CLASS NOTES
CLASS NOTES
winter 2014 | St. Lawrence University Magazine 57
56 winter 2014 | St. Lawrence University Magazine
Syracuse, N.Y., law firm Bous-
quet Holstein PLLC has an-
nounced that the 2013 issue
of
New York Super Lawyers
– Upstate Edition
has named
Kathleen Faulknham Cen-
tolella
a Super Lawyer Rising
Star.
Super Lawyers
, a Thom-
son Reuters business, is a
rating service of outstanding
lawyers from more than 70 practice areas who
have attained a high degree of peer recognition
and professional achievement. The annual selec-
tions are made using a rigorous multi-phased
process that includes a statewide survey of law-
yers, an independent research evaluation of can-
didates, and peer reviews by practice area. To be
considered for a Rising Star distinction, lawyers are
asked to nominate the best attorneys who are 40
or under, or who have been practicing for 10 years
or less. They are instructed to nominate lawyers
they have personally observed in action—wheth-
er as opposing counsel or co-counsel, or through
other firsthand courtroom observation. Centolella
is a member of the firm practicing in the areas of
business transactions, mergers and acquisitions,
New York and federal income taxation planning,
and employee benefits.
2002
Katie Evereth ’02
1220 Marion Street #26
Denver, CO 80203
703-517-0071 (cell)
Next Reunion: 15
th,
2016 (cluster with ’00, ’01)
HappyWinter, classmates! I have a lot of informa-
tion to share. Here we go--let’s talk babies!
Tiffany Arel
and her husband, Sean Doherty,
welcomed Ava Elizabeth Doherty on June 24,
2013. They are madly in love with their little girl.
Congrats, Tiffany!
Congrats also to
Jamie Singer
and husband
Jonathan Chan on the birth of Ethan in July 2013.
Ed Forbes
and Emily Hunt ’04 welcomed their
daughter, Caroline Jane, on September 14, 2013,
at Northern Westchester Hospital in Mount Kisco,
NewYork. Ed said in his announcement,“Emily and
the lass are both doing well.”Congrats to you both!
Holly Dodge
and
Steve Folsom
live in Lansing,
N.Y., and were expecting baby girl #2 in early De-
cember. Grace turned 3 in the fall, and was look-
ing forward to being a big sister. Holly wrote,
“Steve is loving the job at Cornell University, and
has found a great running community. I am still
working from home for an environmental lab
based in Massachusetts.”
More running news:
Sarah Fogler Little
and
Katie Cuiffo Hughes
ran their first half marathon
last summer. Congrats, ladies!
Brett
and
Hattie SheltonHarvey
are in Anchor-
age, Alaska. They were looking forward to getting
their toddler, Baxter, out skiing this winter.
Charissa Bernagozzi Bixler
writes that
Kit
Whaley
hosted a get-together on the Eastern
Shore of Maryland in August. The group met up
on Tom ’74 and Judy Long Bixler '74's Oxford Bel-
levue Ferry. Also in attendance were
Tim Bixler
,
Alex ’00 and
Danielle Epstein Peterson,
Heather Lanigan, Meghan Weyrens Kuhn
and Dave ’00,
Katie Fitzgibbons Hoek
and
Matthew, and
Brigid Hayes Zeoli
and Rich,
along with Future Laurentians Brayden Bixler,
Lexi Hoek and Ella Bea Kuhn.
2003
Sarah Cook-Raymond ’03
10219 Green Holly Terrace
Silver Spring, MD 20902
202-997-9823
Next Reunion: 15
th
, 2019 (cluster with ’04, ’05)
This post is all about new jobs and the class-
mates that are rocking them. Congrats all
around!
Courtney Babcock
is a foreign service officer
at the U.S. Agency for International Develop-
ment (USAID) and recently completed her post
in the Congo. She then headed east across Af-
rica to her new two-year post in Liberia. I had
the chance to catch up with Courtney (aka“Tex”)
during her brief stay inWashington, D.C., to hear
about her international adventures and wish her
well on what’s next to come.
Beth Slater
is still living in Aspen, and after four
years with the Aspen Institute (which is based in
D.C.), she’s accepted a new position at the Buddy
Program, a youth mentoring program serving
the Roaring Fork Valley. Beth writes,“I'm running
our development department as well as the
peer-to-peer mentoring program—kids from
Aspen High School mentor kids at the middle
school.”
Jen Lorence Rapke
and
Tom
moved to Syra-
cuse, N.Y., where both accepted new jobs. Tom
is an executive at Target, and Jen is a professor
at SUNY Oswego and Syracuse University. They
also recently welcomed Leah Angelina into the
world.
John Trentini
graduated in May from the Uni-
formed Services University of the Health Scienc-
es (USUHS) and recently began his emergency
medicine residency in Dayton, Ohio.
Another recent graduate is
JaimeM. Ross
, who
successfully earned her Ph.D. in medical science
in September 2012 from the prestigious Karolin-
ska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden, as part of
a collaborative neuroscience doctoral program
with the National Institutes of Health in Bethes-
da, Md. Karolinska Institutet is a world-class
medical research institution and is renowned
for selecting Nobel laureates in physiology or
medicine. Jaime’s published thesis, “Mitochon-
drial DNA mutations: Brain developmental and
aging consequences, and possible treatments,”
can be downloaded from:
net/10616/41142. Her work has sparked interest
in the aging research community, and has been
recognized by several prizes and foundations.
Since completing her Ph.D., Jaime has been
awarded a post-doctoral fellowship from the
Swedish Brain Foundation to continue her quest
to understand the relationship between damage
to mitochondria—the organelle responsible for
energy production in the cell—and brain func-
tion as we age. Her research has led to a publica-
tion in the journal
Nature
, September 2013, where
she and her colleagues describe how the aging
process is influenced by inherited mitochondrial
DNA from our mothers. This paper may be read at
dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature12474.
As for the future, Jaime and her husband, Dr.
Giuseppe Coppotelli, a native of Italy and also a
post-doctoral research fellow at Karolinska In-
stitutet, enjoy sharing their passion for scientific
discovery together in the laboratory and look for-
ward to whatever life may bring their way!
2004
Rachel B. Peterson ’04
2242 Montgomery Ave., Apt. C
Cardiff by the Sea, CA 92007
610-304-4110 (cell)
Next Reunion: 10
th
, May 29-June 1, 2014
Lisa Gallo
emailed me to set the record straight
about the excitingwork on her film,
Infreschi.
Con-
trary to what I wrote in the last column, the film
has not yet been made. Lisa's hugely successful
Kickstarter campaign was focused on raising the
initial
$50,000 of the projected budget of half a
million dollars. Lisa explains, "Financiers tend to
bite after there is already money on a project and
people interested. I did go to Italy last summer to
shoot the Kickstarter Campaign video, record my
Nonno's voice, work on the script, and location-
scout." She has no doubt the film will be made,
adding, "I am still in utter awe at all the support
I received and am working my hardest to get this
film into production by next summer."
After spending more than 10 years in New York
State,
Jonathan Kent
moved back to Maine as
vice president of enrollment at Thomas College
in Waterville, just 10 miles from where he grew
up. His wife,
Sara Rademacher
, graduated from
SUNY Oneonta with a master's degree in school
counseling and was hired as a guidance coun-
selor at Nokomis High School in Newport, Maine.
They traveled back to campus in August for the
cross country team’s annual Run 4 Ryan race,
where they saw
Bryan Tolcser
,
Amy Barr Red-
man
and
Mary Clark Parker
.
Ed ’02 and
Emily Hunt Forbes
welcomed
daughter Caroline Jane last September 14 at
Northern Westchester Hospital in Mount Kisco,
N.Y. She weighed in at 7 pounds, 4 ounces and
20 inches long.
Billy Welcome
and
Kristin Winters
married
on September 1, 2012, in Gunnison Memorial
Chapel. The reception followed at the Gran View
hotel in Ogdensburg. Many alumni attended, in-
cluding
Josh Considine, Sarah Kaulfuss
, Jessica
Lawrence Pecola ’05, Danielle Winters ’11, Sierra
Knight ’16,
Dan Albrecht
and
Morgan Fee
.
Cori Wilhelm
dis-
tinguished
herself
on the TV game
show
Jeopardy!
in
early October, after
taping in Los Ange-
les over the summer.
Cori, pictured with
host Alex Trebek,
won her first contest on the strength of a wise
wager and a correct response on Final Jeopardy,
“By population, it’s the largest country in the
world without nuclear weapons” (Indonesia), and
returned for one game as defending champion.
A history major with minors in Asian studies and
education, she has a master’s degree from SUNY
Potsdam and an additional degree from the Uni-
versity of Buffalo, works as a librarian at SUNY
Canton, and lives in Potsdam. She told a
Water-
town Daily Times
reporter she was surprised by
how calm she looked in front of the cameras, and
that she plans to use much of her winnings on a
house renovation project and a winter vacation.
In August, I hosted my first Shadow-a-Saint stu-
dent, and it was a fantastic experience! It was
wonderful to introduce a bright young woman
to the leadership development industry and the
Center for Creative Leadership. Meg Ryan ’15
traveled all the way from Massachusetts to San
Diego to shadowme and observe one of our stel-
lar open enrollment leadership programs. If you
haven’t volunteered for Shadow-a-Saint, I highly
recommend it! It’s one of the opportunities I wish
I had taken advantage of as a student but am very
glad to take part in now.
I hope you all have marked your calendars for
our 10-year reunion! I am beyond excited to re-
turn to campus May 29-June 1!
Keep the news coming in. Until next time, I wish
you all the best!
2005
Danielle Sanzone ’05
147 Pawling Ave.
Troy, NY 12180-4718
518-269-9414
Next Reunion: 10
th
, 2015
There were some cool locations for recent wed-
dings of ’05 grads.
Kassandra Hardy
married Eric Bissmeyer in
Yosemite National Park on Oct. 4. An employee
of the National Park Service, Hardy went back
to school to study law online at Vermont’s Law
School for environmental law and policy. “I enjoy
working for the National Park Service as a man-
agement assistant and we are especially enjoying
life in the southern Sierra Nevada.”she said.
Meanwhile, in the Mediterranean Sea,
Sean
Brennan
married Elena Terekhina on June 27,
2013, on Santorini, a Greek island. His father and
sister, both SLU graduates, attended.
Back in the states,
Colby Gargano
and spouse
Chris Summers ’07 bought a house in Old Green-
wich, Conn. They also had another baby girl on
July 23, named Ellen “Ellie”Telfair Summers.
Jean
Walker
and
Noah Plotkin
gave birth to daugh-
ter Meredith Leigh in April. And
Liz Chadwick
and her husband, Joe Burns, had their baby son
on August 6. His name is Liam Joseph Burns.
I attended the baby shower in July for Liz’s baby
with
Chinasa Izeogu Seyse
and
Clementine Vi-
tek Buyle
. Chinasa is still living with husband Eric
’06 in Scotia, N.Y., and Clementine is in New York
City with her husband, Hendrik.
Fallon Reed
has started her own photography
business as a side job that began as a hobby. She
still works full-time for the state of New Hamp-
shire, with the Division of Homeland Security
and Emergency Management. She was recently
promoted to assistant operations chief. She has
bought her first house and is planning to get mar-
ried next October.
Molly Ryan
took a job as manager of com-
munity outreach for CVPH Medical Center,
Plattsburgh, N.Y. She handles special events co-
ordinating for its foundation and manages the
volunteers at the hospital.
As for myself, I’m still working at my hometown
newspaper in Troy, N.Y. I’m doing a few freelance
jobs and I enjoyed a fun fall of hiking and camp-
ing in the Adirondacks.
A St. Lawrence “identical twins” classmates’
reunion last summer in Ocean Park, Maine,
brought together
Aaron Cutter ’03
(left) and
Adam Cutter ’03
(rear right) and
Heather
Fitts Barnes ’03
(purple dress) and
Kristen
Fitts Vaillancourt ’03
(white dress), and their
children and spouses.
The Laurentian Connection
Ryan Schaefer ’13 – Free Flow Culture
It was through a conversation I had with a student that I learned about Free Flow Culture (FFC)
and Ryan Schaefer ’13. The art and art history major and Boston, Mass., native made a name for
himself on campus last year by designing iPhone cases.
What many didn’t know was that his work wasn’t just admired on campus – he was selling cases
overseas, too.
FFC
) was born inMay 2012 after Schaefer helped
another startup company get underway. He originally wanted to be an ar-
chitect because of his love of drawing, but realized he wanted to have more
freedom. Noting his ability to draw near-perfect freeform lines, Schaefer says,
“I never use a pencil. When I put a line down on paper, it’s not coming back
up. There are no erasers, just like there aren’t any in life. If you make a mistake
you don’t get to take it back; you have to make it into something positive
and better.”
Schaefer decided to share his art with others via iPhone cases. “I knew I
could use people’s creativity to inspire my own imagination,” he says. More
than 200 cases later, Schaefer is still developing new designs and concepts
daily. His conversations with clients start like this:“’Tell me three to five things
you love in life, and two textures you like.’”
“People can be as specific or as broad as they want,” he says. “Their answers
completely drive the discussion, my creativity and the end result.”
I wanted a St. Lawrence-inspired case, so our consultation took a different direction. “Tell me
five things you love about St. Lawrence and give me some textures you like,” he said. I told him
scarlet and brown, the fall, our campus buildings, the people and traditions, and I chose water
as my texture.
While we talked, he told me that several of his clients have been St. Lawrence students. “I was
able to sustain my business because people believed in me,”he says.“They could’ve bought a $10
case but they wanted to support me as I attempted to do this onmy own. Coming back for Home-
coming last fall and seeing students still using my cases was incredible. I’m blessed to be part of a
community that has my back.”
FFC has expanded beyond iPhone cases. Schaefer designs websites and produces video, among
other creative projects. He’s worked with MIT and various artists and believes that if he’s “in it to
win it”each time he works on a project, he’ll be able to do what he loves the rest of his life.
—Meg Bernier ’07, M’09
