELL FRIENDS ALUMNI BELIEVE IN GIVING BACK TO THEIR COMMUNITIES.

Survey respondents indicated that the following are “extremely” or “very important” in their own life:

Serving others within your business or organization

70%

Serving the community and the economy through socially responsible business practices

69%

Choice of a career in public service, social change, or social innovation

63% 69%

63%

59%

53%

Volunteering

73%

49%

Advocacy

I believe that at Sidwell Friends we were all given a chance to have a voice, and to nurture and come to value that voice.

Sidwell Friends and my parents, who were of like mind, made sure I understood that ‘you are what you do.’

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73%

‘Let your life speak’ to me means… taking an active role, identifying those areas where I can make a difference, and following through by working individually and with others to make the change and ensure that it sticks.

Sidwell Friends provided us with many examples of people who made personal sacrifices for the benefit of others, and many of them did it as an act of love. These were people who took action much more than they talked about taking action. They were our teachers.

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69%

47%

Philanthropy

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Survey respondents indicated that fellow alumni are “extremely inclined” or “very inclined” to the following activities:

ALUMNI ADVISORY COMMITTEE Many thanks to the alumni advisory committee, without whom none of this would be possible.

Eric Adler ’82 Phil Auerswald ’83 Anne Popkin ’83 Geoff Smith ’77 Matthew Wheelock ’88 Betsy Zeidman ’76

SERVICE LEARNING FOR GROWN-UPS

Alumni Find Meaning through Nonprofits During morning carpool or a close-the-deal meeting, in a homeless shelter or the halls of Congress, as a volunteer or a nine-to-five (-six, -seven, -eight) employee, the opportunities to “let your life speak” are limitless. Most Sidwell Friends alumni first began helping the larger world outside their own through the School’s service learning opportunities; for many, their way of doing this as adults is by working for or with a nonprofit organization (or even starting one). And whether they’re holding a hand, writing a grant, chairing a board, or saving a stray, they’re effecting change—and finding themselves changed in the process.

Alumni Magazine surveyed alumni who are affiliated with nonprofits and asked them to talk about why they’re passionate about giving their time and talents to a particular cause. Some respondents were interviewed by a classmate—after all, who better to find out what motivates you than someone who was by your side for the first veggie chopping or all those Meetings for Worship? Other alumni were asked for an example of the impact their work (or their organization’s) has made.

Their answers are as inspiring as the nonprofits they stand behind.

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THE BRENT BISHOP COLLECTION

JOLENE HOLLISTER, GUIDING EYES FOR THE BLIND.

AMY THALER ’82 Organization: Guiding Eyes for the Blind, Guide Dogs of America, and Royal New Zealand Foundation for the Blind City Location: Bethesda, MD Mission: To provide service dogs to families with a visually impaired or autistic member.

Role: Puppy raiser Why I love what I do: I have been raising guide dog puppies for nearly 20 years. I’ve raised 11 dogs for three schools in two countries. The gift of independence that I contribute to is incredible. It feeds my soul and changes someone’s life for the better. It doesn’t hurt that I love dogs. Twelve years at Sidwell Friends absolutely influenced my need to give.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I volunteered at the Gay Men’s VD Clinic in the very early ’80s. It left a valuable and indelible mark.

My impact: When I took a blindfolded walk with one of my dogs, I truly understood the incredible gift of independence I was contributing to. I had attended many graduations and had listened to the graduates’ stories about the impact their guide dogs had made on their lives, but I didn’t fully understand until I (literally) walked a mile in their shoes.

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HIGH ON THE ENVIRONMENT Brent Bishop ’84 | By Willie Brent ’83 Just as we did in the halls of Sidwell Friends in the early 1980s, to this day we still holler, “Willie Brent Bishop!!” at each other whenever we connect. After Sidwell Friends, not only our names merged but our worlds as we are both international wanderers. Our families got to spend eight years reconnecting in the Puget Sound area.

Brent followed in the footsteps of his late, legendary father, Barry Bishop, to become the first American legacy to summit Mt. Everest. He is the recipient of the American Alpine Club’s David Brower Award for Environmental Achievement (in large part due to his efforts to clean up trash left on Mt. Everest by climbers) and the Explorers Club’s Lowell Thomas award for exploration.

Mt. Everest summiteer meets waste management—please explain.

I climbed Everest twice, in 1994 and most recently in 2002 as part of a National Geographic expedition to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first summit. On the 1994 climb, I witnessed firsthand how much garbage had been generated by climbers in that half century. I realized I could put energy into a bit more than my selfcentered pursuit and orchestrated the cleanup of more than 25,000 pounds of trash on the mountain over a sevenyear period through an organization I founded called the Sagarmatha Environmental Expedition (Sagarmatha is what the Nepalese call Everest and means “Forehead of the Sky”). Now the mountain looks clean. The awareness created by Sagarmatha helped ensure that it’s now standard practice to “pack in, pack out.”

Sidwell Friends did an amazing job of creating awareness in me about the concept of “being of service,” and of instilling a sense that we all have a responsibility to make a change wherever we can. The world is more than the ego and the id. It’s just not that hard to roll up your sleeves and give back; even if it is only a small amount, it adds up and can make a difference.

How do you volunteer these days?

I still am focused on climbing, and volunteer on a regular basis. I help guide wounded veterans on climbs for Paradox Sports, and I serve on the board for Nature Bridge and its Olympic Park Campus, an organization that connects kids to the environment through science curriculum. I lecture to classrooms on environmental issues and the need to get our kids outside and away from Gameboy and PlayStation. I really believe that if we don’t connect kids to the natural world, they are not going to care about it, and if that happens,

nobody is going to be around to protect it in the future.

Is there a way for nonprofits and for-profits to work together to amplify impact?

I think markets can’t be ignored when addressing the question of sustainability. That belief informed my decision to get degrees in both environment and business administration. A good example is a startup company I’m working with now called Jadora which is preventing deforestation (the biggest worldwide cause of carbon emissions) through REDD+ stewardship programs in the Congo. (REDD stands for Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation.) Functioning as almost a nonprofit within Jadora is the Isangi Project, which helps local communities construct fish ponds that produce a sustainable source of protein to reduce demand for bushmeat, as well as grow cacao and coffee in degraded farmland to reduce the need for carbonemitting slash-and-burn practices.

It’s a nice mix of community capacity building and making carbon markets stronger.

Willie Brent shares Brent Bishop’s love of “the wild” and of “using human ingenuity to combat human stupidity.”

After 15 years living in China as a journalist and entrepreneur, Willie spent the last 10 years running a “clean technology” and renewable energy group at the international marketing agency IPG. He is currently living in Granada, Spain, for an “adult gap year”—taking a chance with wife Jocelyn to hang with their two sons, Theo and Elliot, “before they enter teenage wasteland.”

NICK COLIN ’00 Organization: Heal the Bay Location: Santa Monica, CA Mission: To use science, policy, education, and advocacy to restore Santa Monica Bay and Southern California watersheds to health and productivity.

Role: Communications manager Why I love what I do: I can see tangible, measurable results from our work in healthier, cleaner Southern California waters.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: Launching the afterschool enrichment program at Ruth K. Webb Elementary school.

My impact: I’m proud that Heal the Bay fought and won the battle against single-use plastic bags in Los Angeles.

Our successful local advocacy imbued the statewide bag ban bill with the clout and legitimacy it needed to pass the state senate in August. Now, California is the first with a statewide bag ban. Pretty cool!

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PHOTO BY MARK REGAN PHOTOGRAPHY

NO DOUBTING HER ABILITIES Ann Barnes Deschamps ’80 | By David Barnes ’80 Ann and I are Irish twins, born less than a year apart. I started at Sidwell Friends in 1st grade, and when Ann joined me three years later, we became classmates. Despite locker proximity and resentment over domestic chores, we managed to survive sibling rivalries, and although we followed different paths, we both ended up working in education.

Ann is senior research associate at TransCen, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving educational and career outcomes for people with disabilities. She has also won the Outstanding Beginning Runners Program Award from the Road Runners Club of America for creating the Reston Runners’ Women’s Training Program; later, Reston Runners named their annual women’s mentorship award after her.

You talk about “transition” a lot. What does that mean in your work?

It means helping young people who have various kinds of disabilities move from school into the workforce or other fulfilling activities. For example, I’m now working on a pioneering initiative called Maryland Promise, a federally funded project to study the outcomes of employment interventions that we developed for teens ages 14 to 16 who are receiving federal disability benefits. It’s the culmination of years of research, and it could become a model for the whole country. It’s incredibly exciting!

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Did growing up with a learning disability influence your career choice?

Absolutely. I never felt that I was smart, because I repeated 4th grade and was surrounded by academically clever people. It’s as if my own personal strengths were being drowned out by everything around me. It took me a very long time to realize that I really was smart in my own way—people skills, leadership, communication. When I did, I felt that nobody should have to go through that kind of extreme self-doubt. If I could help kids with disabilities realize how capable they are, then that was what I would do with my career. When I stumbled on the whole field of transition, it fit perfectly with my mission.

What were the highlights of your professional training?

One was being present for the signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990. I was working on my doctorate in special education when the legislation was going through Congress. I was working on one of the first transition projects funded by an older disabilities law. This new legislation intersected with my work, and I was at George Washington University so I was able to go to the Hill and follow the ADA. Being on the White House lawn for the signing was a life-changing experience for me—like being there for the signing of the Civil Rights Act or for the March on Washington!

What would you hope for as your legacy?

I would love to see a day when disability is just another diversity, and think that I made a difference for people who didn’t think they could do it for themselves but were encouraged to do things that everyone else takes for granted.

David Barnes ’80 teaches the history of medicine and public health at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of The Making of a Social Disease: Tuberculosis in Nineteenth-Century France and The Great Stink of Paris and the Nineteenth-Century Struggle Against Filth and Germs. Currently he is writing a history of, and working to restore and preserve, the 19th-century Lazaretto quarantine station on the Delaware River outside Philadelphia.

PHOTO BY TIMOTHY JOHNSON

Were there any experiences at Sidwell Friends that hinted at what you would become later on?

In Middle School, I tutored younger students and really enjoyed it. I always liked taking on helping roles, like being a “big sister” for new students. In high school, I volunteered for a suicide prevention hotline. That was huge: you had to go through training and actually deal with life-and-death situations. I loved it, and at that point I knew that I would go into a field like teaching or counseling.

Paul with Rosie Allen-Herring, CEO of the United Way of the National Capital Area

PAUL THORNELL ’90 Organization: United Way of the National Capital Area Location: Washington, DC Mission: To give individuals and families the opportunity to reach their potential and improve their quality of life.

Role: Board member Why I love what I do: I helped get community leaders from around the country excited about embracing a strategy and skills set—public policy and advocacy—that has been a central part of my career for 20 years.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: During my junior year, I helped disabled athletes at the Achilles Track Club. I have a deep commitment to incorporating service into my life, through volunteerism or serving on boards or working at nonprofits, because it was a common thread throughout so much of Sidwell Friends in a way that did not make it a big deal or a special undertaking, but rather the norm and a very basic expectation of myself. For me, the School helped make the extraordinary ordinary and taught that working or supporting a cause through service should be a core part of life.

My impact: A high point was when thenSenators Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Elizabeth Dole (R-NC) joined with United Way leaders from across the country (among them United Way Board Member George Clooney) to introduce bipartisan legislation creating nationwide access to the social service hotline 2-1-1.

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PHOTO BY GENE SORKIN

FINDING MEANING AMONG THE MAYA Laura Wheelock ’86 | By KK Ottesen ’89 When I entered Upper School as a freshman, Laura Wheelock was a confident senior who ran cross-country with my sister, Andrea Ottesen ’87. Naturally, I was afraid of her, never expecting that one day she’d be my sister-in-law and good friend.

GREG BERMAN ’85 Organization: Center for Court Innovation Location: New York, NY Mission: To reduce crime and incarceration.

Role: Executive director Why I love what I do: It combines doing and thinking, action and reflection.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I served as a docent in the Discovery Room at the Museum of Natural History.

My impact: New York City is a dramatically safer city than it was 20 years ago; however, less remarked is the fact that the city has achieved this while reducing the use of incarceration. My agency provides alternatives to thousands of defendants. Last year, our Red Hook Community Justice Center reduced both re-offending and the use of jails in southwest Brooklyn, while at the same time improving public trust in justice. Now we are looking to replicate this in the city’s most violent community, Brownsville.

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Laura is the co-founder and co-director (with Markus Naugle) of Magic Carpet Rides, a nonprofit organization based in Eastsound, Washington, that empowers cross-cultural understanding through creating opportunities for cultural immersion and community service in Guatemala. MCR connects travelers of all ages eager for meaningful service with the families living in a Mayan pueblo in Guatemala.

Program participants range from gap-year students to families with adopted Guatemalan children looking to understand their heritage.

Stepping way back, when did you begin your community-focused work?

Straight out of Stanford, I had an incredible opportunity to develop the volunteer program for Oracle. It was exciting to have the space to create the vision; I could experiment and see what worked well, and what didn’t. I found that two things were very important. One was to individualize the experience so that it was a good match for both the employee and the community. And the other was to create a group environment so that it wasn’t so foreign for people to all of a sudden step out of their beautiful corporate headquarters into, say, a soup kitchen in the Tenderloin in San Francisco, where they served food to homeless people, many of whom had mental illness or drug addictions. That can be unnerving for people who haven’t had that kind of exposure. It helped to have them work in a team.

And with Magic Carpet Rides, we continue to serve as a bridge between cultures.

Participants live in the pueblo with home-stay families and volunteer with the local people so they have the opportunity to be immersed, and often totally out of their comfort zones. When you have a well-defined, well-executed volunteer project where both the community and the participants can see the results of their work, it’s very satisfying to all people involved; you can see that transformation as both parties grow through the exchange. We believe that there is no substitute for rubbing against the skin of our human mosaic to foster the oneness that unites our global family.

You’ve gravitated, it seems, to more entrepreneurial settings for your service work. Is that intentional, a personality trait, a love of challenge—what is that?

It’s madness, probably!

Right! So are there times you’ve said, Why don’t I get some cushy job?

Of course! Starting Oracle Volunteers, running a fledgling NGO with a staff comprised of ladino and indigenous Guatemalans working to protect Lake Atitlan, and founding Magic Carpet Rides have been challenging, for sure. But everything has been filled with growth for me as a person. There’s never been a dull day on the job in any of these positions. And to be able to learn and grow and adapt has been

PHOTO BY LAWRENCE TAUBMAN

incredibly satisfying. It hasn’t had the financial rewards of a more established career path, but it certainly has had profound personal rewards.

Does it make dull look glamorous sometimes?

Yes—absolutely! But, you know—I was reflecting on this recently—Tikal, home to the incredible ruins of an ancient Mayan kingdom, means “place of spirit voices.”

And there’s something about coming to this magical country with its many different languages—23 indigenous languages, Spanish, and the spirit voices in Tikal—and even though you don’t speak them all, in working with the people your deeds are speaking and your life is speaking. You discover your own authentic voice through this mélange.

Laura Wheelock ’86 (far right) with host family members (foreground, left to right) Thelma Mendoza, Karol Ujpan, Raquel Ujpan, and Graciela Mendoza. Rear: Loretta Horowitz and Markus Naugle

KK Ottesen ’89 is the author of Great Americans (Bloomsbury 2003), a documentary look at life across the country, and is a freelance photographer and writer whose work has appeared in the Washington Post Magazine, Washingtonian, Esquire, and other publications. She lives on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, with her husband, Matthew Wheelock ’88, and their two young children.

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PHOTO BY VICTOR L. BURT

Dax-Devlin with All-Star Cory Trader

STAYING AFTER SCHOOL Dax-Devlon Ross ’93 | By Peter Sisitsky ’93 Dax and I were basketball teammates and friends, bonding on and off the court in our six shared years at Sidwell Friends.

Together, we had way more fun than we were supposed to throughout our senior projects.

In addition to being an author, journalist, and commentator, Dax is executive director of After-School All-Stars of New York and New Jersey, which provides comprehensive after-school programs that keep children safe and help them succeed in school and life.

How did Sidwell Friends influence your career decisions, and do you think it had an influence on your choosing to take this role?

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work is, who does valuable work, what it means to be rewarded by your work. I think going to a school in which I could relate to my teachers as peers (or at least as close to peers as I could at such a young age) gave me an understanding and appreciation for what can happen when you treat a child as if that child is a member of the community and not just someone you direct and boss around.

Especially in Middle School, these people I knew by first name—teachers Benj [Thomas], Rick [Honn], and Ellen [Lawsky]—interacted with me in a mature way. I felt like I had a say-so over my education. I felt my voice actually mattered. At a lot of the schools that I work in, that’s not really the case.

How did After-School All-Stars become important to you?

When I grew up, I had many afterschool options. I had coaches, I had

mentors, I had teammates, I had relationships, and those things were huge. These kids didn’t. So when I got introduced to the mission, I started to understand what it meant for me and what it can mean for these young people if I’m able to provide really highquality, innovative, entrepreneurial experience for them that can support what they’re getting in their school, but that also could be the thing that is the difference-maker.

When you first started out after high school, would you have envisioned being in this role now?

I felt an altruistic impulse—a desire to give of myself and of my time, and to also acknowledge what I had gotten. I had felt privileged, and I had big guilt around that for a long time. It sent me on that journey to figure out how I could really make an impact given what I had experienced. For a long time, I didn’t want to run anything, I didn’t want to lead anything, I didn’t want to start anything. So in that sense, it does kind

PHOTO BY BERNARD FALKIN

of surprise me. I really said to myself: deeply give yourself to something, to an organization, to people, to children, to the work that you’re doing. Just deliver yourself to that and see what happens.

So many students could benefit from the work you and your organization can do. Is there frustration you can’t reach everybody?

Our objective as an organization is not to be the biggest, that’s missing the point.

I think ultimately it’s about having deep impacts, ultimately maybe staying smaller but being strong. I also think there is capacity to grow. But I’m not in this business to be the largest player on the block. I’m just in it to be the best.

Is this your life’s calling?

There’s still more that I want to do in this world. I’m still evolving. Will I always be doing work that is an extension of my experiences as a young person?

Probably. It’s going to always be grounded in how we are creating the world for the next generation.

EVELYN BROWN ’68 Organization: Operation Gratitude

Peter Sisitsky ’93 lives in Rye, New York, with his wife, Aviva, and children Kyle (8), Summer (6), and Cole (3). After attending Dartmouth College and Harvard Business School, he is now a partner at Stonehill Capital, a hedge fund in New York City. He is becoming increasingly involved in Dax’s organization. In addition, he and Aviva sponsor a “twinned” team of Jewish and Palestinian youthwho play basketball together in Jerusalem with a nonprofit called PeacePlayers. The team is named after two of his basketball coaches at Sidwell Friends, Mike Jones and George Leftwich.

Location: Encino, CA Mission: To boost morale of deployed troops, wounded soldiers, veterans, caregivers, and other first responders by delivering care packages to them.

Role: Photographer and speaker at functions Why I love what I do: It’s an economically efficient organization, the people are great, the cause is relevant, and I get to do photography.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: Working summer camp at Camp Shriver. Who knew then that it would grow up to be Special Olympics! I met wonderful folks from the other area private schools and felt deeply rewarded when the parents of the campers told me about the positive impact I had on their children’s lives. I also had several wonderful tea and cookie breaks with Rose Kennedy, who had a lot of wisdom to share!

My impact: Last December, Operation Gratitude packed and shipped its millionth package! I knew that this milestone was special not only for the troops who receive the packages, but for each and every volunteer who worked to put them together over 10 years. As the Blue Shirts (long-invested volunteers) formed the fire-brigade line to get that momentous package from the assembly line to the stage ready for delivery, we were all in tears.

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PHOTO BY MATTHEW STRAUSS PHOTOGRAPHY

MAKE-A-WISH ARIZONA

FOLLOWING AND SETTING EXAMPLES Elizabeth Rhodes Reich ’71 | By Mary Reyner ’71 Elizabeth and I have worked on almost every one of the Class of ’71 reunions and plan to work on our 45th in 2016. We were in Mrs. Dater’s 6th grade class together (that’s when I entered). She reached out to help me adjust after I started school two weeks late because of appendicitis surgery.

We were on the winning volleyball team in high school and sat next to each other in homeroom: Reyner, Rhodes—students had to sit in alpha order back then!

Elizabeth and Buddy, whose wish was to go to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

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Elizabeth is president and CEO of Make-A-Wish Arizona, which works to grant the wishes of children with lifethreatening illnesses.

What interests you about the nonprofit world and why is the Make-A-Wish Foundation a “fit” for you?

When I was a senior, a friend of my mother’s (from our hometown of Mesa, Arizona) formed an organization called Prehab of Arizona to help keep at-risk high school students from dropping out. I was so impressed that these adults would volunteer and care enough to create an environment where kids they didn’t even know could be successful.

My fascination with the nonprofit world started as a result of their example.

After college, I worked in white-collar industries and found it difficult to get motivated by the goal of beating last year’s numbers. I didn’t enjoy my job, but I loved the work I was doing with my personal time. In addition to raising three sons, I served on the boards of several local charities, including Prehab of Arizona.

I got so much out of helping organizations that improved the lives of others.

It wasn’t in my nature to be a caregiver, but I loved providing business guidance and raising money to support the work of those who have those caregiving genes. I transitioned from volunteer to a career in a mission-driven organization and was fortunate to land an amazing position with a hospital system, creating a women’s health program where none existed.

I’m pleased to say that I’m still on the board of Prehab, which was renamed A New Leaf, now one of the largest and most respected charities in Arizona.

I think it is interesting that so many of our classmates pursued some kind of service career as doctors, veterinarians, nurses, pastors, journalists, government professionals, lawyers, and advocates.

Did anything we experienced at Sidwell Friends guide you to consider a cause-related career?

My parents were both very active in public service and as volunteers, so they were my first role models. But the thoughtprovoking discussions at school reinforced my parents’ lessons. The Quaker philosophy of letting your life speak really resonated with me. The teachers and programs gave me the chance to act on those ideas. In 10th grade, I was a reading tutor in Adams Morgan. I remember feeling sad that those kids didn’t have the kinds of tools for learning that I did. For part of my senior project, I volunteered at what is now Children’s National Medical Center.

I remember the parties at my house at Christmastime when our group of friends would have dinner and then go around my neighborhood caroling for the Children’s Hospital. We were off-key but enthusiastic fledgling fundraisers, and I loved delivering that money to the hospital!

If there were three pieces of advice you could offer to nonprofit leaders, what would they be?

A nonprofit is a business. Remember, No Margin, No Mission. You must be as diligent about minding your business as any Fortune 500 CEO.

What’s the most successful thing you have done to educate people about the Make-A-Wish Foundation and move them to give to your organization?

It’s not difficult convincing people that the work we do is special and unique.

Work only for organizations whose ethics are above reproach—you must honor those donors who are entrusting their dollars with you. Finally, do all you can to ensure that donors are being directed to support your mission in the best way possible.

What does take some education is convincing them that wishes are an important piece to a child’s recovery from a life-threatening medical condition.

A recent study of the impact of a wish demonstrates that large numbers of physicians recognize that the anticipation of a wish is often the turning point in a child’s fight against their illness and makes children more compliant with medical protocols. The study also indicated that kids 10 years past their wishes credit the wish as an instrumental part of their psychological recovery from their illness.

Make-A-Wish was started in Arizona in 1980, so I am very fortunate to get to lead the founding chapter of what is now a worldwide phenomenon. I don’t know how it happened, but Arizonans have forgotten about this great gift we have given the world. I love sharing that news with them and seeing their faces light up when they realize how important that gift is. In the four years I have been with Make-A-Wish Arizona, we have gone from granting 251 wishes a year to 330, and from a $4 million budget to $6.5 million. There are still kids waiting for wishes, so there is more work to be done!

Like Elizabeth, Mary Reyner ’71 gravitated to the nonprofit world with the desire to help others in need. For nearly 30 years, she successfully raised funds and friends for animal and human service organizations, universities, and independent schools (including Sidwell Friends). After earning her master gardener certification, she spends her time volunteering at national and community gardens in the Washington area and working in a pottery studio and a garden center.

Not ready to give up development entirely, she continues to offer pro bono fundraising assistance to friends’ organizations when she can. Mary lives in Washington, DC, with her husband, Brian Steinbach ’71.

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WOLFGANG SOMARY ’50 Organization: HATI Foundation (Humanitarian Assistance for Tradition and Innovation) Location: Zurich, Switzerland Mission: To support two schools for poor children in India.

Role: Fundraising and supervising

Fernanda with client Brandon Olebar and his wife, Mely

FERNANDA TORRES ’93 Organization: Innocence Project Northwest, at the University of Washington School of Law Location: Seattle, WA Mission: To provide pro bono representation to prisoners.

Why I love what I do: A great friendship with its founder and an interest in India.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I raised money to send food parcels to hungry people in war-ravaged Europe. My Latin teacher acknowledged my efforts by taking me on a two-day visit to the Friends Service Committee in Philadelphia.

My impact: I realized it was all worth it after holding a dialogue for five hours with a huge assembly of pupils and teachers of two Indian schools. As I answered their questions, saw their dances, and listened to their songs, it raised my spirits as I realized the impact of helping the dedicated people who made it all possible.

Role: Managing attorney and volunteer coordinator

LIZ KELLISON ’83 Organization: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Why I love what I do: It is the only group in the state representing those wrongfully convicted and addressing, through reform and education, the cause of conviction.

The legal work is challenging but rewarding, and I work with a great group of attorneys, staff, and students.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I worked with the Play to Grow Program. Each Monday evening, a group of men with mild to severe developmental disabilities would come to campus for an evening of arts and crafts, games, dance, and outdoor play. I looked forward to seeing them as much as they looked forward to seeing all of us.

My impact: Last year, two of my clients were released from prison after years of wrongful incarceration. Meeting them outside of the jail and witnessing the joyful reunion with family and friends was incredibly special. In one of the cases, delivering to his wife the news that he would be released within hours was the best phone call I’ve ever made!

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Location: Seattle, WA Mission: To work with partners on critical problems around the world.

Role: Deputy director on the financial services for the poor team Liz (center) with a Kenyan sweet potato farmer (far right)

Why I love what I do: I love being able to help chip away at extreme poverty around the world. The foundation’s motto, “All lives have equal value,” permeates everything we do. It’s an honor to be a part of the work in support of this belief.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I worked with Special Olympics and had a fantastic experience working with the kids. Because I played a lot of sports, it gave me a new appreciation for what athletics can do for everyone, regardless of ability.

My impact: At the Gates Foundation, we have a unique opportunity to use philanthropic capital to help tackle some of the world’s toughest problems. I am surrounded by colleagues who are working to eradicate polio, cure HIV, end malaria, provide lifesaving vaccines to kids, improve smallholder farmer productivity, and provide financial services to the poorest folks in some of the toughest spots in the world.

TRISTAN HARTER ’96 Organization: PAWS Chicago, a no-kill humane organization Location: Chicago, IL Mission: To build a no-kill Chicago Role: Volunteer

Danika Weather, Rachel, Kayla Byrd, and Melvin Smith at the 2014 LLI Columbus graduation

RACHEL WILSON ’02 Organization: Law and Leadership Institute Location: Columbus, OH Mission: To help students from underserved communities get accepted to college and have the opportunity to attend law school.

Role: Program director Why I love what I do: As a Teach for America alumna, I enjoy developing LLI’s curriculum for students. I also utilize my law degree, and I am charged with figuring out ways to make the law intelligible to students. I believe that all children are entitled to receive a high-quality education, and I love helping students, particularly those from underserved communities, reach their academic goals.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: In Middle School, I was involved in a weeklong program with teacher Rickey Payton and students from a local DC public school. We performed musical theater songs in front of family and friends. Mr. Payton’s talent was unparalleled, and he remains an inspiration to us all!

My impact: When I see graduates of our program matriculate to top-tier colleges and universities, I am always humbled and inspired. We recruit students from the most vulnerable situations, whom society has often written off, and encourage them to believe in themselves and in the possibility of an exciting future that involves college and a professional career. There is nothing better than seeing those same students develop, mature, and reach their personal, academic, and professional goals.

Why I love what I do: Animals are a consistent source of unconditional love in a world in which this is at a premium.

Every animal deserves the right to find its perfect match, and the benefits to both parties are immeasurable. This volunteer work actually helps my professional work as a school psychologist by supporting the ideas of accepting students and animals where they are, rather than where we would like them to be, and that everyone expresses emotions differently.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: As early as Lower School, I assisted at Martha’s Table. My family went on Saturdays to help make sandwiches, chop vegetables, and bag pastries. In Middle School, the 7th and 8th grade teams participated in overnight service trips, spending time with the kids there and serving the homeless.

My impact: We cared for a pit bull, Red, that had been shot in the spine by a burglar and paralyzed in his hind legs. No one adopted him for more than two years and we fully expected him to live out the rest of his life with us, where he was loved and all of his medical and physical needs were taken care of. He was about the happiest dog I’ve ever met. When he did find a home, I was at his adoption party.

I’ve sent home some [less desired] 13- and 14-year-old cats, but nothing compares to the story of Red.

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SCHOOLED IN THE ARTS Beth Rubenstein ’77 | By Shauna Miller Wertheim ’77 Beth and I have been friends since we were 5 years old attending Sunday school together. She was my first Sidwell friend when I arrived in 3rd grade. We literally grew up together, danced to Beatles songs in her basement, supported each other through rites of passage, and celebrated milestones together. Our bond endures across the miles and years.

In 2000, Beth founded Out of Site Youth Arts Center in San Francisco, growing it from idea to full-fledged model organization. The nonprofit provides arts education and youth development for low-income public high school students. She stepped down as executive director last year to work on youth, arts, and jobs policy at City Hall.

How did you make the leap from architect to school founder?

In architecture school, a part of me always wanted to teach.

I began as a teaching assistant for one of my professors and found I really liked it. After graduation, I started teaching at RISD (Rhode Island School of Design). As a student, you know what makes a good teacher and a great educational environment in which students can flourish. I knew from my own experiences as a graduate student what kind of teacher I wanted to be. It’s all about building relationships between the

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student and teacher, and among the students, and providing a safe place for your students to take risks and not be afraid of failures or judgment.

I continued teaching when my husband, Evan (also an architect) and I moved to California in the ’90s. I was frustrated with college teaching because I was interested in teaching the whole person. If a student was having personal difficulties, the institution still required that project deadlines be met. Many of my college students were coming from education backgrounds without strong reading, writing, or analytical skills. I began considering that I would need to reach the students earlier, as high school students.

After several years teaching multidisciplinary arts at a top private school, I looked around and saw that it was the public school students who were not being taught this. Since the passage of Proposition 13 in the 1970s and other tax legislation, California dropped almost to the bottom of all states in per pupil funding. For the most part, there was a generation of students missing arts from their education.

Together with a friend who taught middle school art, we developed our vision to bring a multidisciplinary arts program to public high school students. Art connects you with all sorts

of knowledge: art is culture and is connected with the history of ideas and social movements; it is the way you understand and connect with the world. We wanted to create an art program for youth that embodied this web of knowledge, and was about engaging in the world. We also sought to change the way communities saw teens, especially low-income teens and young people of color who were often unjustly perceived as a source of violence and disrespect in their neighborhoods. We named the arts program “Out of Site,” because we felt the work came out of the site, the place, the community.

How did you get from your vision to implementation?

With funding from three parents we knew from our teaching in private schools, we started a summer pilot program. We had no idea what we were doing. We started writing grant applications. Sidwell Friends had taught me how to read and write—and think—and I attribute a lot of our success in obtaining grant support to my education in how to articulate my ideas clearly. In 2000, we started teaching classes in public schools. We formed partnerships with schools. We helped teachers within those schools think about integrating art into their curriculums.

We started getting funding through foundations. Eventually, we had enough funding to start hiring teachers. Within several years, we grew to 10 to 15 programs around the San Francisco Bay area, including at schools and museums. We realized we needed to take our vision to the next level and permanently establish in one community. We wanted to be part of youth development, bringing non-academic enrichment to young teens.

At this time, a charter school we had worked with asked us to co-locate to a permanent site. In 2003, the Out of Site Youth Arts Center found a permanent home and community. Eleven years later, the Out of Site Youth Arts Center continues to be a thriving program.

Was there any moment in the early years of the center when you questioned why you got involved?

My co-founder decided to leave four months before our program moved to its new home. Finally, we had the permanence and place we had been seeking for our center, and I was on my own! There were moments along the way when I wanted to leave; like any business, running a nonprofit can be a heavy burden with meeting salaries and raising money. I was worried if I left, it would all collapse. But it didn’t. I am proud to say that the organization has endured and grown.

What was your strategy in overcoming obstacles?

I’m not sure why I didn’t walk away. It would have been just as scary to walk away, a real sense of failure. After the freak-out, I started thinking strategically. I realized I needed a program director. Once I hired one, I assumed the position of executive director, which I held for the next 13 years.

What or who are your sources of inspiration?

My parents have been a great inspiration for me. My mom was an art historian and wrote and curated exhibits at the Smithsonian; I spent my childhood at all the museums in Washington. She showed me how the arts are at the center of our lives—that they reflect the way we see ourselves and the ways we want to see the world. The arts express and challenge the values of our community. Fully one-half of my dad’s career has involved working with nonprofits, including the Arena Stage and the DC Jewish Community Center. His work has taught me about philanthropy and community engagement, learning how the organizations are run, and participating effectively within them.

What pearls of wisdom do you have for anyone interested in starting a nonprofit?

Be driven by what you want to achieve, and not your own ego; learn from others who have preceded you with the same or similar mission. Sometimes you do not need to start from scratch. Figure out what your resources are, and finally, stick your neck out!

The experience was such a learning curve for me. It mirrored what we were trying to give our students. It was my own journey of putting myself out there.

Shauna Miller Wertheim ’77 is a co-managing partner at the intellectual property law firm The Marbury Law Group located in Reston, Virginia.

She heads up the Trademark and Litigation practices, with an emphasis on global brand protection. She devotes time to counseling startups and nonprofits, and teaches for the D.C. Bar and American Intellectual Property Lawyers Association (AIPLA). She was a recipient of the Newmyer Award for her years of service to Sidwell Friends. Her proudest achievements are the three children (Jess Wertheim ’07, Jerry Wertheim’10, and Michael Wertheim’11) she has raised with her husband, Ray, a psychiatrist.

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PHILANTHROPY AND POETRY: Two nonprofit executives reconnect Lynn Heller ’84 and Phoebe Stein ’85

Lynn Heller ’84 is vice president at the Abell Foundation, a private philanthropy in Baltimore that provides grants and conducts research in a range of program areas, all aimed at improving the lives of the underserved. Lynn is responsible for overall operations and manages the foundation’s environmental portfolio.

PHOEBE: Lynn was a year ahead of

PHOEBE: How would you describe your

me, and I remember then being struck by her leadership—as a stellar student academically, of course, but also as soccer team captain. I also remember how close she was with her family, Rick Heller ’88 and Anne Heller ’81. I remember her laugh and her presence at my 15th birthday party, where all my girlfriends dressed up and we had a dinner party. She and I did not stay in touch much after high school, but when my mother died in 2002, Lynn was the first person to send me a condolence note. When I moved to Baltimore six years ago, she was the first person I called. We have regular dinner dates and talk frequently about our nonprofit work.

path to the Abell Foundation? What did a Quaker education, or more specifically Sidwell Friends, contribute to your career path?

PHOTO BY MITRO HOOD

LYNN: It was like a time warp when Phoebe and I reconnected after 25 years.

She had exactly the same combination that I loved in high school—her calm demeanor, her humor, and her intellectual curiosity.

Phoebe wrote and edited for The Quarterly magazine, and I remember first learning in high school that she was related to Gertrude Stein, thinking how cool that was, and thinking that there must’ve been something in her blood that made her like the arts and literature so much.

Phoebe with 2012 Maryland History Day winner Shayna Berman

Phoebe Stein ’85 is executive director of the Maryland Humanities Council (MHC), a nonprofit organization that creates and supports educational experiences in the humanities. She directs MHC’s governance, programming, grant making, marketing, fundraising, planning, and government relations efforts.

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PHOEBE: I remember you as a leader

in high school—when did you know that you wanted to lend your leadership skills to the nonprofit world?

LYNN: I’ve worked in the nonprofit and government sectors my whole professional life. I began my nonprofit work by teaching English in Indonesia after college, and following a stint doing voting rights work in D.C., I went to graduate school in public policy. I then spent a number of years doing start-up nonprofit work in California, Southeast Asia, and Baltimore.

LYNN: There are two things: the Quaker emphasis on the importance of service to community, and the confidence to take risks.

PHOEBE: What do you tell your kids

about how we can make a difference in today’s polarized, polluted, violent world?

LYNN: The world’s problems can feel so big sometimes, and our kids are young, so we try to find balance between awareness and innocence. They’re not always so happy that we both work fulltime, but they’re proud of what we do, and I think they know we do it because we believe it’s important to try to make a difference.

LYNN: What drew you to the promotion of the humanities? For those who might ask, how do you define “the humanities?”

PHOEBE: Even as a young kid, the

humanities had a profound impact on my life—I just didn’t call them the humanities. Books were a wonderful escape for me from a young age, and I also loved hearing my father’s stories about family and world history. He was a non-combat veteran of World War II and a real history lover. My mother fed my love of poetry and fiction. And I always seemed to have my nose in a book. After finishing my PhD in literature and teaching college for 10 years, I discovered the world of public humanities and was hooked. In my

NATASHA BONHOMME ’01 Organization: Genetic Alliance Location: Washington, DC

work, we basically bring the humanities (history, literature, philosophy, ethics, art history, languages) to public spaces—libraries, museums, VFW halls, and community centers.

We also have a presence at what some may see as unexpected places for the humanities—prisons, veterans’ centers, and hospitals.

LYNN: Did Sidwell Friends contribute to your work in nonprofits? In the humanities? If so, how?

PHOEBE: It’s funny. I talk a lot about

my Quaker education and how it relates to my work today. I emphasize collaboration, and there is a lot of dialogue in our office. I’ve even opened a number of our meetings with a moment of silence. Certainly, the ideas that there is light in all of us and service as a central component of living a full life led me to my work today.

LYNN: What role do you think the

humanities can and do play as the world tackles its incredibly complicated problems?

PHOEBE: I like to say that we are in the “A-ha moment” business. I feel fortunate that my liberal arts education and continued lifelong learning afforded me these moments to reflect and connect with others. I can think of nothing we need more today than more opportunities to reflect on the past, present, and future and interact respectfully with our friends, neighbors, and strangers.

Mission: Engaging individuals, families, and communities in using genetic history to transform health .

Role: Vice president/director of maternal and child health Why I love what I do: The field of genetics and genomics is radically changing how we relate to our health information.

Genetic testing can help you learn more about your health or your children’s health and particularly about conditions that may have lasting effects. By finding this out early, treatments can be given before symptoms display, greatly improving the chance for a healthy life.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: Going with my Advisory group to the NAMES Project Foundation for the AIDS Memorial Quilt. It was great to work with families and advocates to put a face to the epidemic.

My impact: In September 2013, I testified in front of the US Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pension Committee’s Subcommittee on Children and Families on the vital need for federal support of newborn screening programs. Our Baby’s First Test program has given a voice to the four million babies screened in the US each year. It was truly a great honor to use this platform to speak about the importance of newborn health and parent empowerment in front of Congress.

ELLEN LAKE ’87 Organization: Kala Art Institute Location: Berkeley, CA Mission: To engage the community through arts, exhibitions, public programs, and education .

Role: Grants manager Why I love what I do: It’s creative and community-based.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I loved working with developmentally disabled adults with my friend and classmate Megan Crowley ’87.

This inspired me to work in mental health and homeless services for 10 years.

My impact: I am most proud of helping to launch new initiatives like Print Public, which brings together artists, UC Berkeley students in urban planning, local businesses, community groups, and other creative partners to develop siteresponsive public art projects along a busy, overlooked transit corridor. I also enjoy simply supporting artists and providing them with access to tools and equipment.

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Liz and staff member Greg Walsh interview Kobe.

LIZ BERNSTEIN NORTON ’84 Organization: Stone Soup Films

CASEY COLEMAN HASSENSTEIN ’93

Location: Washington, DC

Organization: Noble and Greenough School

Mission: To build capacity of worthy nonprofits through digital storytelling.

Location: Dedham, MA

Role: Executive director and founder

Mission: To instill in students leadership for the public good.

Why I love what I do: It’s amazing to combine your passion and your skills and put them to work through service.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I worked at Legal Aid. It was such fascinating work that I asked the principal (Clint Wilkins) if the School could adjust my schedule during the spring of my senior year so that I could continue working there. It really changed me, and I was grateful for the insight into the real world.

My impact: We were given the opportunity to tell the story of Hope House, a program that allows children ages 8 to 14 with incarcerated fathers to participate in a “camp” inside a prison for one week every summer. Filming inside the maximum-security prison in Cumberland, Maryland, and documenting the program has been one of the great privileges of this work. At one point I heard one of the fathers say to his son, Kobe, “You are so much stronger than me, I know you won’t end up here. This is not a life. Stay in school and take the right path.”

This kid was looking right into his father’s eyes.

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Role: Director of annual giving Why I love what I do: I truly value independent school education, largely because of my own experience at Sidwell Friends.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: I have great memories of making origami peace cranes every year during my free periods so that they could be taken to Hiroshima, Japan, by classmates traveling there. I think I still have a few from those days.

My impact: I organized Nobles Rally Day, a one-day rally to give back to the school by making a gift to the Annual Nobles Fund (ANF). Students made real-time thank-you videos, participated in our student “selfie” Instagram challenge, and more than 50 teachers and volunteers hit the phones. By evening, more than 650 new gifts and pledges had been made.

The ANF supports student financial aid, making an independent school education (and a lifetime of opportunities) possible for more students.

ANDY KAUFMANN ’87 Organization: Code of Support Foundation Location: Alexandria, VA Mission: To engage and leverage the nation’s resources to ensure our service members, veterans, and their families receive the support they need and have earned through their service and sacrifice.

Role: Director of military engagement and veteran peer navigator Why I love what I do: It allows me to interact with and help veterans from all services and conflicts. Whether they are still serving or retired, being able to pay it forward and assist my fellow veterans gives me no greater pleasure.

Favorite service project while at Sidwell Friends: One event we did in grade school was a bike ride pledge through Rock Creek Park. It was fun to do something for others as a community. Parents joined the class, and we all rode. It was a beautiful day and we raised money for a great cause.

My impact: One case that I worked on that really hit home was being able to introduce a homeless veteran to Diane Rehm at National Public Radio. Through my interactions with him, I learned he was a huge fan of hers (and of NPR). I brought him into the WAMU studio where he met Diane, toured the facility, and watched a live show. To see the smile bloom on his face was outstanding. That one moment changed his entire attitude and brought a little ray of sunshine into his life.

Click Here for Charity Bill Strathmann ’85 As CEO of Network for Good (a company that makes online charity donations secure and turnkey), Bill Strathmann ’85 is passionate about giving and businesses that do good. He credits his Quaker education for instilling service at an early age. “We have savings accounts and checking accounts—can the norm be to also have giving accounts?” he asks.

After graduating from Sidwell Friends, Bill studied philosophy at Haverford College.

“I loved the Quaker focus on ideals and carried those values with me,” he says. After college, he dreamed of starting a green company that would have global impact, so he enrolled in business school and upon graduation began consulting. But then Bill’s mother, Leslie Strathmann, died suddenly of cancer at age 54 (a memorial fund in her name at Sidwell Friends still helps fund faculty projects). His wife’s mother passed away shortly after that. And then the world experienced the tragedies of September 11. Bill did some soul searching and realized that his work as a consultant wasn’t fulfilling. “If I am only going to be on the planet until I am 54, that is not a lot of time to make a difference,” he thought.

“I believe that pretty much everyone is inherently generous. We just need the right ask at the precise openminded moment,” says Bill.

“My goal is to put compelling giving opportunities at everyone’s fingertips and unleash generosity on a massive scale.”

He started running marathons and getting involved in charities. In 2003, he ran the Chicago Marathon and saw that there was a website where you could create a simple tribute page to someone to help raise money for the American Cancer Society. It had a spot for a photo and a digital thermometer showing how much the participant had raised so far. Bill knew then that he wanted to start a company to let all charities have access to online donations, something that was not the norm 10 years ago. He set about researching his newfound passion, only to discover his brainchild already existed. It was Network for Good, started by Aol Founder Steve Case. Serendipitously, Network for Good needed a turnaround, and Bill was hired as CEO in 2004.

Ten years later, he has grown the company from seven to 70 employees, but more importantly has grown donations to charity through Network for Good from $20 million a year to $200 million a year. This year, Network for Good surpassed $1 billion in donations it has processed for more than 100,000 nonprofits. The organization earns revenue by charging a small transaction fee for online donations and from monthly subscription fees that thousands of nonprofit customers pay Network for Good for its now best-in-class online fundraising pages.

“I believe that pretty much everyone is inherently generous. We just need the right ask at the precise open-minded moment,” says Bill. “My goal is to put compelling giving opportunities at everyone’s fingertips and unleash generosity on a massive scale.”

In the meantime, every small effort counts. He shares one story where his team was looking for “$1 donations,” often a red flag that a credit card may have been stolen and is being tested to see if it’s good. They found a recurring $1 gift every Sunday, and investigated. That’s when they discovered an inspiring story of a 6-year-old girl logging on with her dad every Sunday to donate $1 of her allowance to the orphanage from which she was adopted. No further evidence is needed, Bill says. Philanthropy is alive and well in America today.

Bill’s challenge to other companies is that they, too, can be social enterprises.

“Companies can do more than just make money—they can also do good.”

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MAX ORENSTEIN, CLINTON FOUNDATION

Chelsea tours a Day of Action site in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

For Chelsea Clinton ’97, Service is More than a Family Legacy Associate Head of School Ellis Turner catches up with his former history class student to talk about leading others to serve.

ELLIS TURNER: Let’s start by talking about your service work today, and what your early influences and experiences were that have led you down this road.

New York, and also in cities which host our major Clinton Foundation meetings. Since we launched the program at the end of 2012, we’ve had more than 20,000 volunteer hours mustered across 10 locations.

ET: Wow.

CHELSEA CLINTON: Sure. I’ll start with your first question, about our current service work.

CC: And the second way that we work to engage citizens through service is through the Clinton Global Initiative.

At the Clinton Foundation, we work to engage people in meaningful service opportunities in two ways. One, directly through our Day of Action program, which launched after Hurricane Sandy. Since many of us call New York City our home (although we have staff in more than 25 countries), we really wanted to do something to help rebuild our community.

And so we mobilized about 1,000 volunteers and came to understand that a significant number of people could make a real difference over a day. We found that model to be tremendously successful. And so we decided to make the Day of Action a formal program on a continuing basis—in

Your second question: I don’t remember a time in my life in which service wasn’t prominent, not only with my parents in a public or political meaning, but also at a family level. We would have family days of service on Sundays, and we always did a family service project around Christmas. That was part of our core family values. Sidwell Friends’ focus on service was one of the reasons why my parents were attracted to the idea of my going to Sidwell Friends. The ethos of Sidwell reinforced our belief that each one of us who can do something should do something, to always be investing in, and improving, our communities. It was an important part of my Sidwell

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experience and certainly only continued to validate why it was the right fit, not just for me but for my family.

ET: That’s very interesting. Do you remember what service you did at Sidwell?

CC: Yes. I was the head of the Community Service Club for two years. I was a member of the service club all four years of high school.

I helped organize all of our trips when I was a junior and senior. I have such fond memories—and hilarious memories, too, because I think it’s important that service be fun. I loved our trips to Martha’s Table: We would provide additional supervision to help elementary schools that didn’t have whatever the mandated teacher-to-student ratio was by the DC Public Schools for field trips—which is kind of amazing that 17-year-olds could be supervising elementary school kids. I think we really only went to the Air and Space Museum or the Museum of Natural History. But those were so much fun. And we would always provide additional staff to the Martha’s Table Christmas Party at the Old Post Office.

ET: That’s great.

CC: I have such wonderful memories of my service experiences all through high school.

ET: Was there a time when you thought you might take a different path in life than you’ve taken and become a teacher or a lawyer or an auto mechanic or whatever it might be?

CC: I spent my 20s working in the private sector, both at McKinsey Associates and on Wall Street, and I am incredibly grateful for those experiences. I learned a tremendous amount. But by the time I was looking toward 30, I just thought, you know: I don’t want to become a hedge fund manager. And the issues that I care most about, particularly related to public health or service work, are the ones that I want to be thinking about all of the time, not just some of the time. And so that led me to become more engaged and ultimately to take a leadership role at the Clinton Foundation, as well as to go for my doctorate and to teach at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health.

So I spent a long part of my life thus far working in very different fields. But…that only has further underscored why what I’m doing now is the right choice for me.

ET: Let me shift gears just a little bit. Can you share your fondest memories from Upper School?

CC: I loved Upper School. I loved my academic experiences, I loved my friends, I loved the extracurricular things I did.

So many of my favorite memories exist in those different spheres—I mean, whether it’s standing outside with my friends during Homecoming, drinking apple cider and watching our football team never win—we never won a homecoming game in the years I was there—or being in the computer lab on Saturdays, when I was working on the yearbook and Jackie [Newmyer Deal ’97] was working on the literary magazine, and Nickie [Davison Fox ’97] was working on Horizon; or studying together with Nickie and Jackie for a 9th grade history class Mrs. Morin was teaching, or for one of your classes, Mr. Turner, when we were in American Studies, which was definitely one of the best classes I’ve ever taken in any grade in high school, in college, or graduate school.

ET: Thank you for your comments about my class. So would you recommend the Clinton Global Initiative University to Sidwell Friends alumni?

CC: Absolutely. It’s one of the most exciting parts of the Foundation’s work, bringing together students who are already change makers, and helping them be even more effective in what they want to do. CGIU is about helping students turn an idea into a real business plan or, increasingly, how to scale what they’re already doing on their campuses or in their communities. We do that by matching CGIU students with mentors who have done something similar, and also through helping to create cohorts in different areas so that students can support each other… [in] everything from how to think of a business plan to how to take your idea to a major foundation or nonprofit. [Learn how to apply at cgiu.org.]

ET: Lastly, do you have any advice that you’d like to offer others who are contemplating a career change or becoming more involved in community work?

CC: Think about what makes you really passionate—and also about what makes you really angry. Passion and inspiration, as well as anger, can be really useful in directing our energies and matching them with our skills.

Chelsea Clinton ’97 is vice chair of the Clinton Foundation, where her focus is on improving global and domestic health, creating service opportunities, and empowering the next generation of leaders. She focuses especially on the Foundation’s health programs, including the Clinton Health Access Initiative, which strengthens health care and access to lifesaving services in the developing world; the Alliance for a Healthier Generation, which fights childhood obesity in the United States; and the Clinton Health Matters Initiative, which addresses preventable disease in the United States. She also continues to lead the Clinton Foundation Day of Action program. She and her husband, Marc, live with their infant daughter, Charlotte, in New York City.

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Ellis Turner still had the original assignment from 1983.

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“Dude,

Where’s My Paper?”

I turned in a senior-year assignment to history teacher Ellis Turner. . . a little late.

By Alexandra Beers ’84

In the spring of 1984, the second semester of my senior year at Sidwell Friends, I took Ellis Turner’s Theory and Methods of Historical Research, which focused on the 1960s. It was a fun, demanding class for older students who were able to move beyond the required courses and delve more deeply into a pivotal period for America and the world while exploring a range of research practices. I had looked forward to this elective, as did several of my friends.

think I managed the emotional turmoil of finishing school, turning 18, readying myself for college, and moving beyond the walls of my childhood home by avoiding it all with tenacity. I performed in a One Act play, I sang in concerts, I did just enough reading to get by in my classes, and—at long last—I fulfilled my community service requirement by helping out at a DC day-care center.

Everything was done under the gun and passionately put off as long as possible.

I recall writing a paper for this course on revolutionary radicals, and have vague memories of another, on pop art, but I cannot say what research methods I used for either of these assignments except for spending a good deal of anxious time in the American University library. I

My friend Sarah Williams ’84 and I faced a dilemma as the semester wore on: how to finish these all-important projects and still graduate on time and with some semblance of peace? We each had research papers to write, but something had to give. We were doing

too much, pulling all-nighters too often, getting overwhelmed. The play had to be performed, the AP tests had to be taken.

The one thing I could not pull off in the limited time left was my next assignment from Mr. Turner: to interview someone about the 1960s and write a paper based on oral research.

Years before e-mail existed, one could not simply type questions and send them out into the ether at 1:00 in the morning hoping to get a response by the next day. Oral research required plans, phone calls, scheduled interviews, and transcribed notes. Not to mention analysis and clear-headed writing.

Sarah faced a similar dilemma, and together we realized there was just no ALUMNI MAGAZINE

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“We realized there was just no way we could do it all. . . . We decided we would each take an F on our papers.”

way we could do it all. We talked it out, with each other and with our parents, who were undoubtedly alarmed but a bit amused that we had come this far—made it to the spring, gotten accepted into great colleges—but had run up against a wall of commitment as we eagerly sapped Sidwell Friends for all it had to offer us in the last days. Well, they shrugged, good luck.

We decided we would each take an F on our papers, and spend the time we might have spent working on them finishing everything else. Oh, and study our butts off for the final exam in this course to save our grades and graduate. That we figured we could do, and we were correct. I still remember those last late nights on the Williamses’ back porch in early June, quizzing each other on the

When I sheepishly mentioned at Reunion that I was thinking of handing in my 30-years-late research paper, Mr. Turner said, “Dude, that’s tremendous!

When can you get it to me?” It took most of last summer to complete. . .

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minute details of political and social trends of the 1960s. We were immersed in documents of an era of revolution while sharing the safety of home—just as we were about to fly off to unknown change ourselves.

As was typical of us in those days of presumed maturity, we decided to tell Mr. Turner of our decision in person, but not quite face-to-face. We would take him for a walk on the Sidwell Friends campus, making it easier to break the news of our delinquencies by moving around.

On a lovely spring day, much like it was when we visited campus again for our recent 30-year reunion, we told him we “needed to talk to him” during a free period. He nervously shuffled behind us out into the sunshine. As we neared the Arts Center, I blurted out, “We’ve decided we can’t finish our research papers and are each going to take an F.” He was stunned. The poor guy—a hero to many of us who valued the excitement, scholarship, and irreverence he brought into class each day—was being checkmated by his own protégées.

We knew what we were in for, and accepted our punishment before he even had a chance to respond to our

. . . Meanwhile, I dug up MY old grade book and the original assignment sheet, complete with MY classic jackalope decor. . .

offense. What could he say? I bet he vowed to figure this one out as soon as he got through the marking period, and to never let this happen again. Revolution, indeed. He told us he understood, sort of, despite the smack of our choosing to drop his assignment instead of something else on our plates, and that he would have to tell our parents. We rounded a corner and hustled back to the Upper School.

In the years since 1984, Mr. Turner mentioned the paper to me at least a dozen times at reunions or on Facebook.

I joked that I was still working on it.

About 10 years after I graduated, he revealed that our refusal to hand in our assignments was a seminal moment in his professional life. He had thought of our walk outside the Arts Center many times. I sensed that it was an anxious memory for him. It certainly had been for me.

Guilt, the idea of disappointing him, and my dropping something I was assigned to do had crept back into many of my recollections of high school, even as I tried to laugh this chapter off or thoughtfully use it as an illustration of where I was, where many of us were, at that point in our lives.

. . . and asked Mamadou Guèye (via speakerphone) to clarify the school’s late policy.

After careful consideration, Mr. Turner gave me an A on the assignment.

Ellis Turner returned Alex’s graded assignment at the September 23 Brooklyn Happy Hour for alumni.

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But as my 30th reunion approached, I lit on an idea: What if I did it now? What if I wrote an oral history on the 1960s and turned it in, a little on the late side?

in person. I was due at Zartman House at 3:30.

I mentioned this idea to Mr. Turner when I saw him on campus over Reunion Weekend this past May. He was, for the second time in 30 years, shocked by something I said outside the Arts Center. He was thrilled, amused, bewildered.

I rushed in with wet hair and my paper unstapled. I was a teenager again, breathless, slightly ashamed to be taking up the time of the staff that was on hand for the occasion with my delinquencies.

The day after the reunion, Mr. Turner sent me a message on Facebook: “Dude, where’s my paper?”

Damn, I thought, now I have to write it.

I got to work. My idea was to research the effects of the counterculture on my own family. It was partly an excuse to revisit some troubling moments from our family’s history. I interviewed my four brothers and both parents. Some of them found it annoying, others invigorating. I culled the interviews and wrote a draft. I did more interviews and wrote more drafts, getting deeply involved with the intense portrait that was emerging as I dug up the past. The paper took on a life of its own. Once I made it a priority, finding the necessary time to work on this assignment that was 30 years late was relatively easy.

Telling people what I was up to was much trickier. The whole thing was so odd. But it was also cathartic. It reconnected me with my old school and the person I was when I left there in 1984.

In late July, I made an appointment to hand in my paper

“Mr. Turner. . . was, for the second time in 30 years, shocked by something I said.”

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I was late, naturally.

I handed the paper to Mr. Turner. There was awkward laughter all around. Then he picked up the phone.

Mr. Turner seems to love the speakerphone. From his desk in the Head of School’s office, he got several people on the line to answer questions such as, “What is the school’s official late policy?” And, “What is the appropriate response to a student who hands in an assignment more than 48 hours late, like by 29 years and 363 days?” Also, “How do we go about changing a grade in the permanent record?” And, “Should we send a revised transcript to any colleges to which she may have applied?”

When it came to the substance of my work, though, he took it seriously.

He read the paper with a critical and appreciative eye.

His thoroughness reminded me of the thoughtful remarks he had always made on our assignments, the integrity that he promoted as we went about our research, the genuine interest he took in all of his students and their ideas. Many of us remember his classes and his amused curiosity in all oddities as being among the most stimulating aspects of our time at Sidwell Friends. Like all the best teachers, he mixed kindness with intellectual rigor. He forgave us when we were a bit off. And there were always laughs. Mr. Turner notices the absurd, and reminds his students not to take themselves too seriously—but at the same time encourages them to throw themselves into their work.

We had some hilarious moments during this whole process. Through our e-mail and Facebook exchanges, Mr. Turner and I realized that we remembered different requirements of the actual assignment. He also continually reminded me to use proper format, and he got out his old record books so he could actually change my grade.

But altogether, this experience has been a sober and valuable one. I was able to ask questions regarding events that shaped who I am, and found that the conflicting memories of those events provided a broader understanding of Washington in the 1960s and of the challenges of documenting history. I am so glad I did it.

It’s never too late to learn. It’s never too late to do your homework.

Sarah Williams ’84 and Alexandra Beers ’84 at Reunion Weekend in May, 2014.

Alexandra Beers ’84 is a teacher and reading specialist in Brooklyn, New York.

She studied English literature at Trinity College, literacy at Bank Street College of Education, and is now at work on a book of poetry. She is married and has two children.

Alex’s friend and paper partner in crime, Sarah Williams ’84, also lives in Brooklyn with her family and advises foundations and individual donors on charitable giving.

Inspired by Ellis Turner, she majored in American studies at Wesleyan University and was a Coro Fellow in Public Policy. She hopes to get her own overdue paper in, and her transcript revised, by their 50th reunion.

PHOTO COURTESY OF SIDWELL FRIENDS ARCHIVES

Making Thanksgiving pies to take to homeless shelters is a longstanding Sidwell Friends service tradition. Can you identify these students, the location, and the year?

Send your answers to alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu for a chance at a Sidwell Friends baseball hat!

› ALUMNI BOOKSHELF

ALUMNI BOOKSHELF JOSHUA HORWITZ ’73 War of the Whales Simon & Schuster, 2014

the whale stocks that had crashed in the 1940s after decades of overfishing. In the 1960s, the navy single-handedly gave birth to the scientific discipline of marine mammal science and cetology.

“This is a story about the clash of two mission-driven cultures, the navy and the conservationists, that both care deeply about the oceans and whales, but for opposing reasons.”

Q|

How did you first find out about the issue of naval sonar harming whales, and what drew you to commit to it for a book?

About 10 years ago, I read an article about an environmental lawyer suing the US Navy over sonar trainings, claiming they could cause mass strandings of whales. The headline, “Navy v. Whales,” read like a divorce proceeding—which, in fact, it was in many ways.

What first convinced me there was a book-length story to narrate, once I’d dug into the history, was discovering that the navy had fallen under the spell of whales and dolphins all the way back in the 1950s, when they first discovered that dolphins and whales echolocate with sound under water in much the same way that bats do in air. At the time, the only people who cared about “saving the whales” were whalers, who were trying to figure out how to revive

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In addition to training dolphins and other small whales to patrol harbors and sweep for mines, the navy was determined to reverse-engineer whale biosonar and to translate their biotechnology to the navy’s sonar surveillance of Soviet submarines during the Cold War. Even now, the navy continues to be far and away the largest funder of whale research in the world. One of the dramatic pivot points in the book is the battle for the conscience of marine mammal scientists, who had to decide whether to bear witness—in their published research and in court—to the sometimes lethal impact of navy sonar on whales, or to heed the instinct not to bite the hand that fed their research careers: the Office of Naval Research.

Q|

Reviews credit you for not portraying the military as the bad guys. Was this a deliberate effort on your part as a journalist, or did you truly never see the navy in that light?

While there are several heroes in this story—notably the environmental attorney who took this case all the way to the Supreme Court, and the field biologist who witnessed the Bahamas stranding and became a reluctant activist—I didn’t find any villains in the US Navy.

I knew next to nothing about the navy and its culture before I reported this book.

I have deep respect for the navy characters I came to know during my research— particularly the retired admirals who gave me a lot of access and insight into what was driving their decisions at the time.

These naval officers make tremendous personal sacrifices, even when they’re serving during peacetime.

The naval officers and the environmentalists in my story have more traits in common than not: They are all highly committed and intelligent, and none of them chose their career path for either money or power. They are true believers, but their particular missions are often in direct opposition: protecting the environment versus homeland security.

› ALUMNI BOOKSHELF

Q|

Over the course of seven years of research and writing, what were the “fist pumps”—the most satisfying accomplishments?

Two breakthroughs provided me with the necessary momentum to move forward in a lengthy, often spiral, research process: 1) Locating my first highly placed source inside the navy: a retired rear admiral at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution who was willing to give me a peek behind the Oz-like curtain that cloaks most navy operations, which are all classified. He introduced me to his “flag buddies”—other retired admirals who remain active behind the scenes in shaping navy policy. I eventually gained access to every admiral and civilian navy official on my list.

2) Meeting Walter Munk, the most famous and accomplished living oceanographer, dubbed by his colleagues as the “Einstein of the oceans.” During WW II, he had predicted the coastal tides at Normandy for the D-Day invasion.

He has been credited with many of the breakthroughs in modern oceanography.

In his 90s by the time I met him, Munk had become something of a recluse. When I finally tracked hin down in a remote cabin on the Woods Hole campus where he was doing research, he invited me to visit him at his home in La Jolla, California.

I brought along my daughter, Julia Horwitz ’15, who had accompanied me on a book-related trip to the last pristine gray whale nursery in Baja, Mexico, during her Middle School minimester. Munk proved to be a charming host, and he took a special interest in Julia’s Quaker school back in Washington, D.C., because his mother had been a rare Quaker in pre-WW II Vienna, Austria.

Q|

What would you like readers to take away from War of the

Whales?

For me, naval sonar and whales is merely the plotline of this book. At heart, it addresses the question: What makes an effective change agent?

My two protagonists—the environmental attorney and the marine biologist— share several important traits that make them highly effective when it comes to forcing social change. They’re both tenacious and totally committed to fighting the fight for as long as it takes—often at a cost to their personal lives. They don’t allow cynicism to erode their idealism, which is a big challenge in a field like environmental law where you’re typically outgunned by deep-pocketed adversaries or arguing in front of judges who tend to defer to the military, especially during wartime.

Tenacity, it turns out, is as important as intelligence or tactical decision making when it comes to fighting to protect threatened species and habitats.

AILISH HOPPER ’87 Dark-Sky Society New Issues Poetry & Prose, 2014

Q|

Racial dynamics play throughout this book of poetry and reflect your experience growing up white in Washington, DC (and being a white basketball cheerleader at Sidwell Friends in a year when that wasn’t the norm). Tell us about this.

I know very few white folks my age who grew up in DC and were not profoundly aware of race. DC was a black town.

And not only that: DC had such an amazing spectrum of blackness, from the radical black-nationalist bookstore in Adams Morgan, to the buppies everywhere in their beemers, from West Indian herbs and locks and healing, to go-go’s homegrown groove. We also reelected Marion Barry after he’d been arrested and put in prison, an event that underscored painfully, to me, how divided the city was, as I watched

Raw and searching poetry from a child of the city (most) white folks I knew deplore and (many) black folks cheer. This dynamic was repeated around the trial of O.J. Simpson, and the events surrounding the police beating of Rodney King. I vividly remember being a young person and looking around like, You all are the grown-ups?!

I needed answers, not only practical ones but, really, existential ones, as to why the world was so divided, and hateful. Langston Hughes’s “two Americas” were not just two ideas to me—they were two dinner tables.

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› ALUMNI BOOKSHELF

I think I was encouraged at Sidwell Friends to notice these absurdities, and to value, and be encouraged to ask, hard questions—questions of ethics really, and of humanity. My family’s situation, which I discuss in the book, also probably primed me.

That said, I remember being the only white basketball cheerleader, a decision that sort of reflects the whole, complex situation of America and race. On the one hand, I was friends with a few of the girls on the team, so it was as simple as, “Hey, can I... .” Or, simple as the things that all kids deal with: feelings of self-consciousness and desire, learning to follow through, to practice and improve, etc. On the other, race means that we are never separate from these larger, systemic inequalities and power dynamics—which I didn’t get yet, of course. I didn’t make it the whole season; I found it hard to cross the color line, publicly, in that way. No one in this country crosses the color line without getting pushed back in some form. For me it was an anonymous note in my locker that said basically, Why are you doing what you’re doing. And, you know, I didn’t yet have an answer for that. And hard as it was for me to be confronted, I needed to get an answer. I think we all do. I think we need answers that are a lot more real than the ones we have now.

After Sidwell Friends, I went to Princeton where, it’s important for me to note, many of the other SFS alums were black. (Including Adam Henry ’87, who was my friend and in the same class, who always had my back. He passed a few years ago, and I will never forget him, or that.)

At Princeton, I found that I could only get the straight dope about those questions in African American studies, which I eventually minored in. My adviser was Cornel West. The poems in this book, and a number of essays I’ve 76

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written as a result of writing them, are definitely informed by that learning experience. I began to try to understand more deeply where I grew up, and what it means, for any of us, to be racialized.

And, though it seems impossible, to be human, and to try to make a world together that includes and cares for all.

Find more of Ailish’s work at ailishhopper.com.

ANNA MEMBRINO ’07 I Want to Be a Ballerina Random House Books for Young Readers, 2014

Q|

This is your first book. How did the idea come about?

I had been working as an editorial assistant at Random House [in the children’s book division] for about two weeks when my boss called me into her office to take a look at an art sample she’d fallen in love with. It was a single piece of a little girl in a tutu on a stage— very luminous and charming, and very pink (an unfailingly salable hook!).

The Croatian illustrator, Smiljana Coh, had provided some text along with the art, but my boss and I felt we could beef up the story and have something really special. With the title given to me, “I Want to Be a Ballerina,” and my own mission to demonstrate a positive female relationship, I came back to her with a new story—this one about a little girl whose motivation to become a dancer was not the pink tutu and leotard, but a desire to spend more time with her older sister, an aspiring ballerina herself.

Q|

Were you a dancer yourself?

I was not! Well, I took a few ballet classes when I was about 5, but I couldn’t do the splits, and so I gave up on that path pretty quickly.

Q|

What was the creation/ publishing process like from the other side? Do you think the experience has changed the way you work as an editor with other authors?

My boss pushed back on a few points in the story, but sort of allowed me to edit myself for the most part. Having this experience early was important, because it allowed me to be in the shoes of my other authors a bit. While I don’t quite feel the attachment to this story the way I would to one I generated independently, I understand how I’d like to receive feedback, and so now, how to give it.

Q|

Do you have any more books in the works? If not, would you like to, and if so, what kind?

I do a bit of freelance writing (uncredited) for our Pat the Bunny line and other properties, and was asked to consider a sequel to I Want to Be a Ballerina. Other than those, I really do enjoy editing more than anything else. I love working with people more talented than I am to make exciting and beautiful books we couldn’t have made alone.

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PHOTO BY TREVOR OWEN

› ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT

Interviews by Juliet Izon ’03

JULIAN WASSER ’51

Star Shooter

Celebrity photographer Julian Wasser sold his first picture to the Washington Post while still at Sidwell Friends. From that precocious start, he built a career as one of the most accomplished celebrity snappers, shooting everyone from Joan Didion and Jayne Mansfield to the Rolling Stones and the Beatles. Julian has compiled some of his famed photos in The Way We Were, a new tome documenting the excess and glamour of Hollywood in the ’70s. To see the photos mentioned here, visit julianwasser.com.

You started taking pictures at an early age.

Yes, around age 12 while growing up in Washington, DC. I became interested because I was afraid of missing something; I wanted to be right where the action was. A reporter can do a story on the telephone. A photographer has to be on the scene.

How did Sidwell Friends help your passion?

It was already in me. Friends School (as we called it then) just rounded out my interests. It made me aware of the world and of history and our past. It taught me that life was more than a series of news photos.

What was your first professional assignment?

At the University of Pennsylvania. I would get my pictures into the Philadelphia papers and the New York Daily News. But my first real magazine assignment was to shoot foreign tourists at Disneyland for Time. They put me under contract, and I did shoots for Life, Fortune, Money, and later, a lot of work for People.

Why did you decide to make LA your home base?

Julian’s shot of the Beatles

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I was in the US Navy at a naval air station north of San Diego.

I would go to Los Angeles every weekend. I marveled at the beauty of the women, the sea and surf, the music, the clubs, the eternal sunshine, and the newness of everything. Everyone from all over the world came to LA to start a new life.

› ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT

You’ve shot some of Hollywood’s biggest names. Who were some of your favorite subjects?

Farrah Fawcett when she was the goddess of the world.

Katherine Hepburn and Gloria Swanson were true movie stars, and John F. Kennedy was another real star. I was with Bobby Kennedy at the Ambassador when he was shot. I had been on his campaign trip for Time. That was a frightening experience.

Wow. What about other memorable shoots?

My most memorable shoot was photographing artist Marcel Duchamp playing chess with writer Eve Babitz in Pasadena.

Duchamp started the Pop Art movement in 1911 and was responsible for many of the important young artists in the ’60s and ’70s. Eve was quite impressive as his chess opponent.

You also worked as a crime photographer. How did that compare with shooting celebrities?

They aren’t alike. Crime photos are the easy way to get attention in a magazine or a newspaper. The celebrities that I photographed were icons of another era. They were movie stars, not just creations of the media.

How was shooting back then different?

I got all access because I was shooting for Time. One day later [after a Time shoot] I might call a publicist for access to his client for another magazine, and he would scream at me and give me nothing. That’s Hollywood. I didn’t hang out. I was a working journalist. My photos made Hollywood film studios and actors millions of extra dollars. So for the moment they loved me. Today, with the advent of the tabloids—and the swarms of paparazzi at every red carpet event and in front of every club and restaurant and on the freeways in vans with blacked-out windows—it is impossible to get access. Unless you are like Paris Match or People magazine and you pay enormous sums of money for exclusive photo rights. Go see the movie Nightcrawler—it’s all about celebrity photography in LA.

LINDSAY JOHNSON ’07

The Real Reality

Ever wondered how some of your favorite guilty-pleasure reality TV shows come to fruition? Enter Lindsay Johnson ’07. As a casting associate producer based in DC, Lindsay is responsible for finding the perfect candidates for shows like Hoarding: Buried Alive and Big Time RV as well as formulating new series ideas that are engineered to leave viewers hooked.

How did you find yourself working in reality television?

I have always been interested in working in the media or entertainment industry but wasn’t sure exactly what I wanted to do. I spent several months after I graduated from college studying for the LSAT, thinking that I might be interested in pursuing a career in entertainment law, but eventually ended up getting an internship at Discovery in Silver Spring,

One of the most intimate moments you captured was Roman Polanski after Sharon Tate’s murder. How did that come about?

The Sharon Tate murder and the trip to the house on Cielo Drive with a grieving Roman Polanski was the most touching assignment of my career. He took me to the house to photograph the scene so a psychic could look at the pictures and try to find the murderers. I never forgot the scene of Polanski sitting on the floor of Sharon’s bedroom and crying as he looked at photos of her he found in a dresser drawer.

Why did you decide to publish your work?

I thought it was a perfect time to show people how good life was only a few years ago.

Job skill: making subjects feel at ease in front of the camera

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Maryland. I worked as a production intern on the TLC show Hoarding: Buried Alive and loved it so much that I knew I wanted to continue with a career in TV production.

What a show. What were your job duties?

When I was interning, they needed help casting the show, which required doing a lot of research and making tons of phone calls. I had never thought about working in talent or casting but ended up liking it a lot, since I love to talk to people and am pretty outgoing. I did help on site at a hoarder’s house in New Jersey, where it was packed to the brim. There were tons of dogs and cats, too, so you can imagine the smell.

We had about 20 volunteers, professional organizers, cleaning services, and four or five crew members, and after eight hours we had only gotten through a few rooms. There were rats everywhere (live and dead) and they were jumping around while we cleaned.

Where do you work now?

At Half Yard Productions in Bethesda, Maryland. I’m a casting AP (associate producer) and I work in our development department, where we create new shows that we hope to sell to networks. I look for cast members that fit new concepts that we’re putting together, as well as for shows already in production. Casting requires a lot of researching and interviewing. I do most of my interviews via video call (Skype) since I can’t feasibly travel to meet every person.

What does working in development entail?

Development involves researching what types of programs are doing well and which networks are looking for which types of programming, as well as a lot of brainstorming. Once we have an idea that everyone agrees would do well in the current market, we start researching to see if we can find the right people for the show. And then when we have footage together in a package, we bring that to the owners of the company. If they like it, we’ll approach various networks to see if anyone is interested in commissioning a pilot and then, hopefully, ordering episodes of a series.

What makes for a good reality-show star?

Casting can be high pressure because having an interesting cast is so essential to a nonfiction program being popular and rating well. If a cast doesn’t have a variety of personalities and an interesting dynamic, there is no way that the show will be fun to watch. As a rule, people with big personalities and interesting or unique backgrounds make for good TV. What shows are you currently working on?

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A Shark Week souvenir from Discovery

are Filthy Riches for National Geographic, Tours by Unger and Big Time RV for Travel Channel, and a new show that we are producing called Driving Vegas, which will air on A&E. The most well-known and longest-running series that our company produces is probably TLC’s Say Yes to the Dress, which has many spin-offs that we produce as well.

Any funny stories about some of your most unique applicants?

When I was working on Hoarders, I obviously worked with a lot of interesting and eccentric people. Most of them were mentally ill, so it was a constant balancing act between being understanding and patient but also getting them to open up and show their true colors and personalities. More often than not, the interviews felt like therapy sessions, but I got to know some of the people really well. A lot of those who appeared on the show would contact me afterward to say thank you for the help that we offered as part of the series. They’d tell me that our show changed their lives for the better, which was so nice to hear. Reality TV is not all bad!

Juliet Izon ’03 is the entertainment editor for Niche Media publications, which includes Capitol File, Gotham, and LA Confidential. She lives in Manhattan with her husband, fellow Sidwell Friends alumnus Michael Lewin ’01. When she’s not writing, she’s blogging; you can read more of her musings at julietsmarried.com.

› UPCOMING EVENTS

FROM THE CLERK OF THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION:

CATE LIVINGSTON FERNANDEZ ’76 This fall, Sidwell Friends School students, faculty, staff, and members of the board of trustees had the opportunity to hear presentations and participate in workshops given by Arthur Larrabee, a widely respected, lifelong Friend and former general secretary of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, the central organizing body for Quaker meetings in the Philadelphia area. Arthur focused on teaching Quaker decision making, which does not rely on voting to determine the majority view, but rather seeks unity about the best course of action.

The Alumni Association Executive Board met with Arthur for an in-depth session titled, “Friends Decision Making in a Friends School.” We were reminded that achieving “consensus” is not the same as “sense-of-the-meeting” decision making.

Consensus implies that participants are in general agreement.

In contrast, sense-of-the-meeting involves: 1. listening beyond the self (which entails listening not only to what others are saying, but also for what the group is saying about what might be the right outcome); 2. releasing after speaking (in which you speak your own, personal truth and then release it to the meeting); 3. separating personal preferences from what may be different, right outcomes for the group; 4. creating a climate of safety for all to speak candidly; 5. uniting when possible, standing aside when appropriate (allowing the decision to move forward when you disagree); and 6. seeking unity about a sense of the meeting, not the matter at hand.

We were reminded that Quaker process involves being ready to participate fully by sharing experiences and knowledge, listening respectfully to others’ experiences and knowledge, and remaining open to new insights and ideas.

Arthur’s evocative presentation inspired AAEB members to try to utilize key sense-of-the-meeting techniques in our upcoming meetings and in our work and personal lives. He reminded us that the point of the Quaker process is not to make decisions, but to build community, the crux of what makes a Friends school special.

REGIONAL EVENTS WITH BRYAN GARMAN

New Head of School Bryan Garman will be joining alumni at regional club events in the following locations—check sidwell.edu/HOS for more information: BOSTON CHICAGO FLORIDA LOS ANGELES NEW YORK SAN FRANCISCO OUT & ABOUT WITH FACULTY AND FRIENDS MARCH 9, MAY 13

See page 83 for more information.

ALL-COMMUNITY MEETING FOR WORSHIP MARCH 15, JUNE 14 33RD ANNUAL JOHN FISHER ZEIDMAN ’79 MEMORIAL LECTURE WITH EVAN OSNOS MARCH 18 DC NET@NIGHT: SPEED NETWORKING MARCH 31 ONLINE AUCTION APRIL 6–12 LIVE AUCTION: “CELEBRATE DC!” APRIL 18 REUNION WEEKEND (CLASSES ENDING IN 0 OR 5) MAY 1-2 LOWER SCHOOL GRANDPARENTS DAY MAY 7 MIDDLE SCHOOL GRANDPARENTS DAY MAY 8 TENNIS ROUND ROBIN MAY 17 NYC NET@NIGHT: SPEED NETWORKING JUNE 18

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› ALUMNI EVENTS

From left: Moderator Marshall Heinberg, Jessica Holsey ’02, Neil Blumental, and Peter Laughter

NYC NET@NIGHT October 29, 2014. Together with alumni from Friends Seminary and Brooklyn Friends, Sidwell Friends alumni gathered at Dillon Gallery in NYC to get insights and advice from a panel of entrepreneurs and enjoy open networking time.

MARTHA’S VINEYARD RECEPTION August 2, 2014. For the second year in a row, the Wilkinson family—Amy ’74, Karin ’77, Monty ’79, and their dad, Bob Wilkinson—hosted this annual celebration. It rained for the first time in four years for the event, but that didn’t keep Sidwellians away. Alumni from as far away as California attended!

Jessica Holsey ’02 spoke about being a co-CEO, the importance of having a mission-driven company, and what influenced her decision not to go to business school before starting Susty Party. Other panelists were Friends Seminary alumnus Neil Blumenthal, co-founder and CEO of Warby Parker, and Brooklyn Friends alumnus Peter Laughter, CEO of Wall Street Services.

The panel was moderated by Marshall Heinberg, Friends Seminary alumnus.

Nalani Lyde, daughter of Janée Hayes ’97, Matthew McLaughlin ’12, Amy Wilkinson ’77, and Diego Arene-Morley ’12

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› ALUMNI EVENTS

CHICAGO WINE TASTING October 26, 2014. The Chicago alumni community, which is especially rich in intergenerational friendships, gathered on a Sunday afternoon at City Winery for a casual wine tasting. Alumni representing classes from 1960 to 2007 enjoyed spending time together.

ANNOUNCING:

OUT & ABOUT WITH FACULTY AND FRIENDS Join us for Out and About with Faculty and Friends, formerly the Book Club and Lecture Series, which will feature evening discussions hosted at various locations in the city, including private residences. Topics or books are selected in advance, and discussions are led by an esteemed faculty member who is a subject-matter expert. Tickets are $40 per person or $75 per couple. All net proceeds benefit student scholarships at Sidwell Friends.

COMING UP:

Intellectual Character: What It Is, Why It Matters, and How to Get It Monday, March 9, 7:00 p.m.

Home of Diane and Jim Bankoff From left: Paul Marengo ’67, Mary Fano Giacomoni ’60, and Dario Giacomoni

What does it really mean to be intelligent? Merry Adelfio, Lower School mathematics coordinator, and Denise Coffin, kindergarten teacher, present this evening with Intellectual Character author Ron Ritchhart. Ron will share insights on a new and powerful view of intelligence that moves beyond ability and instead focuses on cognitive dispositions such as curiosity, skepticism, and open-mindedness.

Lincoln’s Last Speech Wednesday, May 13, 7:00 p.m.

President Lincoln’s Cottage at the Soldiers’ Home

Naomi Miller ’92, Susan Popkin Cahn ’82, Emily Paster ’92, and Jesse Levine ’85, Chicago Club co-president

Lincoln’s last public speech, which he delivered a few nights before the assassination, is less than three pages long but raises fascinating questions about what should happen to the country post-Civil War. Included is a 30-minute tour of the Cottage led by Ruff Fant, SFS trustee and chair of the board at President Lincoln’s Cottage. The discussion will take place in the Emancipation Room, where Lincoln wrote that seminal document. The event is presented by Ashish Patwardhan, Upper School English teacher, and Steve Steinbach, Upper School History Department chair.

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COLLEGE DINNERS Sidwell Friends Young Alumni Coordinator Anna Lindel traveled to New England this fall to host the first round of 2014/15 College Dinners. She started in Vermont and wound her way down to Providence, hosting dinners for alumni who are currently students at University of Vermont, St. Michael’s, Middlebury, Dartmouth, Harvard, MIT, Tufts, Wellesley, Bentley, and Brown. More College Dinners are planned throughout the rest of the academic year at campuses across the country!

Two fun evenings for students were also hosted at the University of Chicago and Northwestern University.

BOSTON Back row: Cecilia Laguarda ’13 (Harvard), Hershel Tamboli ’14 (Tufts),

Thomas Esch ’11 (Harvard), Emily Bernstein ’11 (Tufts), Amir Nasr ’11 (Tufts), Will Mendez ’12 (Harvard), and Nick Mendez ’10 (Harvard). Front row: Zein Aburish ’14 (Wellesley), Nora Kelsall ’14 (MIT), Eric Foster ’14 (Bentley), Bora Tarimcilar ’14 (Tufts), Carolyn Peyser ’11 (Tufts), and Peter Estes ’11 (Tufts)

BURLINGTON

Alex Collingsworth ’12 (University of Vermont), Bridget McElroy ’12 (St. Michael’s), and Danny Wiggins ’13 (University of Vermont)

DARTMOUTH

MIDDLEBURY Michael Davies ’11, Kate Hamilton ’11, Ryan McElroy ’11, Hannah Bristol ’10, and Emma Walker ’14

BROWN Benny Miller-Gootnick ’14 and Riley Woodwell ’14.

Not pictured: Andrew Flax ’13

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Chase Migas ’14, Evan Honnold ’14, Aaron Lewin ’13, Henry Joyce ’12, Rachel Gray ’11, Dylan Everett ’11, and Brendan Caldwell ’13

› ALUMNI EVENTS

ALUMNI PLAYERS AFTER THE GAME

Back row: Cole Graham ’12, Brendan Caldwell ’13, Nick SmithHerman ’09, Wes Roman ’11, Daniel Perlis ’12, Julian MacMillan ’10, Bora Tarimcilar ’14, Seth MacMillan ’10, Dek Sayeh ’06, and Chris Marciniak ’09. Front row: Nick Roman ’11, Nick Jackson ’14, Bardia Aghdaey ’09, Ames Ward ’14, Daniel Alers ’14, Allie Levey ’05, and Andrew Smith-Herman ’06

ALUMNI SOCCER GAME

NORTHWESTERN

Back row: Taylor Riley ’11, Danny Baker ’13, and Andy Linder ’12. Front row: Patrick Lansdale ’14, Aislinn McMillan ’13, and Isabel Shimanski ’14, who is in the nearby Joffrey Ballet Training Program

August 23, 2014. Despite fairly heavy rain during the first half, the annual alumni vs. varsity game was well attended by both players and spectators, with 17 alumni taking the field, including three sets of siblings: Andrew Smith-Herman ’06 and Nick SmithHerman ’09, and amazingly, two sets of twins, Wes Roman ’11 and Nick Roman ’11, and Seth MacMillan ’10 and Julian MacMillan ’10. The teams were well-matched for much of the game, but the alumni took it away in the second half with the final score at 5–0. Two alumni players are current assistant coaches for the SFS varsity team (Allie Levey ’05 and Seth MacMillan), so it was great fun for them to square off against their varsity charges. Upper School math teacher Jon Mormino refereed, while Coach Jorgen Kjaer lead the varsity squad and Allie Levey took the helm of the alumni team.

See more photos at sidwell.edu/pics.

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

Jonathan Gerstell ’13 and Aidan

Lilienfeld ’13

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Alexa Cerf ’11, Chris Williams ’09, Mamadou Guèye, Finn Stern ’11, Cleo Abram ’11, and Colleen Oberg ’10

Helen MacIsaac ’77, Betsy Zeidman ’76, Craig Brashear, Rebecca Kelly ’69, and David Kleeman ’75

BROOKLYN HAPPY HOUR September 23, 2014. Sidwell Friends’ Happy Hour in the NYC borough (which shall forever be known as “The No Sleep ’Til Brooklyn Tour” thanks to the video invitation created by then-interim Head of School Ellis Turner, interim Upper School Principal Mamadou Guèye, and former faculty member George Lang, who all attended) drew alumni from the classes of 1948 through 2011! Nearly 90 alumni attended. For more photos, go to sidwell.edu/pics.

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Shelleye-Anne Bailey ’91 and Olivia Gentile ’92

S TAY C ONNECTED WITH S IDWELL FRI END S ALUMNI Sidwell Friends School Alumni

›

Sidwell Friends School Alumni

1937 Doris Powell Schultz: The 14 graduates of 1937 are now represented by Elin Gudger Parks, who lives in Arizona and retains her grandfather’s historic home in Glacier National Park, and me. I live part time in my Mount Vernon-area home with one daughter and the rest of the time with my second daughter in Nassawadox on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. I am researching the Custis family, who established a plantation near here on the Chesapeake Bay shore and named it “Arlington” for their home in England. Martha Washington’s first husband was born here, and her (Custis side) great-grandson built his home on the Potomac’s banks and named it “Arlington” again. It is now known as Arlington National Cemetery, so it all started here! . . . My husband and I, married for 66 years, vacationed by traveling the “blue highways” and spent as least one night in each of the lower 48 states. We toured many state capitals. . . . I have many SFS memories: inspiring teachers, good friends, and Quaker principles. Mrs. Sidwell explained to us her rose garden, to the east of which was the primary school building built from lumber used as President Wilson’s inaugural stand. (I remember a misguided

snowball landing in her Eye St. office!) Mr. Sidwell was not only a founder/principal, but a farmer at heart. Once he was seen pounding nails on his farm’s barn roof. A visitor remarked: “You are working on Sunday.”

Mr. Sidwell replied: “And my cows will be dry.” He spoke to us each morning from the study hall platform before dismissing us for seven 40-minute classes. From that same platform, craftsman/ musician Roman Steiner led singing on Tuesday mornings for high school and Wednesdays for middle school before teaching wood carving. I still have the deeply carved patterned footstool and oak chest which took several years’ class periods. Mr. Steiner was the composer of the music for “Friends Forever.”

1953 Gloria Girton ggat58b@orange.fr Gloria Girton: I retired for the second time last June and had no sooner done so than I was asked back. However, I think this time my retirement from teaching in Paris will last. I am now giving half-day gastronomic and architectural tours in Provence.

For the moment I am offering two: one of Avignon itself and the other around Les Baux-de-

Provence to taste olive oils and visit Les Baux (both tours include lunch). You can read my blog at francefoodandgloire.blogspot. com.

Hank Holmes: My daughter, Sukanya “Ning Nong,” and her husband are still living in Paris. We are having a hot correspondence about the World Cup, in which— as of this writing— we Yankees persist as upstarts.

My son Stacy (named after my brother, F. Stacy Holmes II ’52 ) just got engaged to a lovely Japanese-German who has just joined the German foreign service. . . . About 50 years ago, as a young volunteer teacher in Laos, I was part of a group who collected this small country’s traditional songs. Most of these were already 50 years old, and few folks remembered them.

In 1965, we got the collection of 41 songs published under the imprimatur of HRH Suvanna Phouma, the prime minister (who was a music buff himself).

The book has the words (in Lao

@sfsalumni

and Western phonetics), crisp photos of local life, musical staffs, and summaries in French and English. A couple of months ago, something inspired me to reprint this book, partly to bring back to overseas Lao people some treasured memories. . . .

Lastly, in May my wife and I drove to Yellowstone, of which the highlight was seeing baby buffaloes. In case you didn’t know this, when they are little, they look just like baby cows and don’t have those intimidating humps. Cute as can be.

Dick Lanham: My life has been most rewarding and, from the start, lucky. I am well and fit now at the age of 78, married for the second time and most happily— and about to enter the 21st year of retirement, dwelling happily in my house in Brentwood, up in the Santa Monica mountains, where I have lived for the last 29 years. I am five miles from the University of California–Los Angeles (UCLA), where I spent most of my career, with a view, albeit distant,

“I asked her to lunch at my house, where she stayed for seven hours and where I found, in the course of our conversation, my second wife.”

—Dick Lanham ’53

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OFFICIAL WHITE HOUSE PHOTO BY PETE SOUZA

’42

DAN PINCK ’42: A MEDAL AND A MESSAGE When Dan Pinck ’42 spoke with President Obama at the 70th anniversary of the D-Day Invasion at Colleville-surMer, France, on June 6, 2014, he had one thing on his mind: Sidwell Friends School. According to an article in The Boston Globe about their discussion (”Cambridge Veteran has a Moment with Obama,” June 12, 2014): “When I get this photo of us, would you send it to the Sidwell Friends School to put in their bulletin?” said Dan. Obama “laughed and said he would.” Shortly after returning from France, Dan received a very special photograph, printed above, from the White House.

Dan served with the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the World War II predecessor to the CIA, and the US Special Operations Command. He was the only OSS veteran in attendance for the Normandy commemoration, where he received a medal from Claude Bartololone, the president of the French National Assembly.

“In a ‘Day of Service’ remembrance activity on September 11, we helped build a playground at our granddaughter Violet’s school. It was a fun event, and later that day President Obama and the first lady visited and did some volunteer work.”

—Jeff Fletcher ’60

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of the ocean and with sea breezes that bring said ocean closer every afternoon. Our glass-walled, post-and-beam midcentury modern home, built on a hillside with decks cantilevered out into the canyon, is filled with Danish modern furniture that my first wife, Carol, and I collected and had built for us in Denmark throughout our marriage. It was just where I wanted to be with the woman I fell in love with at 19, married at 21, and lived with until she was struck down by a brain hemorrhage in November 2007. We had just returned from a month in France to celebrate our 50th anniversary, and if a deep marriage had to end, that was not the worst way it could have come. . . . My academic career followed a familiar pattern: undergraduate and graduate work at Yale, three years teaching at Dartmouth, and then the move to UCLA. Carol took a PhD in Classics at UCLA and, after a year’s teaching at Brown (I had a fellowship and could travel), we returned and she started an editing career at the UCLA Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies. I taught in the English Department until 1994, when I embraced a very advantageous early retirement package (I dedicated my last book to it!). I continued my other work, writing and working as an expert witness in copyright cases for the TV and motion picture business. We had some wonderful trips, including a month on a freighter from Los Angeles to Genoa, and I had some rewarding post-retirement posts—Mellon Professor at Tulane, humanities fellowships at Cornell and Michigan, Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Fellowship—and have revised several of my books and written a new one. . . . After Carol’s death, I received a phone call from Anne Strasburg ’65, a Friends School lifer who was 12 years behind us.

She had been handling alumni relations in Southern California, calling all the alums to invite them to a day of public service. I had always begged off, but this time I just told the truth: My wife was dead, and I was beside myself with grief. She asked me if I would like to talk about it; I suggested lunch at the Faculty Club, and after that I asked her to lunch at my house, where she stayed for seven hours and where I found, in the course of our conversation, my second wife. She grew up on the banks of the Potomac, not so very far from where I lived, and we shared a Washington life, albeit without meeting. When I introduced her to my old friend Ed Condren, he said, “Dick, you are the luckiest guy in the world.” And so it has proved.

1960 Jody Hutchinson mdodyh@yahoo.com Diana Lady Dougan was honored at the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training “Tribute to Excellence” Gala in Washington, DC, on May 6, 2014. Diana received the Cyrus Vance Award for her pioneering leadership in advancing telecommunications, information technologies, and media globally in both the public and private sectors. Her vanguard work under appointments by three US presidents (Republican and Democrat) in Senateconfirmed positions included six years overseeing US bilateral and multilateral policies and negotiations as the first statutory United States coordinator for international communications and information policy, and administratively as assistant secretary of state. Diana’s leadership in the private sector was also highlighted, including the Global Information

› CLASS NOTES

1960s 1. Ambassador Diana Lady Dougan ’60 and former Secretary of State James A. Baker; 2. Annie Bissell ’62; 3. Joan Mills Busko ’62 celebrating her 70th birthday with “five and two-thirds” of her grandchildren; 4. Granddaughters of Jeff Fletcher ’62, Kat and Violet.

Infrastructure Commission she established in association with the World Bank and the Center for Information Infrastructure and Economic Development which she founded and co-chaired under the prestigious Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Diana was also recognized for her many contributions to media, including directing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, co-founding the International Media Fund, and producing Peabody awardwinning television. Her acclaimed documentary films that were noted included Pandora’s Promise, Girl Rising, and the 2013 and 2014 Oscar nominees How to Survive a Plague and The Square.

1962 Peter Enemark peter.and.meme@gmail.com Annie Bissell continues to work as a volunteer at the Washington National Zoo, where she takes care of cuddly, spotted leopard cubs as well as elephants that weigh between 7,000 and 10,000 pounds. One of her favorite elephants, Ambika, is a female who is about four years younger than the members of the class of 1962—Annie’s “little sister.”

Chett Breed (with his wife, Suanna, at his side in a Wi-Fi

cafe): Suanna and I are living in the house we’re remodeling in Portland and will be here another month after three so far. We’re looking forward to the return of Charlie Mills to the city, and hope that Jeff Rogers is around and wants to befriend a pair of tooold-to-be-doing-this Iowans who nevertheless will be hammering and sawing and building into November but more happily with a few distractions. . . . On grandchildren: Our 11-year-old is running cross-country for her 6th grade school team, getting very good at piano, and loving art class; our 13-year-old is doing her homework on her own after years of resisting and is developing extraordinary artistic skills; and her 9-year-old brother is working at reading and writing like many reluctant 9-year-old boys, but he’s got the personality of a Buddha so we don’t worry much about him, either. I hope all our classmates are well.

Patricia Harrell Burk: After much thought and prayer, my husband, Bill, and I made the decision to move to Mason, Ohio, very close to Cincinnati. My oldest son and his family live in Cincy as do my daughter and her family (with another grandbaby due in November). It is definitely a huge step, but the right one for us at this time. We should be in our new home close to the

first of November. As a native Washingtonian, I am finding out that it is both exciting and challenging to leave this area and begin a brand new chapter for the two of us.

Terry Eakin: I had a great 70th birthday with my family and a few friends last weekend. I retired from EYA real estate development earlier this year, and my wife, Lindsay, and I are enjoying our additional time together. We hope to have some publishable news about grandchildren in the next Alumni Magazine.

Jeff Fletcher: My wife, Tara, and I had a good trip to Key West in July and are looking forward to a week in Europe on a Danube River cruise later this year. . . . In a “Day of Service” remembrance activity on September 11, we helped build a playground at our granddaughter Violet’s school. The construction effort involved nearly 100 people, including young AmeriCorps volunteers and staff from KaBOOM!, a national nonprofit that funds and coordinates playground construction projects.

It was a fun event that was covered by the Washington Post, and later that day President Obama and the first lady visited the school and did some volunteer work. . . . Our two granddaughters, Kat (age 3) and Violet (age 6), continue to delight and amuse us.

Tara has had great success lately with her watercolor painting, but on a sad note, her 101-year-old father passed away in August. . . .

I still serve on several nonprofit boards and on a neighborhood transportation committee.

Jill Robinson Grubb likes to take her three grandchildren on “Road Scholar” trips—most recently to the Columbus, Ohio, zoo and aquarium. Jill recently took a weeklong canoeing trip by herself in Quetico Provincial Park in Ontario, Canada, north of Lake Superior. It was “a splendid, peaceful, arduous, loon-lover’s paradise of a trip.” Jill is looking for suggestions for more Road Scholar (grandparent/grandchild) trips.

Ellinor Duffey Hayward: Now that I have retired from my tax business, I’ve been able to escape Minnesota winters and spend more time at our condo on Sanibel Island, Florida. I’ve also become more involved in animal welfare issues. My husband, Ed, and I just visited Farm Sanctuary in Watkins Glen, New York, and were very impressed by all the great things they are doing for rescued factoryfarmed animals.

Helen Hawes and Michael Morse have been to Niagara Falls, where they got soaking wet, and to Chebeague Island, Maine,

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1960s 1. Elin Sowle, partner of Charlie Mills ’62, with her grandchildren Simon and Emile; 2. Michael Morse ’62 and Helen Hawes ’62 (photo by Cam Page); 3. Cameron Page, widow of Russel Page ’62, sent news of a mini class reunion with Michael Morse ’62, Helen Hawes ’62, Steve Carrier ’62, and Sam Gaskins ’62. The gathering was hosted by Sam and Susan Gaskins on Chebeague Island in Maine (photo by Cam Page); 4. Children and grandchildren of Judy McGregor Caldwell ’62: Marcy with newborn son, Davis, and Carter with his son, Parker.

where they enjoyed the summer sunshine.

Charlie Mills: Pictured above is a photo of my partner, Elin Sowle, and her two grandchildren, Simon and Emile Gouffier. Simon is 6 years old, Emile is 19 months, and Elin is a little past 29.

Art Hill and his wife, Sherry, have retired. They have just completed a move from Maryland to Southport, North Carolina, a small, historic town 30 miles south of Wilmington, where they are surrounded by unopened boxes and misplaced furniture.

The Hills took a break from their move to visit their 11-month-old granddaughter, Ada Madeleine Hill, who lives in Los Angeles with their son Benjamin and his wife, Stacy. Also visiting was the Hills’ younger son, Nicholas, and his wife, Lex. It was the family’s first reunion in more than 18 months.

A repeat is scheduled in Southport during the holidays.

Nancy Grabill Sherman: I interrupted my retirement activities and jumped back into the nonprofit arena as a navigator with Vermont Health Connect, Vermont’s version of ObamaCare. I assist people as they go through the application and enrollment maze so they can get healthcare. I meet interesting people at farmers’ markets and

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community events and respond to their questions or comments about the healthcare exchange and progress toward publicly financed, affordable care for all Vermonters in 2017. And there’s still time for adventures with my husband, Michael (we just celebrated 46 years together), and trips to Arizona and Chicago to see our kids, Adam and Roger. I’ll be there for the 55th reunion!

Erik Thorson: Rhonda’s and my son, Lars, graduated from Berklee College of Music this summer, and I flew up to Boston at the end of August to get him, his many musical instruments, his minimal collection of furniture worth keeping, and other detritus of a college career. After a fun couple of days together in Boston, we loaded his worldly goods in a small, very yellow rental truck and drove back to Nashville. Along the way, we explored some historical sites: Old Sturbridge Village in southern Masssachusetts, Gettysburg Battlefield in Pennsylvania, Monticello in

Virginia, and TVA’s Norris Dam in Tennessee. We got to spend two of the four travel nights with relatives. At my sister Ingrid’s house in Bethesda, we ate dinner with their daughter and her two spirited and very entertaining daughters, ages 10 and 8 (I think).

Full of drama, comedy, and lots of energy, it was big fun. . . . As we were nearing home on the fifth and last day of our journey, Lars said, “Dad, I’m really amazed at how fun this trip was. I thought we’d run out of things to talk about after three or four hours, but we’ve had great conversations all the way down.” Every once in a while, something happens that lets you know that all the parenting has not been in vain.

Judith Markley Wastler: I hope this finds all our classmates well. I have almost completely recuperated from a broken arm and rotator cuff operation. It happened on a plane when I was serving drinks. [Judy works as a flight attendant.] Someone put a bag in the aisle, and I was carrying

“Chris and I are in the process of adopting a 12-year-old girl named Monica who has been in the foster-care system for the last five years.”

—Stephen Griffith ’63

the drinks on a tray and I didn’t see it. That was in March, and I should go back to work at the end of October. It has been a long haul, but I feel great now!

1963 Margo Lee Hofeldt Margo10022@aol.com John Bralove: I am still working for the Captiva Erosion Prevention District, the agency responsible for beach renourishment for Captiva Island, Florida. We just completed a $23 million project. Anna and I were in Berkeley in April to attend my niece’s wedding. We spent a week in Freeport, Maine, in August.

I continue to avidly and rabidly follow Washington’s professional sports teams, especially the baseball and football teams. If the Nationals get into the World Series, I will come up to DC for one of the games, assuming I can get tickets. Anna and I continue to play tennis as often as we can, given our work schedules.

Garth Dougherty: We celebrated my mother-in-law’s 90th birthday at a restaurant on the Mississippi River. I gave a small speech, mentioning that she was so old that her first Christmas was the first Christmas and she called her first boyfriend Hun, because

› CLASS NOTES

Lucy Hilmer Elfstrom: In August, after I became one of Lensculture’s Emerging Talents for 2014, my lifelong self-portrait series, Birthday Suits [See box at right— Ed.], was discussed online in the Huffington Post, Slate/Behold, The New York Times, and in countless blogs all over the world. A month later, I was in Virginia with my only sister, Cathy, during the last week of her life. It’s been an overwhelmingly emotional and tumultuous time. Such is life.

George Galland: Ellen and I have nothing much to report since the reunion of 2013, other than stupendously boring and unimportant health problems that aren’t getting much in the way of anything. We hope everyone else is doing no worse. We both are still working. We both say we want to cut back, in which Ellen is being sincere and I’m possibly being insincere. All the best from both of us.

Stephen Griffith: I have two bits of news. Chris and I are in the process of adopting a 12-yearold girl named Monica who has been in the foster-care system for the last five years. Monica is now living with us, and we hope that she will become a permanent member of our family. I also am scheduled to receive the President’s Award for Public Service from the Oregon State Bar in December.

Lucy Jaspersen Glenn: My dear David passed away on March 22, 2014, from complications of an unusual form of cancer. We almost made it to 35 years! My life now consists of tutoring, especially Spanish, and much more. I work with students from independent schools and also with public school students. I

love my work teaching Spanish to little ones at an after-school language enrichment program.

Friends have been supportive, as well as my Film and Food group and my book club, which add companionship and intellectual stimulation to my life. Grief support groups and counseling from hospice have been helpful.

I will visit Washington for two weeks at Thanksgiving and hope to catch up with some local people from my class then. If anyone is available for a visit, contact me so we can set something up. If you venture to the San Francisco Bay Area or Central Coast of California, I would love to hear from you. Meanwhile, I am learning to make the most of the goodness of life and am learning many new skills. I don’t know what my future holds, but I am seeking new paths and hoping to continue to grow. This is a time in our lives when we may know that we all are mortal but may still be surprised by that fact!

Margo Lee Hofeldt: The past year has been nonstop activity!

We are always doing things in Miami, which include theater, art events, charity events, literary society, garden club, wine and food events, and more. Our travels included a one-week Western Caribbean cruise; family visits in Oregon, Atlanta, Rhode Island, and Boston; a few days in New Hampshire; and our annual summer/fall drive up I-95 to Connecticut with stops along the way. While we’re in Connecticut, I love to go into New York City to see friends, theater, museums, and shops. I did also take a tour of The World Trade Center Museum, which is so beautifully done. It’s been a great year so far, and I look forward to lots of good times ahead for all of us.

’63

©LUCYHILMER

he was one. Got a good crop this year.

Birthday Suit — Age 31

April 22, 1976

LUCY HILMER ’63: “BIRTHDAY SUIT” SELFIES For 40 years, I’ve photographed myself on my birthday wearing nothing but my white Lollipop underpants, shoes, and socks. I made my first “Birthday Suit” self-portrait in 1974, at age 29, in Death Valley, California. Without fail, I’ve faced my camera every April 22 since then to create a history of one woman’s journey through time.

As a child of the 1950s, I came of age before women’s lib and struggled to buck the stereotypes of a culture that branded me a pretty girl, thin enough to be a fashion model and not much more. By the early 1970s, I found a way, with camera and tripod, to define myself on my own terms—in the most open, vulnerable way I could.

Each year, I wait to see exactly where I am—inside and out—on April 22, and then simply stand up as authentically as I can to be counted. I’ve never skipped a year, even in the hardest of times. Every portrait goes into the family album.

My biggest supporter is my husband, Bob Elfstrom, who’s believed in me as an artist even when I’ve doubted myself. (He’s not pictured here, however.)

What I’ve learned from my “Birthday Suits” series is that I’m really no different from anyone else. I see myself as a kind of stand-in for every woman and man, as year by year I’ve stripped off a bit of the camouflage we all share to reveal something true and universal.

I’ll continue making these photos for as long as I live. My book, BIRTHDAY SUITS: A Woman, Her Camera & Time, is about to be published. I’m also trying to complete my personal film, about an artist who tries to stop time with images. Find out more at lucyhilmer.com.

Jeanne Perkins Hofferkamp: The big C came back again; the first

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“We are auditing courses in Islamic art and architecture, and I am auditing a music appreciation course. We are keeping those little gray cells busy!”

—Alison Feiss Kriviskey ’63 one was in 1987. So I had surgery in January. I started chemotherapy in February and ended it in April. Steve and I still got to go to Florida for our annual trip, just a little shorter this time because I had to be back home for a chemo treatment. We had a great time, but unfortunately didn’t get to see Margo Lee Hofeldt in Miami due to conflicts. Next year is another chance! I’m feeling great now, and all reports are that I’ll live to be 100! There was lots of golf this summer, along with a few trips to Michigan. As of last December 21, I have a new grandson, Evan. The two granddaughters (Olivia and Carina) are now 10 and 8. All live in Milwaukee, so it’s not too far to go and visit. I will be going to Arizona in October and hope to be able to hook up with David Ogilvy in Tucson. This year when we go to Florida, we WILL see Margo and hopefully others who don’t live too far from Naples. I’m hoping all of you are well, and I send you my best!

Sharon Smull Hinckley: I just published the La Jolla 2015 Calendar (fourth year in print).

The calendar is available at La Jolla area shops and online. I also juried the Black & White Art Show for the La Jolla Art Association. Kent Hinckley, my husband, recently published his first book, Hearts, Minds, and Coffee, available in paperback or on Kindle from Amazon. A synopsis: The Army assigned four antiwar soldiers to infested Viet Cong territory and expected them

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to be killed, as had happened to the previous team. Instead, they survived by befriending the locals in the village of Phan Lac. When a North Vietnamese division makes a surprise attack against a nearby US regiment, these four dissidents, despite enormous odds, devise a ruse to save fellow Americans and the Vietnamese villagers. The plan was working until the regiment’s commander’s helicopter, ignoring radio messages to leave, gets shot down, nullifying the effective plan.

The four soldiers become more exposed. Faced with certain death, they resort to radical tactics in hopes of saving Americans in the regiment, the villagers, the men in the chopper, and their lives.

Alison Feiss Kriviskey: The big news in our life is that our son, David, was married in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on August 31. With our daughters and their families, we joined the larger extended families of the bride and groom for a wonderful Southwestern-themed wedding.

Both the groom and the bride wore cowboy boots! Now Bruce and I are home in Northampton, Massachusetts, enjoying a New England autumn. We are auditing courses at Smith College, which is only two miles from home. We are both auditing courses in Islamic art and architecture. In addition, I am auditing a music appreciation course about the history of the first performance of five famous pieces of music, including the first opera by Monteverdi, Beethoven’s

Symphony no. 9 and Handel’s Messiah. We are keeping those little gray cells busy!

Pam Fraser Leeming: David and I are off to New Mexico again, this time joined by our son, Paul, and his family. Fall is beautiful there.

Any Class of 1963 activities in the New York area coming up?

John Luykx: I was in touch with Sharon Smull Hinckley and her husband, Kent, when his book came out. I keep up with Jeanne Perkins Hofferkamp, mostly by “Words with Friends” chat, and enjoy Facebook postings by Kathy Anderson and Mary Lou Peterson Johnson. Linda and I were in Sun Valley, Idaho, for most of July and some of August again, working guests for our friends.

Thankfully no forest fires this summer! . . . We are enjoying our current digs in Glover Park, just up from Georgetown, now living the urban semiretired dream still in the shadow of Sidwell Friends just down the street. We are aiming for the prize for traveling the shortest distance to alumni and school events. I am keeping an eye on local news, including the huge new construction of a shopping center/mall at the site of the old Giant and G.C. Murphy at Wisconsin Avenue and Macomb Street. Also, I am anticipating the closing of Fannie Mae, once the home of Sidwell Friends’ playing fields just across the street (50 years ago!).

Dave Nichols: Lila and I continue to enjoy the Southwest Florida lifestyle, playing a lot of tennis and volunteering with the Guardian ad Litem program, our church, and mentoring in a 4th grade classroom. We also enjoy visiting our grandson, who lives in Athens, Georgia. We continue to be blessed with the ability to travel and this year have made a cruise trip to Tahiti and two

riverboat trips to France: one in the Bordeaux region, and the other from Paris to the Beaches of Normandy. The Normandy visit was quite emotional. We recently returned from a trip to the Dominican Republic to visit a child we sponsor in the Compassion International program. My 70th birthday on New Year’s Eve will be celebrated in Cabo San Lucus with dear friends. We visit my sister, Jan, and her husband, Tony Thompson ’59, periodically in Boynton Beach, Florida.

David Ogilvy: Spent three-anda-half months at our Flagstaff home, enjoying the (relatively) cooler weather and playing golf.

On a totally unrelated subject, I was amazed to see the class giving for our class. Terrible! I support Friends, albeit not with a big check, but I left after 6th grade.

Many who graduated in 1963 attended from 1st through 12th, or from 8th or 9th grade, and gave nothing. See you in about threeand-a-half years at the 55th, God willing!

Vic Smith: There’s not much going on except painting my house this summer, ridding it of previously buried-underpaint dirt—hand scrubbing with ammonia. Fall and winter are special here in Williamsburg. Not that the tourism is less, which is not a plus, but the Chamber Music Society concerts kick in.

I still remember the yearbook’s blurb: “esoteric music.” One nice thing about growing up in DC was the concerts, especially since Dad taught music at American University and knew many of the best. We have two PBS stations in Norfolk—a rarity, it seems, which allows one to be 24-hour classical, and Williamsburg also sports a classical station: not much Bartok or Schoenberg, or musique concrete, but music

› CLASS NOTES

brings me home, and I keep remembering my daughter’s playing. She is still in Europe: too far to visit for concerts! Other than that, still trying to get more on John Lockwood’s last years, and rejoicing in Lucy Hilmer’s mention in Huffington Post for her book [Be sure to see the box on p.

91. –Ed.].

Robert Zweben: Hello, classmates. I am not sure when this will appear in the magazine: probably after the midterm elections. Thankfully, I am leaving October 5 to spend five weeks in Israel. Of course, the visit may be a bit strange given the recent events there, but it will still be more stimulating than the pathetic discussions about which party will win the Senate. And who cares, because does it really matter since we have a democracy in name only? . . . My life is well even though I live in a state that is suffering a severe drought.

Elaine and I recently visited our daughter, Alena, in Seattle. Then we tacked on five days to go to Quadra Island, a short ferry hop off of Vancouver Island. Then we made an unscheduled visit to Toronto to see Elaine’s 95-yearold mom, who was moving from her condo to an assisted-living facility. Our Toronto visit was emotionally intense. It appears that we will be going there more than our twice-a-year pattern to assist with her mom. . . . My son, Seth, and his wife, Bonnie, live near our house in Albany. We enjoy being grandparents. We admire Bonnie and Seth. How they have the energy to raise three kids, work, and deal with all the logistics is impressive. I am not quite sure how I got through those child-raising years. Somehow I did, and a lot of credit goes to my children, who were much easier to raise than I was. Another year is speeding by. They do seem to go faster as we get older. I am trying

to live this year fully with some grace and thankfulness. The best to all classmates.

1964 Louise Berry Strait lbstrait@gmail.com George Bernstein: I began a three-year phased retirement last year (working half time), and then will retire after 36 years at Tulane University. I am using my extra time to do some reading (still mostly history), some traveling (in recent years Rose and I have gone to the Amalfi Coast and Sicily to celebrate the 70th birthday of my brother, Alan Bernstein ’59; the Olympic Peninsula in Washington; and most recently Alsace and Savoy), some watching of the English Premier League football (the result of spending many years in England), and some time with grandchildren who are getting ever older. Depending on how retirement agrees with me, I will progress on a book I have been working on and maybe do some adjunct teaching once in a while. Rose and I are staying in New Orleans; visits from classmates and other Sidwellites are always welcome.

Mary Bralove lives in New York City. After years in journalism, first as a reporter at the Wall Street Journal and lastly as a ghost writer for a book on rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust, she changed careers. She is currently a postural therapist helping take people out of muscular pain and on to a higher level of health, fitness, and energy. She travels to DC monthly to see her 100-year-old and still very mentally sharp mother and other family members, including niece Mara Bralove ’89, who just finished her term as clerk of the Alumni Association Executive Board. Her daughters Rachel

WHO ARE THESE FRIENDS? The photo was taken in Japan during the Japanese Language and Culture Summer Study Program, which retired staff member Ellen Pierson directed for many years and which is sponsored by parent of alumni Mikio Kanda, president of the US-Japan Culture Center.

While abroad, the students visited the Hiroshima Peace Memorial and delivered the many origami cranes folded by students—a beloved School tradition.

Ellen says that if memory serves, the student at left is Peter Prinz, who went to Walt Whitman High School, followed by Jennifer Kushner ’92, Jon Stoel ’92, Charlotte Kaiser ’91, and Eric Doeringer ’92.

However, when we reached out to Eric for confirmation, he said the woman in the yellow sweater is Jodi Walker, a student from another school.

If your memory says otherwise, let us know!

E-mail alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu.

Y O U R C L A S S M A T E S WA N T T O HEAR FROM YOU! Send news about your family, career, retirement fun, travels, “mini reunions,” or anything else you’d like to share. Send your submission in one of the following ways: 1. E-mail the class correspondent listed at the beginning of your year in Class Notes.

2. E-mail alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu.

3. Submit online at www.sidwell.edu/alumni.

4. Submit through the Alumni App. Photos are welcome but must be high resolution.

Include maiden and married names and class year.

All contributions are subject to editing. Deadline for the next edition is February 3, 2015.

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Stern, 33, and Stephanie Stern, 31, live in the Bay Area, where she, too, may wind up and pursue her next career. . . . She is Facebook buddies with George Bernstein, Susan Morse, Star Black, Richard May, and Nancy Beiter.

Bonnie Eisenberg: Being with old friends and classmates at our 50th reunion after so many years was a privilege. It brings back memories of those growing-up years, with their stresses and strains, as well as the accomplishment of making it to the ripe old age of 68. As I write this, I’m mindful of our classmates who are no longer with us, and I am sad about that.

As I think about my life, there is no doubt that I am most proud of the three wonderful children that my husband, Frank, and I have had the pleasure of giving to the world: Becky, a neuropsychologist married to Eric; Andy, an office complex property manager married to Lauren and father of 1-year-old Eleanor Mary; and Susie, a middle school English teacher. They are all such good, loving human beings, and Ellie is an absolute sweetheart. . . .

After graduating, I went to Duke University intending to get a BS in nursing; however, I realized that the only aspect of nursing that I enjoyed was talking with patients, and my father became very ill with an inoperable brain tumor. I came home to be with family and to attend George Washington University, changing my major to psychology. There, I found my niche and a lifelong professional passion, and in 1975, I received my PhD in clinical psychology. I joined the American University Counseling Center and then started my private practice.

Shortly thereafter, Frank and I met and married, bought our first home, acquired our first two dogs, and started our family. Sadly, my mother died of the horrible disease ALS a few months after 94

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our first child, Becky, was born.

My profession is one for which training and learning are ongoing and lifelong. My years as a student at Sidwell Friends prepared me for that. I have a full-time private practice, and I teach and train other psychologists, social workers, and psychiatrists. It is emotionally rewarding work, and not a day goes by that I don’t feel grateful to have the opportunity to get to know people in such an intimate and trusting way.

Rich Fisher: Sidwell Friends had a profound and wonderful impact on my life. The Class of 1964 welcomed me, and the spirit of the School provided a great foundation for my launch into life. Quaker values, reflections, athletics, service, fun! Thank you, Class of 1964! Awesome!

Sue Grabill Hanson: The thought of living to the next millennium: impossible. Here it is, 14 years later, and I am still learning things about classmates and making connections. This is what this chapter is all about.

Art has been important to me all through Sidwell Friends: losing concentration on history in Mr. Cox’s class, I spent many hours looking at the art in his classroom. At Sidwell Friends, I started “thinking” about pottery. I bruised my shins on the “Sculptor’s Block.” Looking forward, I wish everyone good years, good friends, and good health!

Sandra Somerville Hoyt: Bob and I now live on the water outside Annapolis, Maryland, and are so blessed to have our three children and two grandchildren very close by. If you are ever in the area, don’t hesitate to look us up. We are dedicated travelers. We currently own two time shares in Hawaii and visit there for three weeks every year. I am interested in all things

Hawaiian—the music, dance, culture, history, and language— and am taking Hawaiian dance lessons three days a week. Bob enjoys everything about Hawaii, especially playing golf there, and has now played golf on five of the six inhabited islands. When not in Hawaii, we’re usually off somewhere else in our RV. We love camping with our grandsons, especially in New Hampshire.

Fortunately, we’ve been able to take the boys on two trips to Disney and see the “magic” through their eyes.

Marilyn Hornbeck Mellowes: After graduating from Oberlin College in 1968, I moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to attend graduate school, and I have lived there ever since. For about 10 years, I held a variety of jobs in a consulting firm and in state government before landing a job at WGBH, the flagship public broadcasting station in Boston. I worked at WGBH for 35 years in public affairs programming as a producer, series developer, and writer. Over the years I had the chance to work on some highvisibility and important projects.

The first major series I worked on was Vietnam: A Television History, a 13-part series on the Vietnam War. I then produced Castro’s Challenge, part of the Frontline series Crisis in Central America.

In the mid-1980s, I developed the American Experience, an ongoing documentary series devoted to American history.

Later, I developed a three-part series on Nixon and produced the concluding hour titled The Fall.

Next came the four-part series The Kennedys; my part focused on Joseph Kennedy Sr. and the political rise of young JFK. During the next several years, I worked on diverse programming from Julia Child to Jesus Christ. In the mid-1990s I produced From Jesus to Christ: The First Christmas Christians, a four-hour series on the origins of Christianity that premiered on Frontline in April 1998. It has been repeated many times on PBS and also broadcast in countries around the globe.

My final project before retiring was God in America, a six-part series that premiered in October 2010 and explored the dynamic between religion and politics in this country from the earliest European settlements to the presidential election of 2008. . . .

I was married in the 1980s and never had children. I love dogs, friends, food, and gardening.

Susan Morse: I was last seen by most of my Friends friends in the spring of 1964. My father died suddenly in February of that year, and although at the time I did not see that as a watershed event, it may have been because it shifted me out of the “must go away to college” expectation and introduced other options. I stayed home with my mom and my sister for a year until they seemed to agree that I should go (somewhere). I transferred

“I worked in a migrant education program, advocating for educational improvement and social justice, serving an invisible part of the US population— the people who harvest our food.”

—Susan Morse ’64

› CLASS NOTES

from GW to Skidmore in order to become a weekender at Williams. I would describe life during this era as “reactive.” The next year, I transferred to Bard, which sounded and was more interesting. Two more years there takes us to 1968, a perfect time to stow the graduation cap and head for California! Again, I had no concrete plans except to teach something to somebody someday.

I landed in Oakland, staying with a Bard friend, and was hired by a desperate nun to take over a 2nd grade class in a small Catholic school in downtown Oakland. So on weekdays for the next six months, I was a pious schoolteacher, and on weekends I got to know Berkeley, witnessing the People’s Park protests, buying my first Volkswagen ($250), and hanging out. When school let out, I hit the road with a new companion, traveled west to east, then south to Mexico, back through California, north to Portland, then British Columbia, settling for five years on Shaw Island in Washington State.

This era changed me. I became deeply connected to the natural environment and rural life, and learned new ways to teach and learn. I also finished a master’s in experiential education. With my new degree in hand, I had a sense that I needed to validate it with a real paying job. Despite long, busy days surviving in the country, part-time work teaching three kindergartners, and an idyllic place to live, it was time to leave the island. California had

more problems but more jobs, so I returned and found a job which became a calling. From 1976 until about 1996, I worked in a migrant education program, learning more than I taught, supporting students, parents, and teachers, advocating for educational improvement and social justice, serving an invisible part of the US population—the people who harvest our food. Despite being nearly expelled from Señora Supervia’s class, I learned to speak Spanish, teach English, and much more. I also met the man I married, had a daughter, and moved to San Diego, then Monterey, California. I now have a “retirement” job teaching at the local state university, CSU Monterey Bay, and am beginning to take up painting again—thank you, Mr. Hogeland!

Ray Murphy: Family: Jennifer, wife of 46 years; three wonderful children; three wonderful children-in-law; eight wonderful grandchildren. The pride of my life. Music: Forty-five years of singing, including in San Marco, Venezie, San Pietro, Roma; 30 years of trumpet playing. Art: collector, dabbler in daubs of paint, writer, landscape designer, architect.

Bucket list: months wandering Europe; sloop sailing through the Panama Canal with brotherin-law, across the Atlantic with university friends; golf playing to a four on my own, 21st in the country with a team; senior warden, production manager for Noyes Fludde. Employment: A

“I am very busy trying to restore two historic mills in Massachusetts. Years to go before I sleep.”

—Jeff Cohen ’67

little of everything, from being the manager on a $14 million construction project to practicing family law. Ever the Renaissance man.

James Sapienza graduated from the Pennington School after leaving Sidwell Friends after the 9th grade. He received bachelor’s and MBA degrees from George Washington University. After teaching 6th grade in Fort Meade, Maryland, he had a career in banking that took him to Los Angeles, Chicago, and Charlotte, North Carolina. In retirement, he splits his time between Charlotte and Cape Cod. Lea Jablonsky Uhre: After graduating from Friends, I attended Miami University (Ohio), where I graduated with a combined major in political science and French. I returned to DC where I worked on Capitol Hill and in the private sector, the White House, and several federal agencies. . . . In 1976, I married Curt Uhre and moved to Wilmington, Delaware, where our first daughter, Katharine Lea, was born. In 1979, we moved to Evergreen, Colorado, where I worked for a communications company and where our second daughter, Emily, was born. We moved back to the DC area in 1983. . . . For more than 40 years, I have been fortunate enough to hold interesting and challenging positions in public policy, management, and personnel. I worked in seven federal agencies and under six different presidents.

Throughout my career, I was an active volunteer in my children’s schools, church, and the Girl Scouts. In 1998, I returned to graduate school at Catholic University and received my MLS in library and information science. I was manager of the

US House of Representatives Library and Archive from 1998 to 2001. In 2005, combining my management and library skills, I served as director of the White House Library until I retired in 2012. Currently, I am enjoying my unstructured time, traveling, reading, writing, working on genealogy, and doing some consultations on the appraisal, preservation, and organization of archival collections.

Sandy Schinnerer Wolfe has returned to Ocean Reef Club, where she raised her family and cut her teeth in her 35-year career in real estate development.

Retirement has allowed her to devote time to volunteer projects as well as pursuing all the fun things to do on land and sea in the Florida Keys. Her son, Jay, and family live in DC; stepdaughter Erin and family live in England, providing wonderful opportunities to visit historic and lovely spots frequently.

Summer brought a chance to rekindle her Maryland roots as she spent August and September in Annapolis.

1965 Flip Todd flip@toddcom.com

1967 Dorothy Clift dorothyclift@gmail.com Molly Clark: In late October, I am off to Europe for a week and a half to celebrate my 65th birthday with a cruise up the Danube from Budapest to Nuremberg and a side trip to Prague at the end. I spent half of a college year in Germany before, with a visit to Austria, but have never been in Hungary or the

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“I left work for an eight-day silent retreat and, without looking back, did not return to the [healthcare] industry.”

—Christopher Knowles ’67

“Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, I found myself at an X-ray clinic, crippled by a blown-out back (again), injured lifting our holiday turkey.”

—Tony Farrell ’67 Czech Republic. I have been doing lots of interesting reading. Trying to get some understanding of the waves of migration and fighting through the Danube area over many centuries is as challenging as trying to figure out where all the new countries fit together on the current map of Europe. I have lots of financial and health care paperwork to do before I go, thanks to the 65 mark. It sure was fun to have the 45th reunion, and I am looking forward to the 50th.

Tom and Rachel Beers Cochran: After 31 years living in Montclair, New Jersey, we are settling into a radically different new place at Green Pond, New Jersey’s cleanest, clearest lake. Green Pond is located in the state’s Highlands region but is only 45 miles from midtown Manhattan.

We are both definitely not retired, so it’s probably a good thing that the views from our offices aren’t on the lakeside, as that view is across a glacial, spring-fed lake at an unbuildable cliff face with giant boulders, trees, and skies that keep producing amazing sunsets during working hours. Our operational definition of “settling in” includes (1) more than half the boxes are unpacked; (2) the back-up

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generator is installed; (3) we’ve gotten to know several of our new neighbors, including humans, some of their pets, and all kinds of wildlife like black bears, bald eagles, herons, etc.; and (4) we’ve prepared a reasonably spiffy guest room. Given #4, we invite visits from old friends including Class of ’67 members.

Jeff Cohen: In June, I married my college girlfriend, Beth Sackler, 46 years after we met. We live on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. I spend a lot of time in the Berkshires as I am very busy trying to restore two historic mills—one was for paper in Lee, Massachusetts; the other for cotton in Adams, Massachusetts.

Each will have a significant amount of “affordable” housing, some retail, and office space.

Years to go before I sleep.

Tony Farrell: This was my “Will you still need me, will you still feed me?” year, and I noticed.

Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, I found myself at an X-ray clinic, crippled by a blown-out back (again), injured lifting our holiday turkey. Across from me sat a gentleman of my “certain age” who’d fallen off

a ladder retrieving Christmas decorations. There we were— two noble patriarch–warriors, wounded on the field of battle.

Further indignities followed.

In early December, Kathy and I were excited to attend a rare rock concert—“The Head & The Heart” at Oakland’s Fox Theater— only to sheepishly vacate after a single song because it really was too loud, honest! It goes on. I returned to DC (visiting Mom) and, at the new Nationals baseball park, I was greeted by a statue of Frank Howard, whom I witnessed hitting monstrous home runs with my dad when I was in high school for the now-defunct Washington Senators. I’m not sure what I feel about my boyhood heroes as today’s statues. But wait, there’s more. Last fall, our younger daughter’s history course was devoted solely to events of 1968, and I was invited to speak—a messenger from that distant past.

I love history but am again unsure what to think of being rolled out as an artifact. Finally, the whole family—Tony (64), Kathy (59), Morgen (21), and Samantha (17)— just returned from our first-ever visit to Hawaii, where I shopped a dozen stores on two islands without ever finding 35mm film for my “too-ancient-to-evenbother-with-apparently” camera.

Then, Phil Everly passed away, which was profoundly sad. But, as Sondheim wrote, “I’m still here.”

Vivien Rubel Fuller: We’re about to have a family reunion up here in Pennsylvania, putting my dad’s ashes in the ground and celebrating my mom’s 90th birthday. Lots of British relatives are coming over, so about 50 of us will be here. It should be great fun. Mom will have her four great-grandkids here at the same time (all from my kids, making me a grandma four times). Very mundane stuff. Yikes, we’re getting up there in age.

Cheryl Doddy Howard: What is the probability of being in a Los Cabos Spa & Golf Hotel in Mexico when it is hit by Category 3 Hurricane Odile? One hundred percent for Cheryl Doddy Howard and husband Jeff. We arrived on September 13; Odile hit on the 14th. We spent four days with 550 guests and 150 staff in the destroyed hotel, sleeping in safe areas like the driveway, the underground garage or the loading dock. We were finally evacuated to Los Angeles by the US government in a C-130 military cargo jet. What an experience to remember for my 65th birthday!

Philip Khoury: Hans Carter and I, along with our wives, Josie and Beth, spent a superb week in early August together in Taos and Santa Fe (to take in the opera, among other things) and had a lovely dinner with Carla Freeman. Incidentally, we were in San Francisco in March and visited a remarkable exhibition

by South African artists. One was named Siopis. Striking work.

I immediately e-mailed Tony Siopis. Could it be, I asked? He responded within six hours from Perth that she was his baby sister (born in 1953) and is today one of South Africa’s leading painters.

They grew up in a very remote district in the extreme north.

Christopher Knowles: This past January I decided to retire.

After 30+ years as a healthcare administrator, I was simply not prepared to embrace all of the changes that the Affordable Care Act would impose upon the practice of medicine or the way services are delivered. In December, my fifth novel, The Cambridge Incident, was published and the reception and reviews were good. Being at peace with myself, I left work for an eight-day silent retreat and, without looking back, did not return to the industry. I

› CLASS NOTES

1960s 1. Cheryl Doddy Howard ’67 and her husband, Jeff; 2. Christopher Knowles ’67; 3. Cathy Ritzenberg McCulloch ’68 and Craig McNamara ’68; 4. Evelyn Brown ’68 and Bill Martin

spent the summer formulating the plot for my next book, and in October made the trek to the Midwest to visit my eldest son, Sean (39), his wife, and my two grandchildren, Caera Elizabeth, 7, and Alexander Lyons, 4. As for 65, it’s just a number! I don’t feel it, and, hopefully, I don’t look it. I’m ready for the next phase of my life, be it as a bookseller, a computer repairman, or a screenplay writer.

It’s time to have some fun! My wife, Mary, is now in her 17th year as a teacher at Project Headway, the public school’s special needs preschool on Martha’s Vineyard.

Sean is a financial analyst in his first year with Wells Fargo in Des Moines. Our middle son, James, is a computer scientist in his fourth year working as a systems administrator for a military research facility housed at the University of Massachusetts– Lowell. And my youngest son, Thomas, is in his third year working as an electrical engineer at Sikorsky Aircraft in Stratford, Connecticut.

Peggy Maisel: I’m not quite 65, but I’m getting close. I started a new job last month as associate dean for experiential education and clinical professor of law at Boston University Law School.

The job is to teach and move legal education at BU even more into what is needed to prepare future lawyers entering the profession

in all types of practice and work settings. It’s fun to be back in the Northeast after 11 years in Miami.

any event I certainly have no time to be bored.

Arne Paulson: Sara and I have been retired for more than seven years now, and we still love every minute of it. The travel bug continues to bite, and in the last 12 months we have found ourselves in Burma, cruising around the tip of South America, on a roots trip to Norway and Switzerland, and a road trip to New England.

The highlight for me was a visit to Easter Island, which I have been wanting to see ever since I read Thor Heyerdahl’s book Aku Aku in 6th grade. (Despite some initial misgivings, Sara also loved the island and wished that we could have spent more than five days there.) I’m not terribly good at keeping in touch with my classmates, though I do keep in fairly regular contact with Ruth (Yackee) Handelsman, Tad Bejnar, Teddy Abraham, George Ferguson, John Henry (who was here in May on a rare visit to the United States from New Zealand), and Stephanie Faul. When I’m not traveling, I spend quite a bit of time doing volunteer work for Palisades Village, which provides services to seniors in our coverage area designed to help them live in their own homes as long as possible. I like to think of it as useful community service, but in

1968 Evelyn Brown n6wee@sbcglobal.net Amy Benesch: I moved to NYC in 1980 to pursue an acting career.

I did some off-off-Broadway theater, summer stock, and extra work in movies, but after nine years of living in Hell’s Kitchen and listening to the garbage trucks and ambulances serenade me every night, I decided to give up my acting dreams and move to a place where I could see trees out of every window. So long, Hell’s Kitchen; howdy, Yonkers. For the past 24(!) years, I’ve been living in a co-op built in the 1930s, teaching and writing. So far I’ve had 13 short stories and two novels published—Remember Me to Paradise and Long Journey Home, both of which, along with some of the short stories, can be found on Amazon. Just search “Amy J. Benesch.” I’ve taught writing at various schools around Westchester, including Westchester Community College.

I also have a web page, taleweaver .org. I’m only half an hour from NYC by train, so if anyone is visiting the Big Apple, let me know, and maybe we can grab a coffee.

Jane Eskew Blong: My husband and I have moved to Marco Island, Florida, which is south of Naples on Florida’s west coast. We live in a condo on the Marco River and are five minutes from the Gulf of Mexico. The weather here is perfect most of the time, and we are settling in to small-town living. Our daughter, Amanda Blong ’02, was married in August in Austin, Texas (a city we love to visit), and we visited our son Matthew Blong ’98 in Moscow last May. I am sorry to have missed our last reunion, but will be there for our 50th. Best to all our classmates!

Evelyn Brown continues to participate in half-marathons and has completed 25 since starting running in 2010. The races are a great excuse for traveling, which she adores. If traveling for other than a race, she looks for a race wherever she may be headed. She visited her 50th state this summer, vacationing with her partner of 27 years, Bill Martin. And, yes, she found a race to run! She volunteers at Operation Gratitude, and fellow classmate Catherine O’Neill Grace managed to get Evelyn’s volunteer profile featured in the publication for the insurance company she was working for. Besides general volunteer activities, Evelyn also is one of the regular photographers

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1960s 1. Larry Cornell ’68 and Kay Burgunder Stevens ’68 volunteering at the Sidwell Friends Next-to-New Sale; 2. Laurie Price ’68 and her husband, Bryan; 3. Lyn Horton ’68; 1970s 4. Kathy Kleeman ’70

for the organization and gives presentations about it throughout the Los Angeles area. Evelyn also volunteers with her local Smith College alumnae club and has served on their board for four years. Evelyn had her music performance debut as bass guitarist at a small club in Canoga Park earlier this year.

Deborah Horner Craydon: I’ve been married 33 years to a Brit/biochemist/science teacher, moving multiple times founding Waldorf High Schools in California, Colorado, and Hawaii.

We have two Waldorf-educated kids—one an oceanographer/ surfer and the other a computer programmer. My book Floral Acupuncture (Random House, 2005) just became an e-book; I’ve been teaching healers online for eight years through my company Flora Corona.

Randy Curtis: I am still at The Nature Conservancy after 28 years of enjoying many different assignments and challenges. I’m currently working on improving how hydropower dams are sited and built around the world and when they are more appropriate than alternatives. So far Mexico leads the way! I think often about my debt to Sra Supervia and the summer in Mexico City with her husband learning Spanish and

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Mexican history. One grandkid so far, a 6-year-old boy, who lives in Brooklyn and has asked his parents for a 3D printer for Christmas!

Rolland Frye: Our son Jody Frye ’12 is now in his junior year at Kenyon College—he’s there with Chris Stevens ’13, the son of Kay Burgunder Stevens. I’m fencing again, after 15 months on “injured reserve” due to two pinched nerves, a resulting operation, and then a concussion.

Still, it’s great fun sticking sharp metal implements into other people (yes, how Quakerly). Also, singing and acting again with the Washington Christmas Revels. We performed at Lisner Auditorium, George Washington University, in December. . . . Took great trips this summer to Normandy (for the 70th anniversary of the invasion) and Brittany, and then Yellowstone and the Tetons.

Finally, I’m still wearing my Sidwell Friends T-shirt that says, “Beat them ’til they reach consensus.”

Catherine O’Neill Grace: Work remains more appealing than retirement, so Catherine has added writing for the Wellesley College alumni magazine to her freelance portfolio. “My first assignment was to drive to Saxtons River, Vermont, to

profile a landscape architect. I’m working now on a story about a Wellesley student who is fighting fracking through the Pennsylvania courts.” She’s also working on a memoir about her childhood in India in the 1950s and ’60s, which concludes in 8th grade at Sidwell Friends. She and her husband, Don, are happy to be back in Massachusetts after two years living in New York City.

They settled in an apartment overlooking the Charles River in Waltham, and Don heads Thacher Montessori School in Milton. If you’re in the Boston area, give her a shout.

Lyn Horton: The year 2014 proved to be a landmark for me.

It started off with a trip to the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Laos). The work in my April 2012 show at the Cross MacKenzie Gallery in DC (1625 Wisconsin Avenue, Georgetown) caught the eye of Virginia Shore, the curator of the Art in Embassies Program.

As a result, she commissioned me to do a piece for the new US Embassy in Vientiane, Laos.

The purpose of my first visit was a cultural exchange in which I learned about the textile industry and purchased many textiles from different regions of the country that would be incorporated into the piece I would install at the embassy. The story of that trip is

told here: http://bit.ly/1ATYRlo. In the interim, the work I did after I returned eventually wound up in a show at the Cross MacKenzie Gallery in September 2014. Installation photos of the show can be seen here: http:// bit.ly/1q1CqTE. At the opening of that show on September 12, I was greeted with the smiling face of Kay Burgunder Stevens and my dear friend and Sidwell Friends faculty member Ed Crow. It was really wonderful to see them both again. Kay has not changed a bit; she still looks as though she is trying out for the top cheerleader for the Sidwell Friends sports teams. Ed has not changed a bit either; he continually expresses his wry sense of humor. In December of this year, I will be traveling to Laos for the second time. I will be installing a piece for the State Department’s permanent art collection in Vientiane. It is a great honor to do so. I am excited and looking forward to the result.

It has been a year in the making inside my mind. To see it will be a wonderful and exuberant experience after a full week of the installation process.

Lynn McCown: I am absolutely loving retirement, dividing my time between Paoli, Pennsylvania, and Washington, DC. Every day is an adventure. Right now we are in Italy exploring its many awesome

› CLASS NOTES

treasures. Looking forward to seeing everyone again soon.

Cathy Ritzenberg McCulloch: Life is full and we have a lot to be grateful for. Our eldest son, Matt McCulloch ’97, and his wife, Jill Romansky McCulloch ’97, have given us two precious grandchildren: Samantha, age 3, and Logan, 7 months, and we’re lucky to have them live near us in Chevy Chase. Our most recent excitement is the engagement of our son Jonathan McCulloch ’00 to Katie Brenner from Chicago, where they both work and live.

A July wedding is planned in the Windy City! My husband, Scot McCulloch ’64, just retired as senior counsel of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation and is now with a consulting firm, working less. This gives us more time to travel and continue checking off the Wonders of the World on our “places to see before we die” list! India is on the agenda for this winter. . . . I’m very involved with the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and serve on two boards there, as a director of the National Symphony Orchestra and on the Circles Board. I’m most interested in their community outreach and education programs. We spend our summers in Martha’s Vineyard, where we catch up with former classmate Craig McNamara and his wife, Juliet, who live in California. Enclosed is a photo of Craig and me at a benefit for The Farm Institute on the island. [see p. 97.] Looking forward to our next reunion already and hope you’ll all be there!

Craig McNamara: My time with [our classmates] at Sidwell Friends remains the highlight of my entire educational experience.

I am quite serious. Sidwell Friends encouraged strong

friendships with classmates and teachers and taught me how to compensate in areas where I was deficient. These are gifts and lessons that I have relied upon ever since. I have spent the past 40 years farming organic walnuts and olives with my wife and children in Northern California and would love to reconnect with you all. All my best.

Laurie Price: Since fall 2013, I have been enjoying the “retirement-that-is-notretirement.” I’m still teaching two courses a quarter at California State University-East Bay and working with 10 grad students, so I’m never bored. I’m continuing to do research/writing on climate-change activism, with an anthropology conference talk coming up in DC in December.

Bryan and I celebrate 12 years together this month. He’s now teaching geology courses at my campus and loves doing it. We got back recently (just in time for fall quarter) from three great weeks doing hiking/refugios in Italy’s Dolomites; fantastic mountains.

Hope Class of ’68 is continuing to thrive.

Kay Burgunder Stevens: Check out the photo of me with Larry Cornell volunteering at the Next-to-New Sale [see p. 98]. I was in charge of the sports section and Larry handled all the golf clubs. All the money netted went to financial aid; all unsold items were given to charities. It’s a huge, schoolwide recycling event that benefits both the School and the larger community. It is held annually during Homecoming week and weekend. . . . I just reconnected with Lyn Horton at the opening of her art show in Georgetown. Her art is wonderful, and so is she! It was a fun two-fer reunion! Wish I’d thought of taking a “selfie” there.

1969 Patricia Tidwell was interviewed on Women’s Network Radio in July on the topic of empowering women.

1970 Margaret Weaver Krull mwkrull@me.com Ann Farner Miller: The Class of 1970 mourns the loss of Elizabeth Norment, who died of cancer on October 13, 2014, in New York City. We all remember Lyz (as she preferred to spell her name) starring in the plays directed by Ed Crow, including Ionesco’s Rhinoceros and Williams’ The Glass Menagerie. In the latter she carried the show, giving a powerful performance as Amanda, the protective mother several times her age. Lyz was one of those rare people who knew her destiny while still in high school.

After Cornell and Yale Drama School, she went on to a successful 30-plus-year career as an actor on stage and screen. Her last high-profile TV role was as the loyal secretary Nancy on Netflix’s House of Cards. Many of us have been happily startled to hear her familiar voice in the middle of

Elizabeth Norment ’70 passed away in NYC on October 13, 2014.

an episode of Law & Order, where she often played a judge. But the bulk of her career was on stage at theaters in New York and Los Angeles and across the country, including a number of seasons at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

Over the years, many of us had the pleasure of seeing Lyz on stage and witnessing her sizable talent and her ability to touch us. Lyz pursued her calling with tenacity and grit, despite the obstacles, and led the life she intended—an inspiration for us all. Finally, she was a passionate, charming, warm, funny, kind, irresistible person. We will miss our friend for her talent, for her commitment to her art, and for the joyful and fearless way she tackled life. Inquiries and comments may be sent to Elizabeth’s sister, Kate Norment ’74, at kbnorment@earthlink.net or 211 Quarry Road, Kingston, NY 12401.

Kathy Kleeman: It’s been a sad and happy year—sad because of my mom’s death at 92 about nine months after a stroke, and because of my dad’s continuing decline.

But happy because we’ve gotten to hear wonderful things about my mom from her many friends and admirers. And happy because my son, Tom, graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in December and is now starting an AmeriCorps placement in Pittsburgh, working on food security. My daughter, Anna, remains in her beloved Philly, prepping to go to nursing school and playing softball with the team from the anarchist bookstore where she helps out.

(Whatever joke you want to make about anarchist softball, it has already been made.) . . . Meanwhile, Joe and I just returned from a great trip to the Badlands of South Dakota [see p.

98] with a stop on the way home at the Minnesota State Fair, one of

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Carol Sisco ’70 has followed in her mother’s footsteps by making philanthropy a cornerstone of her life.

“I will probably stay in place long enough to see if we elect a woman president, since I’ve spent the last 36 years working on advancing women in politics.”

—Kathy Kleeman ’70

NO NEWS FROM YOUR C L A S S M AT E S ?

“I am still learning things about classmates and making connections. This is what this chapter is all about.”

—Sue Grabill Hanson ’64 Class Notes keep the fun going—send your update today for the next edition! DEADLINE IS FEBRUARY 3.

No notes from your classmates? Be a class correspondent and help get the word out (and in!)

The following classes do not have anyone to help collect notes. Please contact alumnimagazine@ sidwell.edu today if you’d like to serve in this role.

Everything is done via e-mail—no phone calling necessary—just two times a year.

Many thanks to Jody Hutchinson ’60, Evelyn Brown ’68, Hilary Dayton Busch ’85, and Ivy Gardner ’99 for volunteering recently.

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my fondest childhood memories, which is just as fabulous and fattening today as it was then.

We’re enjoying a lot of domestic travel and now, having stopped in Nebraska briefly, each have only one state left before we’ve seen all 50—his is North Dakota and mine is Hawaii. Guess which is more likely to be our next destination?

We also adore our annual music cruise, Cayamo, which takes us to the Caribbean for a week on the Norwegian Pearl but focuses mainly on an incredible roster of singer-songwriters, with music all day and late into the night. Joe is heading toward retirement from his medical-writing business, but I will probably stay in place at least long enough to see if we elect a woman president, since I’ve spent the last 36 years working on advancing women in politics. I’m hoping to see many classmates next May at Reunion; meanwhile, I’m enjoying keeping up with many on Facebook!

Sherry Slack Koelbel: Our four children flew the nest for outof-state colleges, then returned to Denver, where our sons Carl, Walt, and Dean are employed and married. Our daughter, Bethany, graduated from Miami University in 2014 and is working in Denver also. We welcomed our first granddaughter, married the third son, and celebrated the life of my mother, Merrilyn, within a twoweek period in fall of 2014. I have very much appreciated the robust e-mail correspondence from the Class of 1970 this past year.

Jim Lyons: My wife, Mary, and I are preparing to retire from our current careers in three to five years. We then plan to begin new ones. Mary is hoping to write, and I am hoping to teach history.

Two years ago, Mary’s daughter, Andree, had a baby, and now 2-year old Thomas takes up a big part of everyone’s lives. My two

boys have both now left the nest.

Matthew graduated from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and is taking a year off before starting graduate work in music at the University of Texas at Austin.

Greg is starting in the honors program at UT Austin, studying math, and wants to teach as well.

So, even though they’re out of the nest, they’ll be nearby. We’re leading, thankfully, quiet lives with an emphasis on a stress-free life. Some day we hope to move north, possibly to New England, Washington State, or Vancouver (where Andree lives). We’re getting very tired of 100-plus degree days here in Austin! Now, if I can just get my boys to move with us.

Richard Murray: I found a few furry friends from Chengdu, China, where I was looking into China’s efforts to advance primary care closer to where patients live through their Community Health Centers. I am still at Merck (in my 20th year), where I am currently the deputy chief medical officer.

I am fortunate to have a position where I get to work with a variety of physicians and scientists internally and externally, which keeps me busy and constantly learning new things. When I travel for work, it is great to see things I would not get to see otherwise, such as the Giant Panda Breeding Research Center in Chengdu, a spectacular preserve for giant pandas and red pandas. I’m still living in Philadelphia. My wife, Pat, is still a practicing surgeon.

Our two children, Victoria and Andrew, are well on their way also, having benefited greatly from our terrific Quaker schools here in Philadelphia (Germantown Friends School and William Penn Charter School, respectively). I am still feeling bad about missing our recent 60th dinner in DC. I’m looking forward to our next reunion and a 65th dinner.

› CLASS NOTES

1970s 1. One of the residents at a panda research center in China that captivated Richard Murray ’70; 2. Richard Murray ’70; 3. From left: Aprille Kniep Sherman ’73, Susan McGregor ’60, and Judy McGregor Caldwell ’62; 4. Adam Stern ’77.

Carol Sisco was the recipient of a wonderful tribute on the University of South Carolina College of Social Work’s alumni site, condensed here at the request of a Sidwell Friends classmate: “Carol has mastered many roles, including that of clinician, educator, researcher, and children’s advocate. Her extensive career had a bit of a rocky start, though: In her first year of the master of social work program, Carol got stuck with a field placement she didn’t want.

When asked about her practicum preference, she was emphatic about not being placed in an addiction treatment program, but she found herself at Morris Village Drug and Alcohol Addiction Treatment Center. The experience changed her life. Not only did she come to love the work, but she seized the opportunity and used what she learned there in her master’s thesis. Carol became particularly interested in studying female addiction, since male subjects had dominated previous research. She graduated from the University of Southern California and went on to earn a PhD from the University of Maryland.

Family is important, and she cites her mother, Jean, as her greatest influence. ‘She was an amazing woman. She had basically three careers: She was a mother, a Foreign Service officer’s wife,

[and had a] spectacular career in business.’ On top of all these commitments, Jean also modeled the importance of giving back.

‘She gave a lot to the community, and that’s how we were raised.

She was an incredible example to us.’ Carol has followed in her mother's footstpes by making philanthropy a cornerstone in her life. In addition to other volunteer positions, Carol established Read for Jane, a fund that honors her late sister. Carol sees her shift from clinical practice to nonprofit leadership as a move from micro to macro. She maintains her interest in the fields of addiction and child advocacy, but now she takes a broader perspective.”

1971 Ann Rutledge: My 4th grade year at Sidwell Friends gave me an incredible intellectual boost that lasted through high school. I graduated from Wellesley College in 1976 and taught literature/ philosophy at the Chinese University of Hong Kong for three years on the WellesleyYenching teaching fellowship.

Since then, I have been involved with China one way or another.

My other career (for which I wear two hats, one academic and one practitioner) is in credit, exchanges, and the market microstructure of securitization.

Most recently, I received a grant to do independent research on the formation of China’s securitization market.

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Joyce Jacobson joyce@brastedhouse.com

Chris Nordlinger chrisnordlinger@gmail.com

Victoria Dessoff Gloster Victoria@victoriacobbe.com

1973 Liza Donnelly: I would love to get together with everyone again!

Not too long ago, I was lucky to rendezvous with Barclay Jones '74, Bill Nye, Brian Glassman, and Kit Emory ’74. I have a new book out, an e-book called Women on Men, published by Narrative Library. And I was extremely honored to receive an honorary degree from the University of Connecticut this spring and to deliver the address at the graduate school commencement ceremonies. Please contact me by e-mail or Facebook if you are in NYC! Aprille Kniep Sherman: At the Two Oceans Half Marathon in Cape Town, South Africa, on April 19, 2014 a group of fellow Friends School alums met accidentally through another runner from Bethesda [see photo above]. Small world. Pretty cool.

1977 Adam Stern adamcstern@aol.com Molly Andrews (from Cambridge, England): In 1992, I conducted interviews with 40 East Germans, most of whom had been leading critics of the East German government and had played an important role in contributing to the bloodless revolution of 1989.

Twenty years later, I returned to Berlin to re-interview 15 of the original 40 participants. This group included artists, actors, religious leaders, scientists, and politicians. Two exhibitions based on this longitudinal study are timed to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall: The first is in London at the German Historical Institute, and the second in Berlin at the Wissenschaftzentrum. In our interview in 1992, Bärbel Bohley observed: “Half of the world… yes, an empire has collapsed. It

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1970s 1. Cate Livingston Fernandez ’76 and Linda Sheffield ’77; 2. Artwork by Diane Sanders Thayer ’77; 3. Artwork from a yoga book by Monty Brower ’77; 4. Robert Hyman ’77.

has not fully penetrated people’s awareness what this really means.”

The focus of this project has been to explore the meaning of living through political change, in conversations carried out over two decades.

Monty Brower (from Wellesley, Massachusetts): Earlier this week, I approved the first print run for my author-illustrated book, The Earthen Vessel: Poems of Yoga and Meditation. The book, with an official launch date of December 6, features a colorful series of visual tableaux framing sonnets and other verse celebrating spiritual insight and personal transformation on the yogic path.

Looking back to some formative experiences I had living in East and Southeast Asia, the words and images seek to integrate spiritual traditions of East and West, alluding to the Gospels, the Baghavad Gita, Greek mythology, Zen circles, and Taoism. A highquality, fine-art, limited-edition hardback, the book makes a great gift. . . . I’ve set off on many adventures since Sidwell Friends, both creative and professional, but this departure is my first without a map. Outside of my day job as a forensic psychiatrist, I’ve spent the better part of the past four years producing the illustrated settings for the poetry, from thumbnail sketches to

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pencil drawings to full finishes in pen-and-ink and watercolor.

The poems came about over the past 8 years, mostly inspired by my yoga, which I took up while recovering from a debilitating bout of pneumonia. Today, I divide my time between my warehouse studio west of Boston, where I draw, paint, and pursue other creative endeavors, and the Massachusetts courts, where I use my clinical skills to examine criminal defendants and others involved with the justice system.

For anyone looking to open the door to his or her creative soul, I heartily recommend Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. I did pretty much everything the book suggested, and I’m amazed to find myself where I am today. I’m also grateful for the gift of yoga, which is the only form of embodied activity I know that doesn’t just get you fit but can truly transform body, mind, and spirit. Also, for anyone affected by alcoholism or addiction—in yourself or through a relative—I’d encourage seeking out the appropriate recovery fellowship. I’d love to hear from any classmates or members of the Sidwell Friends community who’d like to share their own experiences with creativity, yoga, mental health, career changes, or the spiritual journey. If I’m doing an author event near you, please come. Check out The Earthen

 SIDWELL FRIENDS

Vessel at my website, UrthonaArts. com, follow me on Facebook at UrthonaArts, or contact montybrower@gmail.com.

Amanda Eastman Buschi (from Doylestown, Pennsylvania): I am almost finished with my dissertation and hope to defend before the end of the year. I may have a great deal to be thankful for

by Thanksgiving! My daughter, Sarah, has settled beautifully into George School as a freshman (9th grade). So happy to be continuing the tradition of Quaker education for her. George is fabulous!

Robert Hyman (from DC): I recently traveled to Colombia with my wife, Deb Atwood, who is on the board of directors of the international development organization ACDI/VOCA, to visit the USAID-funded AfroColombian and Indigenous Program. The program aims to improve the socioeconomic and political inclusion of AfroColombians and indigenous people in the Pacific, Caribbean, and central regions of the country. I traveled by bus to the northern city of Cauca to meet with community leaders and see agricultural projects that preserve Afro-Colombian traditional farming through organizational strengthening and capacity building.

Jeannine Perrot (from Houston): I moved to a new (circa-1965) house in June. I’d been living in a townhouse for the past two-anda-half years. It was great for the flexibility and proximity to work, but I’m glad to have a yard and to see woodpeckers and other birds at my feeder. I’m really looking forward to the season change. It’s still hot and humid in Houston although we’ve been teased by some dry, cool fall days. Hope it continues, because it’s a lot more fun to ride my motorcycle when it’s not 100 degrees outside! This summer I traveled to historic Roswell, Georgia, for a family wedding. We had gorgeous weather and a wonderful time.

Then I spent a week in Vancouver, British Columbia. What a gorgeous place!

Linda Sheffield (from Berlin): Whenever I am in the States, friends, family, and those I encounter are all so curious about me living in Berlin and gasp, “I have always wanted to go there.”

The dry spell of visitors finally ended this August, when Cate Livingston Fernandez ’76 and her charming husband, Lew, came to Berlin to deliver their son (Nick Fernandez ’11) to study here for a semester at the Freie Universität and took two weeks’ time to discover the city Cate lived in during elementary school.

Cate and I have not seen each

› CLASS NOTES

other since graduation...no need to calculate the years. We spent a delightful evening catching up with the highlights of each other’s lives dining in the classic Berlin restaurant Florian. Afterward, we visited the Nationalgalerie, designed by Mies van der Rohe, to see the colorful light show by the recently deceased Otto Piene adorning the interior of the building. Reconnecting with Sidwellites is always a warm feeling and makes one so aware of one’s roots. As an expat, I know where home is.

Adam Stern (from Menlo Park, California): As part of my work for Acterra (a San Francisco Bay Area environmental group), I organized a tour of the environmental features of the brand-new Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara in September. This is where the San Francisco 49ers now play and the site of Super Bowl 50, scheduled for February 2016. Our committee also visited some adjacent natural areas (creeks, trails, bike paths, wetlands, and natural habitats) that with additional resources could become part of the environmental legacy of SB50. It was great fun to get on the field and imagine scoring touchdowns.

Diane Sanders Thaler (from Chevy Chase, Maryland): Outside of my career as a homeroom teacher at an elementary school, I pursue my passion for art [see p. 102]. I have had showings at Barnes & Noble, among other places; it’s a need like air or water. Vivid color and painting intuitively is what I know. I put the paint down first and then use a fine-point permanent marker to give it form. I never know what is going to happen initially. I choose a color that I am attracted to at the moment and go from there. Forms begin to emerge that I build upon.

I have a relationship with the watercolor; it leads me as much

as I lead it. One day, when I am retired, I hope to live on the beach, look for shells and ocean gifts, and paint to my heart’s content.

1980 Andie Donohue amdonohue@aol.com Louisa Schneiberg Hollman sent a photo from the bar mitzvah of her nephew, Henry, who is the son of Adam Schneiberg ’86. [See the photo on p. 106.]

1981 Vidisha Dehejia Patel drv4kids@yahoo.com Greetings from Florida! This fall I have heard from many classmates who don’t typically write in for the Alumni Magazine. Thank you all for sharing! Many of us are in the midst of life changes while others are well settled in their current situations.

Marilyn Fletcher: I’m still going strong in Gotham, where in September 2014 I became an executive producer for a new channel at A&E Networks, LMN. I’m excited for the challenge of making quality TV. If you’re ever in the city, do let me know. As ever...peace.

George Roman married Margo Gorra-Stockman on November 16, 2013, at the Unity Church of Fairfax in Oakton, Virginia.

Attending the wedding and subsequent reception at the Renaissance Hotel in DC were Lara Roman Domingues ’83, L.J. Aurbach, Erle “Chris” Ellis, Keith Hunter, and Stewart Sonnenfeldt.

Dan Froomkin: I’m writing about national security and other outrages for The Intercept, a new

digital magazine founded by Glenn Greenwald and friends with the intention of publishing fearless, adversarial journalism.

Come find me at https://firstlook. org/theintercept/froomkin/ or e-mail me at froomkin@ theintercept.com, especially if you have something really juicy to leak.

Adam Bernstein: My oldest daughter, Danielle, just graduated from Penn, and my daughter Liza is a junior there. My son, Brenner, is a senior at Sidwell Friends, and Tracy and I will be finishing our 18th and final year as Sidwell Friends parents in the spring (we have a fourth, but she is at Maret).

My son is captain of the varsity soccer team, and we have enjoyed many events in and around the School with many of our former classmates who are also SFS parents. We will miss it greatly!

Andrew Szanton: I was briefly in Washington, DC, in late September to celebrate the publication of Pot Shards—the memoir of Donald Gregg (father of John Gregg). John and I were able to catch up at a Pot Shards book party in downtown Washington. John is still political editor of a New England newspaper and looks great—long winters and long hours at the paper haven’t robbed him of any of his sparkle. Also, Vidisha has introduced me to a friend of hers in Florida, Beth Knopik, and we are now writing a book together.

Danny Abramson: I continue to teach architectural history at Tufts and live in Lexington, Massachusetts, with my wife and two teenager-ish children.

Recently, we hiked together to the top of Mt. Monadnock, New Hampshire.

Sarah Willens Kass: My son, Elliot, graduated from Occidental

College in May with a degree in diplomacy and world affairs and will soon travel to India to tour and work. He and my mother, Susan Willens, will travel with a family friend who is a longtime activist for women’s education and social change in India. . . . My sister, Peggy Willens ’79, and Liz McGrail very graciously joined us in LA for Elliot’s graduation celebration.

Cassandra Dickson: I have recently co-authored a parenting book, Face to Face: Cultivating Kids’ Social Lives in Today’s Digital World.

I live in Portland, Oregon, with my husband, Chris, and our two daughters: Isabel (14) and Tulip (11).

David Weinberg: After six years of operation, a sky survey project I help to run (SDSS-III, Sloan Digital Sky Survey) has finished its observations and is preparing its final data release. After making 3-D maps of more than a million galaxies, a quarter million stars, and 200,000 quasars, I’m looking forward to using our completed maps to learn about the energy contents of the universe and the history of the Milky Way. On another end of the spectrum, I am enjoying (or not, depending on her mood) helping my daughter through 7th grade math and science and learning the drums (which she is much better at than I could ever be). We usually spend most of July in Paris, so drop me an e-mail if you’ll be passing through (or if you find yourself in Columbus, Ohio, the rest of the year).

Elinor Mody: My beloved dad died almost two years ago now, my mom almost five. Selling our Potomac home and closing up our lives there has made me think about Sidwell Friends quite a bit. I learned the importance of a life of service at the School.

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I also learned the importance of friendship, particularly important to me as an only child.

I am still working in Boston as a rheumatologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. My husband, David, is thriving at his work. Our 15-year-old daughter, Hannah, is a 10th grader at BU Academy and hitting her stride in high school. I am very lucky to have wonderful friends and family. I look forward to hearing about all my classmates—I still think about them frequently!

Trish Peyser Perlmutter: I was in Boston recently, and a highlight of the weekend was reconnecting with Joie Gelband, David Cort, Andrew Szanton, and Barbara Cannon. Joie’s son, Ben, started Harvard this fall. Her daughter, May, is in 5th grade and is an aficionado of Minecraft and books. Joie does great work helping laid-off union workers launch new careers. She and David have a beautiful garden which Joie lovingly maintains. Andrew is continuing to write memoirs and remains a master storyteller and writer. He and Barbara took their son, also named Benjamin, to Washington University in St. Louis after a summer road trip.

Seeing their daughter Elizabeth (a high school freshman) was a treat, and I was impressed that she was doing homework on a Saturday afternoon. Hats off to Andrew and Joie for living very happily without a cell phone! . . .

We are fully wired in Montclair, New Jersey. Brian and Julia are in college, and our youngest, Elana, is in 7th grade. Tom is working in private equity at Behrman Capital in Manhattan. I am on a bit of a hiatus from practicing law but am representing a Honduran child in deportation proceedings.

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I love it. I’m a senior trainer with the state’s retirement system, a position that has taken me throughout the beautiful commonwealth. My free time is spent competing in obstaclecourse races and other endurance events as well as raising money for veterans’ causes.

Vidisha Dehejia Patel: I continue to live in Sarasota, Florida, with my husband and daughter, Neena. We recently dropped off our son, Chetan, at Williams College. Neena is a senior and preparing to leave home as well.

This summer we celebrated Neena’s accomplishments as she completed her Bharatnayam Arangetram, a two-hour solo dance performance of classical Indian dance. This was the culmination of eight years of training. We were able to enjoy a short family vacation in Italy before Chetan began college. I continue to work in my private practice helping children and families with their social and emotional needs. If you are ever in Southwest Florida, please come to visit!

1982 Ted Morrow-Spitzer tspitzer@marketventuresinc. com Jonathan Franklin: My wife, Sharon, and I still live in Bethesda and are on the way to being empty nesters, with our daughter, Stephanie, starting her junior year in college and our son, Noah, starting his senior year in high school. Our daughter is somewhat eerily following in Sharon’s and my footsteps: same college as both of us, same major, and very possibly the same future profession. Noah, on the other hand, is very good at things that I am terrible at,

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like acting and singing. I am the head of the Supreme Court and Appellate practice at Norton Rose Fulbright, which is now the third-largest law firm in the world, and recently argued my seventh case in the US Supreme Court and am always wondering where the next one might come from. It’s still interesting work, at least to me, and my docket of appeals runs the gamut from patent law to the death penalty and almost everything in between.

When I have time to get outside, I’ve been doing a fair amount of biking and am currently gearing up for a century ride in a couple of weeks. . . . I don’t see very many Sidwell Friends folks, but I do occasionally run into Macon Morehouse because we have kids in the same class at Whitman High School. I’ve also been playing a long series of online Scrabble games with Charlie Freeman. It’s really just masochism on my part; he is incredibly good and I lose most of the time. And last year I actually set foot on the campus for the first time since graduation, after having driven by it nearly every day on my commute. It sure looks different, and maybe I’ll get back there before another 30 years pass.

Peter Froelicher: I am living and working as a hearing officer for the State of Wyoming in Cheyenne. Linda and I (married for 25 years) have two children: Elsa, a freshman at the University of Wyoming, and Joe, a junior at Cheyenne East High School.

When not working and attending

to other responsibilities, we enjoy recreating in the mountains, rivers, and high plains of the Rocky Mountain West. We recently enjoyed dinner with Joe Sollee and family near Boulder, Colorado, where Joe’s oldest daughter goes to college.

Jon Gould: I am living in western Massachusetts and teaching two sections of English 101 at Holyoke Community College this fall. Nice students and good discussions of late around Michael Pollan’s book In Defense of Food. My wife, Tina, is an adjustment counselor in two schools in Hadley. My daughter, Emma, is a 9th grader and my son, Marcus, is a 12th grader. We all enjoy biking on the hilly roads near our town of Williamsburg!

Anand Kasbekar: I am happily married to Joyce, my wife of 22 years (she is very tolerant). We have two daughters: Karinn is a junior in high school and a violinist, pianist, and field hockey player. Sara is a freshman at Duke University and planning to study engineering; she also is an accomplished violinist and just made the Duke orchestra. Both girls and the entire family are avid skiers, but I still strive to be as good as Kai Rasmussen was in 8th grade. . . . I am president of a company that specializes in failure analysis and computer simulation.

I have been doing this for about 30 years. I received my bachelor’s degree and doctorate from Duke, where I am an adjunct professor in the mechanical engineering department.

“I recently argued my seventh case in the US Supreme Court.”

—Jonathan Franklin ’82

› CLASS NOTES

1980s 1. Fred Wilhelm ’83 and Cheryl Derricotte ’83; 2. Willie Brent ’83 with his sons, Theo and Elliot, and his wife, Jocelyn; 3. A magazine photographer covering Triple Oak Bakery, owned by Brooke Parkhurst ’85, captures assistant Katie Long preparing cream puffs; 4. Meg Elliott Smith ’85 modeling Fitness Bitsy bracelets.

I keep in touch regularly with Ed Dixon, who has been a great friend in good times and bad. We spent last winter skiing in Vail and had a great time. I try to keep in touch with Ellis Turner and George Lang.

Diana Dibble Kurcfeld: Hello from Maryland. I celebrated my 50th birthday and am having a blast. My business partner and I just celebrated the 13th birthday of Design To Delivery Inc. (our govcon business) on September 10, and the three-month birthday of Nu’U Vitality Center (our wellness center). On a personal note, I’m trying to be more adventurous: I spent a week in Coronado, California, learning to surf, and went to La Jolla to kayak near sea lions and snorkel with leopard sharks. I’m also having a blast as a Femme Ambassador for De Soto Sport and a brand ambassador for HydroChic. They are awesome companies to work with. Other than that, thankfully, my family is good and growing.

Manuel Lerdau: I’m still at the University of Virginia in the environmental science and biology departments, studying pollution, plants, and soils.

UVA continues to be a bizarre mixture of top-tier university and southern finishing school. I just completed three years as an AAAS Climate Science Fellow, during

which I visited Capitol Hill and spoke with congressional staffers, plus a few members of Congress.

Takeaway messages from that experience: (1) Many Republicans understand climate change, but they are scared of their party’s fringe; and (2) If staffers ran Congress, a lot more would get done. . . . I’ve gotten back to mountain biking and have found a good group of younger guys to ride with. They have a different notion of “acceptable risk” than I, but so far that has led to nothing worse than bruises and minor lacerations. My family is also good. Bonnie (wife) is enjoying her job as a professor and just had her jazz debut in town. She has been a professional classical musician for a long time, and tackling jazz is a fun challenge for her. The twins are 11 and doing the expected 11-year-old things. They are modeling their mom and are both in their school’s jazz band as the bass and violin players. The little one has the best rhythm in the family and sees himself as the band’s future drummer. Ruairi, the wonder-yellow-lab-mutt who sometimes lived with us, finally died, but he had a good life and left when he was ready.

Ted Morrow-Spitzer: In his note, Anand Kasbekar reminded me of an architectural model that we worked on together in Jay Roudebush’s architectural

drawing class, which Anand still keeps in his basement! Some things are just too precious to throw away, I guess. . . . Life here in Maine continues to be great.

Jason Horowitz and his lovely wife, Anouche, visited us in early September, and we enjoyed a boat ride on Little Sebago Lake as the leaves were just beginning to turn color. I continue to romp around the country helping communities develop or improve their public markets; thank goodness for so much interest in local foods (particularly now that I’m supporting two kids in college)!

I look forward to more updates from our classmates!

Lynne Pettigrew: Two years ago, shortly after our last reunion, I was appointed as an administrative patent judge on the Patent Trial and Appeal Board at the US Patent and Trademark Office in Alexandria, Virginia.

I decide administrative appeals relating to patent applications and preside over trial proceedings in which parties challenge issued patents. Thanks to recent patent legislation, that is keeping us busy. It’s an exciting time to be at the board (at least for those of us who think patent law can be exciting). When I’m not in Alexandria, I spend time on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

1983 Linda Gaus gaushaus1965@verizon.net Willie Brent: My family (Jocelyn, Theo, and Elliot) decided to change things up and move to Spain for a year. We left the US Sierra Nevadas and ended up in the Spanish Sierra Nevadas living in Granada. The boys are both in local schools. I’m not sure what I’ll be doing, which is nice after “the grind.” Hopefully whatever it is will be fun and refreshing.

Cheryl Derricotte: I was delighted to see Fred Wilhelm and his wife, Paula, at my art show this past summer in Santa Ana, California.

The show was called “Home,” and it was presented at the Orange County Center for Contemporary Art and Vietnamese American Arts and Letters Association in July 2014.

Linda Gaus: I had the great pleasure of visiting both Cheryl Derricotte and Matthew Denckla while on vacation in the Bay Area in August; both appear to be healthy and happy in their Left Coast homes.

Patrick Hewes: This past year was a year of hobbling. I fell directly upon the right kneecap in June 2013, and what followed was surgery, hospital, and then long

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“I have to be philosophical about the fact that I’m in a national food magazine, and what they wrote about is the fact that I talk to my flock of crows!”

—Brooke Parkhurst ’85 1980s 1. Adam Schneiberg ’86 celebrated the November bar mitzvah of his son, Henry, nephew of Louisa Schneiberg Hollman ’80, in San Francisco. Standing, from left: Adam, Sam Kernan-Schloss ’09, Alexandra Hollman ’06, Drew Grandi ’86, and David Owen ’86. Seated, from left: Louisa, Max Hollman ’09, and Wilma Schneiberg.

NO NEWS FROM YOUR C L A S S M AT E S ?

“I am still learning things about classmates and making connections. This is what this chapter is all about.”

—Sue Grabill Hanson ’64 Class Notes keep the fun going—send your update today for the next edition! DEADLINE IS FEBRUARY 3.

No notes from your classmates? Be a class correspondent and help get the word out (and in!)

The following classes do not have anyone to help collect notes. Please contact alumnimagazine@ sidwell.edu today if you’d like to serve in this role.

Everything is done via e-mail—no phone calling necessary—just two times a year.

Many thanks to Jody Hutchinson ’60, Evelyn Brown ’68, Hilary Dayton Busch ’85, and Ivy Gardner ’99 for volunteering recently.

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recovery. This organ recital is only mentioned because it was my first experience in a hospital, and all that was required to improve. The episode has been a reminder of many blessings in good health, good luck, and a strong network of friends and family. Ultimately, I view this as an advanced sports injury, even though the bone shattering occurred not on the playing fields but in the kitchen.

I hope to be fleeing the police as swiftly as before by, say, Thanksgiving.

1985 Hilary Dayton Busch hcdayton@gmail.com Hilary Dayton Busch moved to Greenwich, Connecticut, after leaving Geneva, Switzerland, where she lived with her husband and two daughters for the past seven years. Among other volunteer positions, she is currently an officer and board member of the Barnard College Regional Alumnae Association and serves as class correspondent for the Class of 1985. She is looking forward to receiving news from her ’mates and catching up with them more frequently in New York.

Brooke Parkhurst: It’s been a busy year. I started a gluten-free bakery, Triple Oak Bakery, in 2007, and it gets bigger every year. We are appearing in the October issue of Saveur magazine (in a travel piece, “Best of the Blue Ridge”), which is pretty exciting, and in the spring I’ll be expanding the bakery into the space next door to make a coffee and tea shop as well as a better retail space for the baked goods.

Please do come by. Yeah, we were all pretty excited, though I have to be philosophical about the fact that I’m in a national food magazine and what they wrote about is the fact that I talk to my flock of crows! Happily, he wrote a very lovely review of the bakery on the roadfood.com site. . . . My kids are both in college now—Mairead is at the University of Maryland studying Chinese, and Nigel just started this year at Champlain in Burlington, Vermont, studying IT security (at least for the moment!). My sweetie and I are really enjoying having the kids gone—the house stays clean for more than half a day, and I don’t have to share my car anymore! . . . Sidwell Friends people are welcome anytime, either at the bakery or at home (any current students want to be a bakery intern?). The bakery is in a beautiful location in Rappahannock County, Virginia,

› CLASS NOTES

1980s 1. In July, a group gathered in DC at the Slover House. Front row: Crispin Rigby ’86, Adam Schneiberg ’86, Carola McGiffert (sister of Laura McGiffert Slover ’86), Maya MacGuineas ’86, and Hans Tresolini ’86. Back row: Andrew Aurbach ’86, Laura McGiffert Slover ’86, Suzanne Simons ’86, David Owen ’86, Laura London ’86, and Marina McClelland ’86. Not pictured: Victoria Sams ’86, and neighbors David Williams ’86 and Athalia Christie (sister of Than Christie ’86); 2. Attending the send-off party for William Pao ’86 were, from left: Alison Steadman (mother of Eric Steadman ’86), faculty member Hunt Prothro, Lizzy Holland ’16, party organizer Maryland Pao ’80, David Schisgall ’86, Victoria Sams ’86, Gaby Sakamoto ’86, Andrew Selee ’86, Michelle Parker ’86, honoree William Pao, Matthew Babcock ’86, Steven Rochlin ’86, Benjamin Shenkman ’86, and Eric Steadman.

right at the foot of the Shenandoah National Park and next to the Thornton River, plus there are a ton of great wineries out here and also many, many cool artists and artisans.

Meg Elliott Smith: Greetings from Great Falls, Virginia! As some of you know, I have always tried to balance raising three boys and working from home. To that end, I am continuing in my fifth year as a camp advisor with Tips on Trips and Camps alongside Lisa Bulman Mullins, my counterpart in Florida. We are a free advisory service for parents of kids 8 to 18 looking for overnight camps and teen programs. We host a camp fair each year at Sidwell Friends (the next one is coming right up on January 24, 2015). . . . In addition, I have started a new business called Fitness Bitsy. I design bracelets to fit over Fitbit Flex bands. I like tracking my steps, but don’t always want the black Fitbit band to show. I started this venture with a friend this past August, and it is taking off! We are selling on Etsy and Amazon and enjoying it thoroughly! Check us out on Etsy (store name is FITnessBITsy) and help me spread the word. I hope to see everyone at the reunion this spring.

1986 Laura London lauramlondon@yahoo.com Gil Griffin: You knew Gil Griffin as a rabid baseball fan, but for the past 15 years, he has developed another sporting passion just as big: Australian Rules football. No, it’s not rugby, and, no, it’s no joke.

In 2013, Gil flew to Melbourne to support his beloved Fremantle Dockers (for whose website he wrote a semi-regular column) in the Australian Football League Grand Final. Last month, Gil returned to Australia—taking a break from his duties as an English teacher and 12th grade advisor at Crossroads School for Arts and Sciences in Santa Monica, California—to work on an upcoming feature story for the website sbnation.com. The feature is about four former college basketball players attempting to become the first Americans ever to play the sport professionally. To learn more about Aussie Rules or the Dockers, or just to say hello, follow Gil (@statesidedocker) on Twitter.

Adam Schneiberg has a great photo for us from his son Henry’s bar mitzvah [see p. 106] thanks to his sister and awesome aunt, Louisa Schneiberg Hollman ’80.

Carl Horton: I recently had a chance to work for a client in Thailand. I was there for two months and brought the kids for a few weeks. I first had the chance to go to Bali and relax and then see The Green School and see Ben Macrory’s old stomping grounds. It was just beautiful. It is committed to the green lifestyle like nothing I have ever seen. In Thailand, I got to see the bridge over the River Kwai, pet tigers, ride elephants, and see the golden Buddha and many other national treasures. Over two months, I had the chance to explore Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, and Japan for work. I just returned home on September 29. I hope to get the chance to return in the near future.

Susanna Blake Murphy: After nearly 20 years with the public defender’s office of Massachusetts, I have opened my own private investigation firm, Campus Investigations, specializing in the independent investigation of sexual (and other) misconduct on campus. This is a hot-button issue that has needed national attention for some time, and I am excited about being involved in ensuring that students on all sides of the issue are being treated fairly and with objectivity.

I can hardly believe that I am the mother of a freshman (yikes) and

middle-schooler, who ensures that any free time I have is spent on the sidelines of the soccer fields—luckily alongside Amy Davidson Bryant, whose sons play with mine. It’s great to be able to see at least one friend from ’86, but I miss the rest of you!

William Pao had a great sendoff party organized by his sister, Maryland Pao ’80, in May to celebrate his appointment as global head of the Oncology Disease and Translational Area (DTA) with Roche Pharma Research and Early Development (pRED). The gathering was a mini-reunion for the Class of 1986.

1988 Louise Andrews louiseandrews@me.com

1989 Elizabeth Wyatt ebwyatt@aol.com

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1990s 1. Chinh Nam Le ’92; 2. Mikol Brandis Rudd ’90 and Caitlin Scott ’90; 3. Gabriella Maureen, daughter of Kia McLean Washington ’94 and her husband, Chris Washington; 4. Spencer Freedman ’90 with baby Devin and Lucas.

1990 Justine Wruble Fahey Justinew1@yahoo.com Justine Fahey: Hi, Class of 1990!

We are nearing our 25th reunion (gulp) this coming May. Hope to see many of you there to catch up. . . . A very micro mini-reunion was had in Copenhagen. Mikol Rudd Brandis and Caitlin Scott met up in September and caught up for the first time in many years.

Mikol and Caitlin, we’d love to see both of you in May, so make plans to hop across the pond! In the meantime, here are a few other tidbits from our classmates.

Amy Shields Doyle is an executive producer for TLC and runs some fun series: Sister Wives, My Strange Addiction, and a bunch of new series coming soon. Her kids, Jack and Frances, are 10 and 7 and really happy and healthy.

Christa Farmer: Christa is in the process of editing a book, titled Learning from the Impacts of Superstorm Sandy. Edited

by Christa along with J. Bret Bennington, it’s going to come out from Elsevier this November.

David Fischer: I gave the commencement address to the Sidwell Friends Class of 2014 in June. I was as surprised as you must be to have gotten the

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invitation from Tom Farquhar.

Apparently my late arrival in junior year meant that I was one of the few people with a clean enough record from Tom’s first go-round to qualify for the honor.

It was a lot of fun to be back on campus and to watch other people walk down the stairs and graduate.

And passing on a few learnings I’ve picked up along the way was even more enjoyable than I expected. Thanks to Tom Shakow, Allison Marinoff Carle, and Eliza Lowen McGraw for coming to Commencement with me. If you’re suffering from insomnia, it’s up on YouTube. It’s only 17 minutes, but you’ll never get them back . . . . [Watch David’s speech at www.sidwell.edu/commencement.

—Ed.] . . . In other news, I’ve been out in northern California for 14 years now and have spent the last four and a half at Facebook, where I lead the ads business. It’s a great mix of challenge and fun, and besides how old I feel compared to my coworkers, I really like it. I have two boys (12 and 8) and really enjoy California living. Hoping to make it to Reunion in the spring and see many of you.

Spencer Freedman, along with his wife, Sophia, welcomed his second son, Devin, on July 1.

Devin joins Lucas, who is 3.

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1991 Charlotte Kaiser cjkaiser@post.harvard.edu

1992 Meghan Terry Broadstone Meghan.broadstone@gmail. com In honor of the year of their 40th birthdays, and with a nod to their Lower School creative writing teacher, Carol Peck, the Class of 1992 rose to Meghan Terry Broadstone’s challenge and proudly presents “Odes to Age and Mrs. Peck”: Class Notes, haiku style! –Ed.

I like getting old.

I’m already practicing “Get off my damn lawn.”

—Sanjay Advani I wonder when I Will need to ask my children How to use my phone.

—Sanjay Advani I started cutting My hair a little longer To show off the grey.

—Sanjay Advani Ah, see what happens?

I can’t even remember How to write Haiku.

—Liz Welford Baer

It’s helped a lot at 40 To hang with old friends.

Sixty-year-olds keep me young.

—Liz Welford Baer It goes by so fast: 16, 21, 40, And the next stop is…?

—Liz Welford Baer Forty-schmorty, it’s nothing; It’s forty-one when You realize, time won’t stop.

—Liz Welford Baer Carpool, homework, w(h)ine: Today I went to Chico’s.

Jesus, make it stop.

—Larissa Lockyer Bayer Forty is lovely: All the bullshit falls away, Settled into me.

—Larissa Lockyer Bayer We got a ferret Cuz we couldn’t do a fourth.

But the ferret stinks.

—Ben Brashares The family bed So uncomfortable but I shouldn’t complain.

—Ben Brashares WTF Meghan— No pressure or anything; Don’t you read my blog?!

—Ben Brashares and Larissa Lockyer Bayer

› CLASS NOTES

Bye mummy choo choo Dog shit and a hulahoop Most important job...?

—Ben Brashares

Living by the Bay; Just saw Kenji, Kevin, and Mr. Gray.

Likely here to stay.

—Dan Ewing

Dad, are we there yet?

When did I stop asking this?

Today it’s all fine.

—V.W. Fowlkes

I wake to find I’m Cutting the crusts off of life.

Is that all there is?

—Carrie Thompson Hayter

Stupid-ass haiku.

Me: jackass counting fingers; Doesn’t even rhyme.

—Ben Brashares

So you’re 40 now?

Cute. Forty-one checking in.

Call me in a year.

—Scott Ewing

Back hurts in morning, But grinning at e-mailed poems; Warmth of memories.

—V.W. Fowlkes

According to France, It’s official. Married or Not, I’m now “Madame.”

—Katherine Herz

I need a decade To catch my breath from the last And let it sink in.

—Meghan Terry Broadstone

Grey hair and day care?

Balding, spouses, and carpools?

I’ve dodged a bullet.

—Scott Ewing

Would it be so wrong To leave the kids for Beach Week?

Party? Nah, let’s sleep.

—Tracy Pizzo Frey

Midlife crisis? Bring it on.

Thank you, Mileage Plus.

Blisters, beer, beaches. Olé!

—Katherine Herz

I prefer it when The ladies shop at Chico’s.

What took y’all so long?

—Joseph Chico Bui

Forty could be old, But I still feel like a kid: Husband is 50!

—Antonia Fasanelli

You? On the Facebook?

We’re just as cool as they are; Of course they’d agree.

—Tracy Pizzo Frey

Drinking malt liquor When 40 meant something else— Ah, the salad days.

—Dan Hirsch

Yes, Carrie, let’s get you Some different bread—with Nuts, raisins, and stuff.

—Nathaniel Carroll

As a dad of twins, I now better understand why Wine at 5 is okay.

—Ben Fitzpatrick

Once a 5Ber A pinky swear of always Years strengthen some bonds.

—Tracy Pizzo Frey

Open my e-mail.

Words from old friends— yep, said “old”— Remembered my youth.

—Samori Cummings

If I was truly Honest, I would admit that I love “Let It Go.” —Ben Fitzpatrick

Random pains.

Different illness every week.

Contusion.

—Kate Fullerton

How did I get down here?

Vegemite sandwiches for four offspring.

Mate, they really say “g’day!”

—Deborah McNamara Hutchins

Measuring my life More by “Dad” and “Husband” Than “Esquire.”

—Ben Fitzpatrick

Curious George, Caillou, Sid the Science Kid, Max and Ruby.

—Kate Fullerton

Goldfish in my hair.

Hefting babies, tears, timeouts.

Love my...wait! My back!

—Doris Quintanilla Forteith

1992 Nevermind hit number 1.

22nd reunion did not show, crossed four-oh.

45th reunion all seniors again.

—Justin Gray

Ran into Aaron; Five mini-mes between us.

Where else but Comet?

—Ellie Dooling Forty is bittersweet: Older than Justin Bieber’s parents.

8:30, time for bed.

—Wesley Durrin Dunleavy Turn that damn noise down!

Trying not to call the cops.

Became our parents?

—Liz Evans Joint pain, house payments.

I’ve fallen and can’t get up.

Hashtag Life Alert.

—Liz Evans Back in school again?

“Mrs. Terry” gives homework To 40-year-olds.

But I’ll join the fun.

And think back on days long gone.

Sidwell FRIENDS always.

—Liz Evans

Goodbye my 30s: Topless car to SUV— Turn down that music!!

—Doris Quintanilla Forteith Shop teacher caught me; Was peeing in the fountain.

Still so embarrassed.

—V.W. Fowlkes A lot is the same: Still pretend my car’s a tank, And there’s Camillo’s —V.W. Fowlkes

Peer pressure too strong; Here is my haiku for you.

Much love from Charles.

—Charles Ince Forty and counting!

A true Silverback at last!!... ...where is that fountain?

—Charles Ince Forty, quarante, cuarenta, Arbaeen, veertig, ogoji.

Same in all languages: old.

—Usama Kanaan

As the years pass by, More thankful for where I’ve been.

Best is yet to come.

—Cory Hartquist

Is it too early For me to start living life Vicariously?

—Usama Kanaan

Electric toothbrush For my 40th birthday.

Gee thanks, hon, that’s hot.

—Carrie Thompson Hayter

Sweetness and pain as Dear friends die and my babies Dance in the fall leaves.

—Nancy Kendall

Wait, do I see some Pimples next to my wrinkles?

Hey, world, WTF? —Carrie Thompson Hayter

Am 40 years young.

Not yet figured it all out; Forty years to go.

—Amanda King

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› CLASS NOTES

1990s 1. Olivia Dietrich ’24 and her sister, Gardiner Dietrich ’27, with Nicole Davison Fox ’97 and Chelsea Clinton ’97; 2. Alison Friedman ’98 and actor Tim Robbins (photo by GAO Shang); 3. Alison Friedman ’98 (photo by Wu Wei); 4. Bill Siegel ’98, his wife, Julie, and son, Nate, welcomed Caroline to the family on June 28, 2014.

The baby smiles; the Toddler, delighted, laughs. She’ll Let him live, for now.

—Kathleen Lawton-Trask

Suburban parents Sing along to “Gin and Juice.”

Children horrified.

—Emily Paster

A moment of silence please For soccer mom, PTA, Minivan.

—Emily Topf Schmidt

Thesis almost done; Then can I somehow avoid Working with eggheads?

—Tim Williams

Late 30s, midlife Crisis: started grad school, had Two kids. Now, 40, tired.

—Kathleen Lawton-Trask

Sitting out Iraq.

Sunny, shabby October in Testaccio.

—Amanda Pilz

Screaming Roman mother, Once I threw parties!

Hirsch calls my life a nugget.

—Katherine Wilson

Testimonials: Who’s next, keep going, don’t stop.

Hashtag soccer moms.

—Malcolm Logan

Three kids in three years, what were we thinking, were we?

Tightrope, work-life balance, can we?

Soccer mom in stilettos, That’s what I said I would be.

Can somebody hand me my Keens?

—Rashida Wilson Prioleau

Couch. Sitting. E-mail binging.

Jackson: “hit that ball!”

“Nationals winning?”

Grant crying. First birthday nigh.

Sigh.

—Jonathan Stoel

Children are crying.

Play video on iPad. Silence is golden.

—Chinh Nam Le I’m hoping to get A punk rock marching band for My Brooklyn party.

—Naomi Miller So much depends upon A blue station wagon glazed with Orange Cheetos beside the carpool line.

—Porter Montgomery V’s e-mail is wrong— V.W. underscore Fowlkes, instead of dot.

—Porter Montgomery How did I get here?

Raising Midwestern children.

What if they say “pop?”

—Emily Paster

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Tracy is 40.

No more 90210?

Ha! Will always love.

—Tracy Pruzan-Roy Sweetest words I know: “Mom, drew this picture for you.

On the wall. Like it?”

—Amanda Rocque I’m over the hill Peak at 40? Grab my skis, Float down on powder.

—Amanda Rocque At Sidwell (Friends) we sometimes skipped Meeting to talk poems and smoke.

Don’t do what we did?

—Amardeep Singh

 SIDWELL FRIENDS

Family dinners: In other words, our nightly Condom commercial.

—Sutton Stokes My 40-year-old belly built Three beautiful babies.

Now it jiggles—a bowl full of jelly.

—Emilie Karrick Surrusco Once young and innocent And now a sex therapist With a minivan.

—Lisa Franklin Topchik A few more wrinkles.

Is that such a high price for?

Being me at last.

—Amy West

Senior moments at The tender age of 40.

Telomeres, revive!

—Douglas Wise My 40-year-old Belly has made no babies.

It does jiggle, though.

—Douglas Wise One is silver and The other is gold, but damn…

40? We are old.

—Vanessa Wruble Biologic clock Beats strong, but the world so wide: Child or Africa?!

—Vanessa Wruble

Tenure and mortgage.

What happened to my life’s plan?

Next adventure, please.

—Amy West

There once was a class of ’92, That did the very best they could do, To stay young at heart And all did their part To write up the perfect haiku.

—Liz Evans

Not dead or in jail; Fake beer still tastes strangely good Now, six months sober.

—Tim Williams

Loving my classmates— Nobody else would send in Dozens of haikus.

—Meghan Terry Broadstone

› CLASS NOTES

NO NEWS FROM YOUR C L A S S M AT E S ?

“I am still learning things about classmates and making connections. This is what this chapter is all about.”

—Sue Grabill Hanson ’64 Class Notes keep the fun going—send your update today for the next edition! DEADLINE IS FEBRUARY 3.

No notes from your classmates? Be a class correspondent and help get the word out (and in!)

The following classes do not have anyone to help collect notes. Please contact alumnimagazine@ sidwell.edu today if you’d like to serve in this role.

Everything is done via e-mail—no phone calling necessary—just two times a year.

Many thanks to Jody Hutchinson ’60, Evelyn Brown ’68, Hilary Dayton Busch ’85, and Ivy Gardner ’99 for volunteering recently.

1954

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University in Cleveland, Ohio.

She recently published her first book with Princeton University Press, Rethinking Private Authority, which examines the role of NGOs and firms in solving global environmental problems. She is proud to live and vote in a swing county in a swing state with her husband, John Harwood, and their adorable 2-year-old daughter, Hannah HarwoodGreen. She sees fellow classmate and environmental studies professor Graham Bullock at annual professional meetings, and would welcome anyone coming through CLE.

1998

Kia McLean Washington: Kia and Chris Washington welcomed Gabriella Maureen Washington, born on September 18, 2014, at 3:08 a.m., weighing 5 pounds, 14 ounces and reaching 19 inches!

1999

Brett Dakin is now general counsel at the Child Mind Institute, an organization dedicated to transforming mental health care for children everywhere. Brett provides legal advice and strategic guidance to the executive leadership and board of directors on a range of issues.

1997 Ellen Cornelius Ericson eccornie@gmail.com

   Chinh “Nam” Le: I qualified [to run the 2014 Boston Marathon] with a 3:08:09 time, and the experience was incredible! The crowd support was amazing, and I must have high-fived every little kid from Hopkinton to Wellesley before suffering leg cramps. The runners and the fans were out in force to show the world what Boston Strong was all about. It was

an honor to run in such a historic race, and it provided me with lasting memories.

1994 Faye Walsh Drouillard fayewalsh@gmail.com

Ginger and Richard Dietrich purchased the “Lunch with Chelsea Clinton and Nicole Davison Fox” package at the 2013 Auction. The lunch took place in New York City, where Chelsea and Nicole spent time with Gardiner Dietrich ’27 and Olivia Dietrich ’24. (See photo on previous page.)

Samantha Staffier Burman Samantha.staffier@gmail.com Alison Friedman: My company, Ping Pong Productions, has had a busy and exciting year.

One highlight was bringing Tim Robbins to China for a completely sold out, 10-show tour of his production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Check out our website (pingpongarts.org) for more information, and stay tuned for major news of our new DC office that will open in 2015!

Ivy Gardner ivymgardner@icloud.com Steve Friedman and his wife, Marissa, are thrilled to announce the birth of their son, Blake Louis.

The Friedmans live in Lexington, Massachusetts, and would love to meet up with any alumni in the Boston area.

Christine Braunohler Hanson lives in Oakland, California, with her husband and two sons, Avery Vincent (3) and Zeal Henry (1). Christine teaches 1st grade at Wildwood Elementary in the Piedmont School District, where she has taught for nine years.

Her family keeps a small urban garden with chickens, ducks, 10plus fruit trees, and year-round vegetables. Christine was recently the maid of honor in the wedding of Katie Groark Regala in Woodstock, Virginia. Christine’s son Avery was the proud ring bearer.

Jessica Fisher Green: Jessica is an assistant professor of political science at Case Western Reserve ALUMNI MAGAZINE

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› CLASS NOTES

2000s 1. Celebrating the wedding of Katie Mathews ’03 and Matt Struhar were, from left: Lauren Johnson ’03, Erin Morgan, Naabia Ofosu-Amaah ’03, Katie, Cara Mullen, Carly Lehrer ’03, and Margot Dankner ’03; 2. Alexi Taylor-Grosman ’03, Christina Huang ’03, Alexandra Citrin ’03, and Robinson Gold ’03 at Christina’s wedding; 3. Allison Vise ’09 with Reuben Hendler ’09 and Jordan Hall ’09.

2000 Lincoln Mayer mayerlp@yahoo.com Christopher Bayh: After a stint as a law clerk to Judge David F. Hamilton of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, and as a research assistant to former Indiana Congressman Lee H. Hamilton at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Chris joined the Indianapolis office of Barnes & Thornburg LLP as an associate in the firm’s litigation department. He is focusing on commercial litigation, product-liability defense, and white-collar defense.

2001 Eliza Orlins eorlins@gmail.com

2002 Camilo Acosta cbacosta@gmail.com Camilo Acosta: I’m living in San Francisco building PayByGroup into a big business. We’re launching major partners like VRBO, HomeAway, and pro sports teams across several leagues, so keep an eye out! Last May, I got a

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chance to attend the wedding of Nick Franchot in South Carolina with about 15 other alumni, mostly from our class. In August, I got to catch up with more classmates at the Baltimore nuptials of Lorraine Spradley. I’m having a lot of fun going to these mini-reunions!

Nick Blaemire: I’m living in Brooklyn with my fiancée, Ana, and our dog, Leo McGarry (yes, the chief of staff). Right now I’m splitting my time between acting and writing, doing a new musical at the Atlantic Theater Company called Found (atlantictheater.org), and finishing up rewrites on a show for Signature Theater in DC titled Soon (signaturetheater.org), which goes up next spring. Just saw Andy Gable in New York last week, and it brought back many wondrous school memories. Hope you’re all doing great! Pajama jammy jam.

Justine Harman: Recently my husband, D.J., and I moved to Philly, where he works in private equity and I, still the features editor at Elle.com, commute up to NYC two or three days a week. No babies...yet.

Ethan Heard: I’m living in Brooklyn. This summer I directed A Little Night Music at the Berkshire Theatre Festival,

 SIDWELL FRIENDS

and I’m currently directing a new musical monodrama called The Other Room in New York. My new company, Heartbeat Opera, is launching its first full season with Purcell’s The Fairy Queen.

Jessica Holsey: I’m living and working in Brooklyn running a company called Susty Party that creates responsibly made party supplies. Our products just launched in Target, which is a huge accomplishment. I live with my boyfriend, Jeremy—some of you may know him as DJ Angel Hands—and I was in Lorraine Spradley’s wedding along with Erin Branche this past August, which was awesome. That’s all for now!

Peter Lafave: I finished up my master’s at SAIS last December and have moved to London, where I do sovereign risk analysis for JP Morgan. I’d be very happy to catch up with any alumni in the area.

Stephen Marks: I co-founded Joyable, which aspires to cure the

world’s anxiety and depression.

We are starting by helping people who struggle with acute social anxiety by delivering online cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). Joyable is venture-funded and based in downtown San Francisco. We’re four people today and we’re hiring—if you or someone you know is passionate about transforming mental health, please drop me a line at steve@ bejoyable.com.

Michaela Miller: I am currently in graduate school at New York University working toward a master’s degree in public administration.

Lazarus “Laz” Vittas: Hey, everyone! I’m living the life in Los Angeles and work for Mattel, specifically on the Barbie product line. Ken is lookin’ swole and Malibu Barbie is as classy as ever.

Hit me up if you’re ever out West and/or want the Mattel Friends & Family discount…Get it?

Friends?

“I co-founded Joyable, which aspires to cure the world’s anxiety and depression.”

—Stephen Marks ’02

› CLASS NOTES

New York University this spring and am sticking with the field as a first-year PhD student at Washington University in St. Louis. Look me up if you’re in the Lou! We had an awesome minireunion at Katie Mathews and Matt Struhar’s gorgeous wedding in California earlier this year!

2000s 1. Celebrating the wedding of Brendan Williams ’02 and his bride, Diana Montoya, are, from left: Laz Vittas ’02, Will Stovall ’02, Otis Collins ’02, Raj Sonti ’02, Rohan Ma ’02, Diana Montoya-Williams, Brendan, Zac Gittens ’02, Samuel Chapman, Jared Press ’02, Evan Steinberg ’02, and Jason Dukes. Also in attendance: Aki Hakuta ’02, Nick Franchot ’02, Meredith Williams ’98, and Rhody Collins ’04.

Brendan Williams: Six years ago, I met my match on the dance floor. This past March, we got married with 02Ohyeah rollin’ deep at the festivities in Gainesville, Florida. The young dubz dance academy still remains on the horizon, but in the meantime, if you break a bone while in Florida, give me a ring.

Rachel Wilson: I serve as the program director of the Law and Leadership Institute (LLI) in Columbus, Ohio. LLI is designed to help students from underserved communities to get into college and ultimately law school if they so choose. Also in 2014, I created my own method of barre classes known as barre-OM (barre-OM. com). I teach barre and yoga in several studios in Columbus. In August 2014, I got engaged to my longtime boyfriend, Cecil Patterson.

2003 Katie Mathews katiecmathews@gmail.com Naabia Ofosu-Amaah n.ofosuamaah@gmail.com Michael Drezner: I’m happy to be moving back to DC after living in Philadelphia for the past few years. I’ll be starting a new job as an attorney advisor with

the Department of Homeland Security.

Christina Huang: I married James Wright, a neurosurgery resident at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, whom I met on the interview trail in April 2013. James is from Atlanta, Georgia, and a graduate of the University of Georgia.

Robinson Gold and Alexi TaylorGrosman attended the wedding, which took place this past April in Potomac. Alexandra Citrin was a bridesmaid and spectacular at coordinating all wedding festivities. I’ve since changed residency programs from the University of Southern California and have joined James’s program at Case Western Reserve, where I am now a second-year resident.

Emma Jaster: I just returned to San Francisco from a month in Italy, where I was directing a new devised performance, now on tour in Europe. Before that, I was in Poland studying Grotowski techniques with members of Teatr Zar. I am especially interested these days in the intersection of ritual, design, and intention.

Lauren Johnson: After five years of working at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, I just completed my MA in art history at the Institute of Fine Arts at

Katie Mathews: In April, I married Matt Struhar, my partner of five years, in Pasadena, California. Four of my closest friends since 7th grade zealously represented their respective Sidwell Friends Middle School teams and served as fabulous brideswomen: Margot Dankner (Team South), Lauren Johnson (Team West), Carly Lehrer (Team North, the best team), and Naabia Ofosu-Amaah (Team East).

Michael Drezner was also there to celebrate. Matt and I live in Oakland, where I work as a deputy public defender in Contra Costa County. Please let me know if you’re ever in the East Bay! Dana Mueller: I completed my residency in internal medicine at Johns Hopkins in June of this year and moved back to DC in August.

I’ve started work at a clinic for the undocumented and underinsured in Petworth as a general internist.

So far, I’m loving being back and getting a chance to catch up with old friends.

Jason Nichols: I got married to my boyfriend of seven years, Jim Concannon, on September 20 in St. Louis, where we met.

In attendance were Emily Madavo, Madeline O’Donnell, Jill Hawkins, Emily Hawkins ’97, Matthew Hechinger, Scott Hechinger ’00, Amanda Hechinger ’09, Rebecca Kilborne, and Kira Romansky.

Jim and I currently reside in New York City.

Daniel Winik: I married Sonja Ralston on July 19, 2014, in DC. Josh Goodstein was my best man.

2004 Catherine Dawson catherine.v.dawson@gmail. com

2005 Nicole Weissman neweissman@gmail.com Grace Rumford grumford@gmail.com

2006 Zach Mueller zachmueller@gmail.com

“I launched The Shotgun Seat, a country music website focusing on songwriters and up-and-coming artists. I live in Nashville and am pursuing the site full time.”

—Annie Dineen ’09

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› CLASS NOTES

Alex Akman akman.alex@gmail.com

2008 Jeffrey Scholl: I have been living in Toronto since last August working in TV and film marketing.

2009 Elle Young xmalielex@gmail.com Annie Dineen: I graduated from New York University with a music business degree in May. I launched The Shotgun Seat, a country music website focusing on songwriters and up-and-coming artists. I live in Nashville and am pursuing the site full time.

Tianwei Fu: I graduated from Fudan University this July. Also, on September 23 I got a new job at FocusEdu. I teach English here.

Annelise Haskell: I am glad to be back in DC this fall working for an architecture and urban planning firm after completing my master’s degree in architecture in May and spending the summer traveling in Europe and Asia!

Thomas Merckens: After working in Shanghai for a year after graduation, I’m currently in South Korea under a Fulbright grant. I’m teaching English at an all-girls high school in Gyeongju while also living with a host family and studying Korean.

Jayon Wang: Hey, Sidwell Friends folks! Since graduating from Carnegie Mellon’s mechanical engineering program, a team of close friends and I decided to pursue the entrepreneur path!

We’ve been hard at work building LifeShel, a community safety company, in Pittsburgh and Palo Alto, California. LifeShel is a privately owned company that allows users to call 9-1-1 and get help at the touch of a button on any smartphone, wearable, or connected IOT device. We’ve spent the past year building our product team and nontechnical teams and are getting closer and closer to launch. We will pitch our idea to Peter Thiel, Malala Yousafzai, and Steve Case at the inaugural Forbes 30 Under 30 Summit in Philadelphia. It’s going to be a great opportunity to push our company forward, and we can’t wait to share our vision with all 1,500 of Forbes’ Under-30 entrepreneurs.

Allison Vise: I hope everyone is doing well and look forward to seeing everyone as some point soon. Here’s a photo [see p. 112] of me with Reuben Hendler and Jordan Hall—we were in the same Sidwell Friends class and are in the same class at Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai in NYC! This is at our white coat ceremony.

Tony Valenzuela: After graduating from Yale University, I spent last year working as an associate consultant at Trinity Partners, a healthcare strategy consulting firm in New York City. I recently began pursuing my MD at Columbia University College of 114

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’12

Physicians and Surgeons, where I hope to focus on neurology and immunology. I also codirect the Columbia University Human Rights Asylum Clinic, an organization that provides free medical evaluations and affidavits to asylum-seekers.

 SIDWELL FRIENDS

PHOTO BY BEN LIU

2007

MALINDA REESE ’12: VASSAR GIRL GOES VIRAL Malinda Reese ’12 has a lot going on outside of her studies: A junior at Vassar who just finished a semester at the British American Drama Academy in London, she’s got a YouTube career in performance and music, and a channel with more than 100,000 subscribers and 15 million views. Her Internet following came from randomly deciding to put the lyrics of “Let It Go” from Frozen through Google Translate multiple times to distort them considerably, and then sing them. The video went viral, and so began her YouTube series, “Google Translate Sings.” She also has a second YouTube channel called “The 20s Project” with smaller vlogs documenting what it’s like to be in one’s 20s today.

Malinda, who has an apprenticeship with the New York Stage and Film Festival at the Powerhouse Theater at Vassar, shares news that is an offshoot of a trip she took in June 2013, when she traveled to Nansana, Uganda, to teach music to students at the Japanese Ashinaga Foundation. Ashinaga works globally to provide educational and emotional support for orphans, and in these students’ case, HIV/AIDS care. The Vassar College Choir met with these Ugandan students and other Japanese orphans in Tokyo to put together a production that celebrates these unique cultural connections; the show is coming to Washington, DC, this summer.

2010

2011

Shannon Welch is in her first year at Duke University School of Law.

Kiki Ochieng akinyi.ochieng@gmail.com

› LIFECYCLES

Marriages

Births and Adoptions

In Memoriam

Jeff Cohen ’67 and Beth Sackler, June 8, 2014

Spencer Freedman ’90 and Sophia Freedman, a son, Devin, July 1, 2014

Henry Maddux Jr. ’35 April 15, 2014

George Roman ’81 and Margo GorraStockman, November 16, 2014

Kia McLean Washington ’94 and Chris Washington, a daughter, Gabriella Maureen Washington, September 18, 2014

Cobey Black ’40 March 27, 2014

Amanda Blong ’02 and Jarred Schiff, August 2, 2014 Nick Franchot ’02 and Alexa Raducanu, May 24, 2014 Lorraine Spradley ’02 and Sean Wilson, August 16, 2014 Brendan Williams ’02 and Diana Montoya-Fontalvo, March 8, 2014

Matt McCulloch ’97 and Jill Romansky McCulloch ’97, a son, Logan, March 5, 2014 Bill Siegel ’98 and Julie Siegel, a daughter, Caroline, June 28, 2014 Steve Friedman ’99 and Marissa Friedman, a son, Blake Louis, August 10, 2014

Woodbury Carter ’41 February 13, 2014 Mary Eliot ’41 November 7, 2014 William Cafritz ’43 August 27, 2014 Ann Sifneos ’43 March 26, 2014

Christina Huang ’03 and James Wright, April 19, 2014

Charles “Chuck” Goodrich ’47 May 6, 2014

Katie Mathews ’03 and Matt Struhar, April 5, 2014

Oscar Gottscho ’49 September 23, 2014

Jason Nichols ’03 and Jim Concannon, September 20, 2014

Roberta Cherner ’50 March 14, 2014

Daniel Winik ’03 and Sonja Ralston, July 19, 2014

Eleanor Granger ’52 October 25, 2014

Nasser Muhammad ’05 and Jazmin Rogers-Blackshear, November 2, 2014

Alden Bradford ’53 February 17, 2014 Vicki Lambert ’55 April 5, 2014 Richard Steinhardt ’57 July 10, 2014 Richard “Dick” Alan Goldstein ’62 December 20, 2013 Sayers Brown ’66 November 5, 2014 Elizabeth Norment ’70 October 13, 2014 Robert Barnard ’71 February 7, 2014 Pamela Hodges ’83 November 4, 2014

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Show the world that once a Quaker, always a Quaker.

Pick up some Sidwell Friends gear from the Fox Den!

Pop Quiz Why was this United States Marines helicopter landing on School property, and when did this happen?

Send your answer to alumnimagazine@sidwell.edu for a chance at a Sidwell Friends baseball hat. We’ll publish the answer in the next edition.

Visit www.sidwell.edu/school-store for School swag.

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ď‚Ą SIDWELL FRIENDS

Thanks to Plant Manager Steve Sawyer for the photo, one of his favorites from his more than 30 years with the Buildings and Grounds Department!

BE THERE EVERY DAY FOR SIDWELL FRIENDS Become a member of The Thomas and Frances Sidwell Society and provide permanent endowment for programs that you value, and improve educational facilities for a new generation of students.

A BEQUEST IN YOUR WILL CAN PROVIDE FOR THE SCHOOL TO RECEIVE, AT YOUR DEATH, A SPECIFIED AMOUNT, A FRACTION OF YOUR ESTATE, OR YOUR ENTIRE RESIDUAL ESTATE. THROUGH A BEQUEST:  You can retain control of your assets during your lifetime.  You can reduce estate taxes.  You can have the pleasure of knowing that your future gift will help Sidwell Friends.

THROUGH A PLANNED GIFT TO SIDWELL FRIENDS, YOU CAN:  Reduce taxes, including income, capital gains, gift, and estate taxes.  Transfer assets to children or grandchildren who will receive your financial support estate-tax free and on a timetable you predetermine.  Augment your income at retirement by establishing a trust which can reinvest your assets in vehicles that increase the return without incurring a capital gains tax.  Turn non-income producing assets into cash for reinvestment in order to provide yourself with a larger stream of income.  Make a gift with even greater impact by combining outright and deferred support.

For more information about bequests and other planned gifts, contact Mary K. Carrasco, director of Institutional Advancement, at 202-537-8117 or carrascom@sidwell.edu.

Copy courtesy Helen Colson Development Associates

 Qualify for a named endowment or facility gift in honor or memory of an individual or family of your choice.  Make the gift today that you want to make but could not otherwise afford.

3825 Wisconsin Avenue NW Washington, DC 20016-2999

Non-Profit Organization US Postage PAID Hagerstown MD Permit No. 93

At the Lower School Science Festival, volunteer Doug Tyson (parent of Spencer Tyson ’21 and Mackenzie Tyson ’23) seems as delighted with the popular wind tunnel experiment as the students are. Counterclockwise from upper left: Quinn Patwardhan ’24, Robby Matsui ’25, Sachin Kundra ’27, and Jacob Edelman ’25.