Class Notes
1950s
Dave Eden ’59 and wife, Linda (DeLauder) Eden, recently celebrated their 61st wedding anniversary. The couple met during an on-campus snowball fight in 1957 while he was a junior and she was a freshman. They wed before his senior year and now live in North Carolina.
1960s
Lee Boyle ’68 published his 33rd book, Virginia Makes the Poorest Figure of Any State: The Virginia Infantry at Valley Forge.
1970s
Travis Tallman ’70 won the 2019 RESNA-Rehabilitation Engineering Society of North America’s Sam McFarland Memorial Mentor Award, given to members who have influenced, counseled and nurtured others in the field of rehabilitation engineering and assistive technology. He works as director of augmentative and computer services at the New Jersey Institute for Disabilities.
Julie Conlon ’71 is the creator of The Lafayette Plarn Project and an ambassador for homeless services in Lafayette, Indiana. Plarning is a process where strips of plastic grocery bags are crocheted into sleeping mats for those who struggle with homelessness or are victims of floods.
William Owings ’73 works as a professor of educational leadership in the Department of Educational Foundations and Leadership at Old Dominion University. He and his wife, Leslie, have written 16 books or monographs, 10 chapters in texts and encyclopedia volumes and 60 journal articles about the intersection of education finance, leadership and student social outcomes.
1980s
Eve Golden ’80 signed contracts to write her seventh and eighth biographies, Jayne Mansfield: The Girl Couldn’t Help It and Lupe Velez: Mexican Spitfire Goes to Hollywood.
“ I want my books to be funny as well as informative. Even when there's tragedy involved—and there sure is with Jayne Mansfield—it has to be balanced with humor. I want my books to take people away from themselves for a day or two. ”
John Manzoni ’82 joined Clearview Group as an associate project manager in the technology and cybersecurity practice providing support for cross-functional client engagements.
Joe Platania ’85 is celebrating 40 years in Baltimore sports media. An alum of The Towerlight and WCVT-FM (now WTMD), he was named Maryland’s 1998 Sportscaster of the Year and was a Sportswriter of the Year finalist in 2010. He can be occasionally heard on WJZ-FM’s Vinny and Haynie program as a pro football analyst.
Mike Castino ’86 is president of the Sons of Italy-Little Italy Lodge and is focusing on membership growth, fundraising and the encouragement of Italian pride and cultural knowledge.
Samuel R. Polakoff ’86 published his latest novel, Shaman, about a U.S. senator who must learn the art of shamanism in order to save the world from evil forces threatening the earth’s core and accelerating climate change.
Ralph Hoffman ’87 works as an executive vice president of risk management at Arthur Schuman, Inc., and has recently been appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to a four-year term on the technical advisory committee for trade in processed food. Hoffman also serves on the National Dairy Promotion and Research Board and is on the executive committee of the Cheese Importers Association of America.
Brook Lenker ’89, ’96 published his first novel, The Restorers, set on the Susquehanna River and inspired by his experiences coordinating large-scale, organized educational river expeditions on the Susquehanna, Patuxent, Potomac and James rivers. He is the executive director of FracTracker Alliance, an organization that studies, maps and communicates the risks of oil and gas development to support renewable energy transformation.
“ Rivers are always moving, changing, renewing. They are dynamic, the perfect metaphor for the ups and downs, twists and turns of life. I'm certainly not the first writer to find inspiration in their ways but throughout my years creeks and rivers have been a constant—something I enjoy and from which I have derived inspiration. ”
1990s
Parth Munshi ’91 joined Taylor English Duma’s corporate practice group. He focuses on matters related to corporate governance, securities regulation and disclosure, mergers and acquisitions and NYSE and NASDAQ compliance. He has nearly 25 years of experience in corporate law and has served as a primary disclosure and governance lawyer for the Coca-Cola Company and Molson Brewing Company.
Vasilisa C. Hamilton ’92 launched “Ask Lisa,” an advice column on WalterboroLive.com. She is an author, independent journalist and communications strategist.
Tracey Grumbach ’94 showed 46 pieces of digital art in a solo art exhibit titled “Brave New World” at the World Trade Center in Baltimore. The exhibit features work from several of her latest series, which examine human nature and the influences of the technical age on the human psyche.
“ Many women feel they are not 'perfect' and need to have a nip and tuck, whiten their teeth, be attached to a man, or wear the perfect clothes to have value as a person. I believe this has become an epidemic in today's technology-driven world. ”
George E. Brown ’96 was recognized for legal excellence and client service by the 2020 legal ranking guide, The Best Lawyers in America. Brown received top ranking for his work in the area of construction litigation. He is a principal of the Baltimore law firm Kramon & Graham, where he co-chairs the construction practice.
Kimberly Voss ’97, author of four books, was promoted to full professor of Journalism at the University of Central Florida.
Jack S. Monell ’97 was recently awarded the Willie Burke Master Teacher Award by Winston-Salem State University.
Tre Alexander ’98 is an actor and model who has commercial experience with brands like HelloFresh, for which she filmed a commercial with her husband. She is the department coordinator of Biology and Neuroscience at Brandeis University in Massachusetts.
2000s
Kelly Savoca ’00 was appointed Sheppard Pratt Health System’s new vice president and CFO. She will oversee financial operations across the health system’s more than 160 programs and 350 sites. She has been a part of Sheppard Pratt for more than 16 years.
Michael Weller ’00 was named senior counsel at Cheniere Energy, Inc., an international energy company headquartered in Houston, Texas. Prior to this position, Weller practiced law for nearly 10 years in Washington, D.C.
Stefanie Hare Bierzonski ’06 works as a media analyst with Bravo Group in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and is a performer in an acoustic band.
Erica Starr ’06 works as director of marketing and senior vice president of Howard Bank, a community bank in the Baltimore area. She has been named to The Daily Record’s 2019 VIP List.
Gary Van Essen ’06, ’08 serves as the Mathematics Department chair at Arundel High School in Anne Arundel County and as the director of music at Christ Church on Kent Island. He earned his Ed.D. in educational leadership from Gwynedd Mercy University, and recently celebrated his third anniversary with his wife, Emily.
2010s
Ken Pipkin ’10 was voted Best School Principal in the Baltimore Sun’s 2019 “Baltimore’s Best” poll. He led St. Joseph, a pre-K – 8th grade Catholic school, during its recognition as a National Blue Ribbon School in 2016.
Daniel Renz ’10, has been promoted to special agent with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Office of Investigations. In his new role, he serves as both a federal investigator and insider threat analyst, protecting the FAA and National Airspace System from international threats.
Christina Kramer ’11 works as a program analyst at the Social Security Administration. She has experience in the positions of claims specialist, operations analyst and program expert. She has worked at Social Security for 11 years.
Sarah Ports ’13 opened The Beach Butler, an Ocean City, Maryland-based concierge service for beachgoers that transports and sets-up/takes-down their beach belongings.
Cameron Swann ’14 works as a research associate for the Institute of Defense Analyses (IDA), a nonprofit corporation that operates three federally-funded research and development centers.
James Greene ’15 works as a digital anchor and reporter at KCRG, an ABC station in eastern Iowa. Before this position, he spent nearly three years as a reporter, producer and anchor at KKCO/KJCT in Grand Junction, Colorado.
Daniel Izume ’15 is currently an assistant professor of business at Baltimore City Community College. He is a Quality Matters-certified higher education peer reviewer, a peer evaluator for the Middle States Commission on Higher Education and a 2018 NISOD faculty excellence award recipient.
Kristen Maygers ’16 is a science teacher at Pine Grove Middle School and a graduate student in Miami University’s Global Field Program. She has studied approaches to saving species in the wild and engaged with local partners developing and testing site-specific methods of community engagement to sustain ecological and social health In Hawaii.