Class of 2019

As always, with the onset of summer, news starts flowing in faster and faster. By the time this issue is delivered to you, I will hopefully have seen you all at Homecoming & Reunion Weekend and be overflowing with notes. With that said, I am not short of anecdotes, updates and congratulations to share here.

I would like to have to visited Williamsburg in May with my dad, Stewart Glendinning ’86, who was delivering the Raymond A. Mason School of Business’ Commencement address, but it was too close to my own graduation to make the trip. Since then, I’ve started studying for the bar, the challenges of which Phoebe Brannock ’18 chronicled all too well in her last winter notes, and it is reassuring to know some of you are sharing in this struggle. I am finally going to be a full-time New York City resident and a Bronx assistant district attorney as of this fall!

I saw Carter Kale, now TikTok famous, is also planning a fall move, but to Philadelphia, and he’s in the market for a house. I have yet to congratulate anyone in my notes for the home ownership milestone, but it seems worth a mention given the difficulty of buying a house today. Off the top of my head, I know Menna Teshome, Melanie Hughes, and Kenny Preston and Izzy Rodríguez-Preston are also homeowners, so it’s encouraging that I can name a few.

You can take a look at Carter’s recent W&M Alumni Magazine feature online. While you’re there, give Natalie Marcotullio’s spring issue feature a read as well. The article focuses on the work of Natalie, Neil McLean ’18 and Chris Hoyle ’18 in running Navattic, a company that creates interactive product demos for software sellers. Also in the news, Caroline Simmons was a guest on ABC24’s “Now That’s Memphis” to promote a conference hosted by the Memphis Grizzlies Foundation, where she works as a senior coordinator. 

More of our classmates are also on the move. Megan Beier recently moved to London, and Jena Araojo is off to Chicago. Many of the newly minted doctors are also moving for their residencies. Among them, Kara Brads will be a pediatric resident at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu and Kelven Lee will be at Duke University as an emergency medicine resident.

Some more good news — Matt Parciak, Julia Stumbaugh, Sam Strausser, Kat Danstrom ’18 and I survived our Icelandic road trip — tölting on Icelandic horses and all (RIP Sam’s ankles). Sam gave me a long list of recent engagements and marriages courtesy of Amy Nelson. Devon McCann and Ben Arp are engaged and living in California. Molly Little and Alex Burke ’20, Adriana McDevitt and Mitchell Luti ’18, and Hannah Ventura and Bobby Rivkin are also all recently engaged to be married. Congratulations to all of you! I also saw that Rishya Suresh is engaged to Surya Sampath, and Kelsey Creech is engaged to Rahum Sherazi. Kelsey is now a pastor at the Virginia Beach Christian Church after graduating from Yale Divinity School two years ago.

Matt and I loved seeing Seth Layton, Ross Fladeland ’20, Nicole Baker ’20 and Maddie Grimesey ’18, M.A.Ed. ’20 at Lizzie Torrez and Michael Ambrose’s beautiful wedding in April. Seth promised he and Julian Mills will be at Homecoming & Reunion Weekend, and I’m excited to see more of you there soon!

Hello all!

In case I lose some of you halfway through my notes, let me begin by inviting you all to join me in Williamsburg this Oct. 17-20 for Homecoming & Reunion Weekend and our five year reunion! By the time this issue is published, five years since our graduation will have officially elapsed, which is difficult to conceive given that’s longer than we actually spent as William & Mary students, yet I feel just as connected to our alma mater as I did five years ago. Some of you might not feel the same, but the best thing about the College is the enduring nature of its community. Our four years on campus was merely the beginning, and it’s never too late to rekindle old friendships or meet other William & Mary people. I look forward to seeing some of you then!

In terms of news, there are as ever a number of engagements to celebrate. Late last year, Will Goncher proposed to Cat Rubio. Then, in January, Alex Taylor, now a dermatology resident at Sampson Regional Medical Center, became engaged to her Campbell School of Medicine classmate Justin Wain.

I saw Cat, Bronwynn Terrell ’19, M.A.Ed. ’20 and Emmel El-Fiky recently reunited for a weekend in New York City, more proof that our Cambridge study abroad during the summer of 2017 created bonds that will last a lifetime. During that summer abroad, Kat Danstrom ’18, Matt Parciak and Julia Dalzell ’20 spent our free weekend together in Edinburgh, Scotland. Tack on Julia Stumbaugh, Sam Strausser and myself, and you complete the group of us headed to Iceland this May.

I am very excited to report that by the time we fly to Iceland and this issue is published, I will have graduated from the University of Florida Levin College of Law along with Gavin Hallisey ’21. Congratulations to all of us graduating with advanced degrees this spring, including Lizzie Torrez from Georgetown School of Medicine, Kara Brads from Campbell School of Medicine, Rui Yin from the University of Maryland with a Ph.D. in Biomathematics, Zach Sims from Yale with an MBA, and Evan Oldshein from Brooklyn Law School.

Note, my email has changed again as I lose yet another .edu email address, but please do reach out. Congrats to Brianna Ferebee for her feature in the magazine’s fall issue for her work with the Bureau for Conflict Prevention and Stabilization!

I have some news to pass along to you all in this issue, but it is unusually accompanied by very little of my own. I am happy to report that I am finally in my third and final year of law school, which I would like to be a fairly relaxed experience. Unfortunately, I am editing around the clock as editor in chief of the Florida Journal of International Law, but looking forward to making it through this finals season and taking some time off over the holidays.

With that said, let’s dive right in. My freshman hallmates seem to be doing especially well. Alex Gilliam and Emma Forman Gilliam recently welcomed the cutest baby boy, Owen. Emma has been both personally and professionally working on women’s health issues in recent years. She started the group Running for Roe in 2022 to advocate for reproductive rights and is currently pursuing a master of science in nursing as a women’s health nurse practitioner at the University of Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, Nathan Rakos and Emily Hynes, both former Monroe residents, recently got engaged and are planning a spring wedding in April 2025.

Over the summer, there were a number of other notable engagements. William Schubert proposed to Lauren Hobbs on a stunning rocky outcrop in Isle of Skye, Scotland. Closer to home but equally beautiful, Isaac Levy ’20 proposed to Sami Kim at sunset on a Nantucket beach. They previously shared vows in a 2018 Greek life ceremony, but this time will be official. Continuing a string of scenic engagements, Kenneth Preston proposed to Isabelle Rodríguez while sailing off of Long Island. Kenny and Izzy were then married in October.

Earlier in the year, McKinley Saunders married Coy DeWeese in Charlottesville with a number of alumni in attendance, including Kat Danstrom ’18, who passed along this news.

While I was in New York City over the summer, I was excited to see Megan Beier a few times. She just ran the New York City Marathon in support of JDRF, the leading type 1 diabetes research foundation. 26.2 miles through all five boroughs is such a feat. I am so impressed by all of the runners in our class and especially proud of Megan! Elena Gaffney and Annie Miller also ran the New York City Marathon this year. This is Annie’s third in a row, but she intends to take a turn cheering from the sidelines next year.

In other news, Louise Ferrall is reading more than ever as a gender studies doctoral student at the University of Indiana. I also heard that Ben Skopic ’19, Ph.D. ’23 recently joined the Institute for Defense Analyses as a research staff member from Mariana Kornreich ’23, who also works at IDA. Ben completed his doctorate in materials science and engineering at William & Mary in 2023.

And with that, I have to get back to my own reading. Keep in touch!

I almost left the column blank this issue, not for lack of happenings in the Class of 2019, but because there is so much happening that I barely have time to put it all in writing. I started working for the U.S. Department of Transportation in May, for its Office of General Counsel, which has been especially time consuming but rewarding. The agency is, of course, headquartered in Washington, D.C., but I am living with Matt Parciak and Julia Stumbaugh in Brooklyn this summer, so I’m super-commuting one day a week from New York to D.C. via Amtrak. Julia is working nights as a sports writer for Bleacher Report now, and Matt is temporarily retired due to a noncompete before starting work at Sotheby’s in September.

In other professional news, Jioni Tuck spent the past few years working in Guatemala, but will soon be attending the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health before joining the U.S. Agency for International Development as a Donald M. Payne International Development Graduate fellow.

It has been a pleasure to play a regular part in so many of my friends’ lives in D.C. again, but I should probably rescind my harsh words about the District. I acknowledge it is actually a very pleasant city to live in. I was also back in D.C. briefly in February as Elizabeth Smedley flew in from London for a Griffin A reunion she organized. There were too many alumni in attendance to name everyone, but it was fun to see them back together again!

I was also recently in D.C. for a memorial service for Kay Menchel, the mother of Hannah Menchel and Cameron Menchel ’17, who passed away late in June after a brief battle with cancer. Kay was known by all of her children’s friends as a generous patron and a frank confidant. She notoriously shipped care packages to entire freshman halls and continued to send me packages of my favorite treats through my most recent fall semester of law school. In short, she was a mother to so many William & Mary students, and she will be terribly missed by those of us who were privileged to be acquainted with her compassion and kindness. Those of us familiar with her skill in the kitchen or her charming wit will no doubt miss her even more. My memories of her during my time at William & Mary will always be a blessing, as I hope they are to everyone who knew her. The Young Guarde was well represented at her memorial service, which was a tragic reunion, but one that Kay would have loved to see.

Until next time.

Hi, everyone! I am feeling freezing down in South Florida, which tells me that I’ve been here for far too long. After successfully surviving half of law school, I did venture north to New York City to visit Matt Parciak, who recently moved into a Brooklyn apartment with Julia Stumbaugh. They hosted an entertaining New Year’s Eve celebration in the city, which Samantha Strausser and Alicia Devereaux traveled in for. A raucous time was had by all. While I was there, Klaire Gubler happened to be traveling through the city, so we had brunch and finished some holiday shopping with Cynthia Wang and Edward Fortunato. Many thanks to Cynthia for her Luxottica connections. Ed shared that he recently came in third place in a pickleball tournament, the rules of which I tried and failed to learn over the holidays. 

Although not an alumnus, my brother recently proposed to his now fiancée, and I wish them the same heartfelt congratulations as to all of those recently engaged or married in our class. This includes the engagement of Nicole Efford and Ian Kunsey; Katie Ferguson and Ben Westerlund; and Alex Hayes and Elizabeth Vanasse ’20. It also includes the marriage of Shannon Fischer and Joseph Plunkett; Rachael McCarthy and Joseph Wade; and Milane Gooden and Cory Wilson. Ada Hinton was in attendance at Milane’s wedding, where she said the couple exchanged exceptional vows. Ben Skopic and Margaret Williams ’20 were also recently married in Richmond with lots of William & Mary swim team alumni in attendance. Their swim friends very thoughtfully had a brick at the Alumni House engraved to celebrate the milestone!

In other news, Sam Strausser is excited that Amy Nelson now lives in Chicago, and I noticed Emmel El-Fiky now lives in New York City while attending Columbia for her Master of Arts in politics and education. Peter Brooks will soon be relocating to the Big Apple as well after spending the winter in South Florida. I’m beating a dead horse now, but the Washington, D.C., departures continue.

I hope you all are doing well. As always, you can email, text, call or write to either share something for the notes or just catch up. With that said, be sure to use my new email address since our promised lifetime email privileges are being revoked. 

I was so excited to receive a FaceTime call from Klaire Gubler and Emily Deem just the other day and hear about what’s going on in their lives. Klaire is playing pickup basketball with the local boys in South Boston, and Emily is hard at work crafting some beautiful stained glass projects. It was also wonderful to hear from Stuart Dopp ’62, with whom I served on the William & Mary Libraries Board, after my last notes. She’s old friends with Grace Prillaman’s family, it turns out! I’m glad my news is reaching far and wide. Until next time!

Hello again, and welcome to another installment of Class Notes!

I’ve just found the time to write while waiting for the arrival of Hurricane Ian in North Florida, which canceled my law school classes for the next few days. Admittedly, that means I’m writing these notes before Homecoming & Reunion Weekend, since I will sadly not be in attendance. I hope some of you will be back in Williamsburg to ring in fall, nonetheless.

My outlook was accurate, this past summer was fantastic, and it included seeing many of my friends from our class for the first time since the pandemic began. I was so excited to get drinks with Megan Beier, Maddy Pellow and Kat Danstrom ’18 after work. Klaire Gubler, Cynthia Wang, Abbey Hillerich, Natalie Marcotullio, Mary Burns and I had a fun Fourth of July on Cape Cod, and we spent an afternoon with Peter Hogan and Greg Garnhart ’20 at a local brewery. I gathered with many of the same friends for Cynthia’s birthday plus Craig Maxwell, Jack Jenet, Andris Murray, Alana Coleman and Edward Fortunato. Needless to say, there was many a group BeReal taken. 

With a population of 8 million, one wouldn’t expect to run into William & Mary people on the street in New York City, but that happened to me more than once this summer. After a lovely dinner with Cameron Menchel ’17, we ran into his classmate Jason Nagel ’17 accompanied by Sarah Acree ’15; and Matt Parciak and I crossed paths with Joel Calfee ’20 in Central Park as if by fate. I hope your summers were similarly filled with friends and fun!

In other news, the D.C. exodus continues with Kenny Preston and Isabelle Rodriguez now in Richmond, Peter Makey moving to New York City to work in sustainability-
related private capital and Kat Danstrom ’18 also moving to NYC for a new mathematically inclined position at Hudson River Trading. Very longtime roommates Casey Herrmann, Amelia Nell and Alex Cole also absconded from the District. Amelia is joining the ranks of attorneys in our class as she just started law school at the University of Virginia. After an incredible summer of travel for Casey, featuring a stop in Switzerland where Alex is now living, she moved to NYC. Casey is now training for the New York City Marathon and would certainly appreciate your help reaching her fundraising goal for the National Alliance on Mental Illness. 

Additionally, Alex Wallace informed me that his work was published in two anthologies over the past several years. They are titled “AlloAmericana: Myths and Legends from Other Americas” and “Building a Better Future,” the proceeds of which he is proud to report benefit Ukrainian relief efforts.

OK, it’s time to congratulate those of us getting married. Allie Cooper and Justin Dulaney ’20 were married over the summer, as were Kyle Parker and his husband, Ariel Listo Argul, on a beautiful day in Maryland with numerous alumni in attendance! Congratulations are long overdue to Moises Romero and Michaela Seaton on their marriage, but I wish you both a very happy third anniversary. 

Recently engaged couples due congratulations include Rianna Banerjee and Matt Boyer ’21, Dillon Cullipher and Nick Flanagan ’18, Kia Garrett and Aidan McKee, David Watkins and Taylor White ’20, Andrea Dumenigo and Chase McKevitt, and Meredith Caine and Emily Gould ’18. Special congratulations to Lizzie Torrez and Michael Ambrose, a fellow Cambridge study abroad couple, on an amazing beachside engagement!

As I mentioned in the fall notes, I am crowd sourcing an anecdotal travel guide from the Class of 2019, which will be published (photos and all) in the online notes. Go check it out as you start thinking about plans for spring and summer!

As always, reach out with any news you have. I would love to hear from you!

What a marvelous summer I hope you all had! Although other class reporters have mentioned this in the past, it’s worth reiterating that these notes are written roughly four months in advance to meet publishing deadlines, and I only completed my last set in mid-March. This means that while I hope the summer was a great one, any summer news will not appear until my next notes. 

With that said, some of our classmates have big plans for the summer already. Abby Whitlock will be presenting her research at a conference hosted by the Royal Air Force Museum in London come September. Abby is an incredible young historian, so I am sure her talk will be a highlight. 

Bill Murray recently signed a futures contract with the New England Patriots according to Sports Illustrated, so I’m sure he has a big summer of practice ahead. 

I will be in the New York City area for most of the summer, interning with a judge in the Eastern District of New York in the federal district’s Brooklyn courthouse. I am beyond excited to spend time with many of our classmates for the first time since the pandemic started, and I am certain I will have news to report back with. 

I am sure many of you will be traveling this summer, although I have already seen a lot of our class traveling this spring. I was especially excited to live vicariously through Megan Beier’s trip to Lisbon, Portugal. I would love to share travel recommendations and stories in our winter notes if you’ll send me your recent travel news! 

Finally, I am catching up on overdue congratulations to our classmates. Ada Hinton was recently promoted to social media specialist at George Washington’s Mount Vernon. Grace Prillaman got engaged to her University of Virginia School of Medicine classmate Anthony Ignozzi, and Caroline Byrd is engaged to Jack Adamek ’18. Congratulations to you all!

That’s all for now. Please feel free to reach out with any news for me to share.

Hello my friends! I am succeeding my freshman hallmate, Mona Sharaf, as our class reporter. I hope that you are all doing well and remained safe and healthy throughout the pandemic. I think many of us felt grateful for graduating in the last “normal” year, but it was still jarring to be fresh graduates and then consumed with the many challenges associated with COVID-19. The pandemic created some extra distance between many of us with less travel and missed events, so I am so excited to use this as a way to keep in touch with my classmates despite feeling overwhelmed by law school most of the time.

If we did not have the pleasure of knowing each other at William & Mary, you might have found me studying in Swem, watching “Law & Order” in the French House, or working in Undergraduate Admission, depending on the year. I double majored in history and finance, so I was around Blair and Miller halls a lot as well. Over the past couple of years, Matt Parciak and I took advantage of remote work whenever possible. Matt interned at Christie’s in their design department just prior to the pandemic and currently works as a senior associate in photography at Artnet Auctions. We spent a large chunk of last winter in Maine and some of the summer in Colorado. I was especially excited to see Elizabeth Smedley in Denver; she was visiting from London, where she’s been living since graduation.

I’m currently living in Gainesville, Florida, attending the University of Florida's Levin College of Law with Perren Vasquez, although I started my legal education a little later than Perren. Not to worry, Gavin Hallisey ’21 and I have all of our classes together!

While I have a few years left in my legal education, congratulations to Perren and all of those finishing graduate-level education this year! Hannah Menchel, Jerry Shaen and many more of you are also graduating law school this spring. Jerry will be working at Ogletree Deakins in Philadelphia after law school! William & Mary seems to have produced an astonishing number of lawyers in the Class of 2019.

There are a growing number of engagements and marriages to celebrate in the Class of 2019 as well. Foremost among them, congratulations are in order for my freshman roommate, Alex Gilliam, and Emma Forman on their engagement! Jackie Valles is soon to be married to her fiancé, Michael Cruz. Ishaan Thakran and Adriane Tomovic ’19, M.Acc. ’20 are also engaged to be married this summer. Victoria Fong and Eli Knittel were engaged this past summer, and her former roommate, Josie Snow ’18, married Peter Bean last summer. I should also congratulate Grace Becker and Tom Parker ’18 on their marriage! Finally, I have to congratulate Hannah Van Essendelft and Wade Hayes ’18 on their upcoming third wedding anniversary! Many congratulations and exclamation marks to all of you now engaged or married! Let me know who I missed so that we can celebrate them as well.

I am so proud of your many accomplishments, but on to some gossip! Washington, D.C., was the place to be after graduation, but many of my friends decided to leave recently. Klaire Gubler left Arlington and joined Abbey Hillerich in Boston, Emily Deem and Chris Parios ’20 moved to Denver and Cynthia Wang made the move from D.C. to NYC to work for Bank of America. I have yet to visit Cynthia and Mary Burns in the infamous Murray Hill, but it is on my bucket list. I noticed Jacob Rexrode and Luke Esposito also departed D.C. for Richmond. Do we think the Class of 2019 is growing weary of our nation’s capital?

Again, let me know what you’re all up to. I’m excited to hear from you!

James Kunder of Alexandria was recently commissioned as an ensign in the United States Navy upon completion of Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island.  He was subsequently assigned to a U.S. Navy guided missile destroyer, the USS Momsen, based in Everett, Washington.

James is a 2015 graduate of St. Stephen’s and St. Agnes school, Alexandria, where he served as class president his senior year and was a member of the wrestling team. He majored in public policy at William & Mary, served as a member of the university's Honor Council and was active in student government.  

Having completed his Navy Officer Candidate School studies in the top 5% of his class, he was designated a Distinguished Naval Graduate upon commissioning as a surface warfare officer. 

No note submitted.

Births

Marriages

Madison Elizabeth Free to Tanner John Holland ’18, 6/15/19.

Sarah Gabrielle Le to Zachary D. Morrill, 5/04/19.

Hello all!

Welcome back to the second EVER edition of the Class of 2019 notes! Hopefully the past six-ish months of adulthood have lived up to your expectations! For me, they have been filled with the THRILL of bills and deadlines and expectations and grappling with the reality that I am no longer a student but a real, full-grown adult! Now to updating the masses on the adventures of the Class of ’19.

Let us jump into some of the updates on what our peers are doing! Jackie Valles is living it up in Austin, Texas working in sales for Box!  

Amy Folkerts is living in New Brunswick, New Jersey, working as a campaign organizer with Environment New Jersey, which is committed to 100 percent renewable energy for the state (you go girl and save the environment!).

Tommy Rubino is hitting the route to grad schools by studying it up for the GRE (you can do it!).

Emily Pearson-Beck is living in Brooklyn and working with the Manhattan DA’s office in the Immigrant Affairs Unit as a Chinese and Spanish program coordinator (a trilingual QUEEN!).

Ola Pozor just moved to Santiago de Compostela, Spain, to teach English.

Connor Glendinning is “Eat, Pray, Loving but in America. Also crying about unemployment. Maybe taking the LSAT, who knows!” (I believe in you, Connor!!).

Mary Kate Maher is ATTEMPTING to teach a bunch of second-graders in Fairfax (I feel you, fellow teacher!).

Evan Oldshein is working as a paralegal in New York City before hopefully going to law school (a special shout-out to Mama Oldshein for always finding my work in the magazine!).

Emma Smullen, my former roommate and current BFF, is a finance queen working with JP Morgan!  

Rachel Becker just moved to Richmond, Virginia, where she was appointed to the Northam administration as the special assistant to the secretary of health and human resources.

Lily Merrill is living in Germany as Fulbright English Teaching Assistant (woohoo to my fellow Linguistics major!).

Carolyn Farling is getting a master’s in applied science from Saint Mary’s University in Nova Scotia, Canada.

Valerie Bambha is getting her Ph.D. in developmental psychology at Cornell (another woohoo to a fellow linguistics major!)

Kelsey Creech is starting the Master of Divinity program at Yale.

Hannah Caffacus is working at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the fitness and wellness department of campus recreation. 

Katherine Dougherty, my former roommate from DuPont during my sophomore year, is studying at George Mason in their nursing program.

Mollie Gaines, another fellow Dupont-er, is working on getting a Ph.D. in geospatial analytics from North Carolina State.

Bronwyn Roseli, a GREAT buddy of mine, is following in my footsteps and making the Midwest move to Chicago, and I am thrilled to have a friend on this side of the no-coast.

Julian Mills is continuing his work in college admissions, transitioning from working as a senior interviewer at W&M (the position we both held and where we met), to working with George Washington University’s admissions office!

Former roommates Nathaniel Anderson and Torger Olson are continuing their studies, both pursuing Ph.D.s in their respective fields. Rosie Rubenstein is living it up in New York City working as an executive assistant to the SVP of content and creative at 9 Story Media Group.

Kenneth Preston is working in Washington, D.C., at Accenture.

What am I up to, you may ask? Well. I am halfway through serving my first year as a teacher in the Windy City (aka Chicago) through Teach for America. I am a middle school eighth-grade English reading and writing teacher at LEARN 8 Charter School on the west side of Chicago. I am also working on my master’s in education. Juggling it all is hard, but I know I have my Tribe supporting me!

Keep up the great work, Class of ’19! Don’t hesitate to email me (monasharaf.96@gmail.com) with life updates that I can share with the W&M community!

Marriages

Daniel Steven Roth to Rachael Hannah Kerley, 1/30/19.

Hello Class of 2019!

First, CONGRATULATIONS! Four years (give or take a few for transfers!) of hard work and memories have hopefully culminated into a glorious college experience! I know that they have for me. If you don’t know me, I am Mona Sharaf, a fellow class of 2019-er. Since the fall of my sophomore year, I worked as an editorial intern at UMAC, where I wrote some of the articles that you have (hopefully) read in the magazine and online platform over the years! Now that I have graduated, I have transitioned roles and am now the class reporter for our class, which means that I will be updating the many of you who read the magazine on what our fellow classmates are doing beyond graduation. From job changes, continuing education, marriages, births and beyond, I want to hear and share all of the wonderful things that you guys achieve post-grad! To start it off, I will share that I am headed to Chicago where I am working at a middle school teaching English and language arts through Teach For America!

Hopefully I will hear from many of you soon and I look forward to seeing where the journey of life takes all of the Class of 2019! Feel free to email be at monasharaf.96@gmail.com with any news, updates, or just to say hi!

Mona Sharaf