People - Alumni/Alumnae
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Benny Abraham ('04) ( abraham@harpethhall.org ) writes from Nashville, TN, about his new environs and employ after graduating last year with his MA. "I'm teaching middle school Latin at The Harpeth Hall School in Nashville, TN. It's a private, all-girls college prep that teaches grades 5-12. I teach introductory Latin to 7th and 8th graders out of the Cambridge Latin Course, which contains just about the most terrible Latin that I've read in a long time. The past year has been one of transition: adjusting to life in the South and teaching middle school girls has proven to be quite a challenge. I'm finding out that teaching at this level has very little to do with one's knowledge of the language and everything to do with making it interesting and fun to learn. I'm trying to improve the quality of the Latin students coming out of our middle school. I spend my free time tutoring boys from Montgomery Bell Academy (HH's brother school), running the scoreboard for home basketball games (HH won the state championship), coaching 5th and 6th grade girls basketball (we almost won a game this year), and reading valuable and important literature like The DaVinci Code (feel free to laugh). But seriously, despite my best efforts, I've landed myself in a career teaching Latin at a really top-notch school, I've got a mortgage now, and I'm doing my best to be a solid citizen. Welcome to adulthood."
Jessica Anderson reports that, after graduating in December, she is "basically up to the same old stuff. Mostly just saving up money for a summer trip to Europe while looking for a "real" job to keep me occupied until I make a decision concerning graduate school."
Andrea Benna ( aeb83c@mizzou.edu ) Andrea Benna has completed her second year of law school and is very much looking forward to the summer. She's been working part-time for the MU Athletic Department in Compliance but will be taking a break until the fall. Andrea also served as a research assistant at the MU law school for Professor John Mollenkamp, where her research centered on various Missouri Supreme Court rules. Earlier this spring, she received the Theodore "Ted" C. Beckett award for the best work in Pre-Trial Litigation; she was also elected President of the law school's chapter of the Federalist Society and is representing the chapter in Washington D.C. at the national convention in July. Andrea notes: "More importantly, I was able to put my Classics degree to good use during the winter semester. With the guidance of Dr. Schenker, I completed a paper for my Law and Religion class entitled, 'Vengeance and Justice in Aeschylus' Oresteia: A Movement from Personal Retaliation to Societal Retribution.'" Andrea plans to spend the summer going to baseball games, catching up on reading, and vacationing in Wisconsin and Alabama.
Mike DiMaio reports that he has completed his 23rd year at Salve Regina. Mike's involvement has helped shape the offerings and recognition of classics there. This past year the Modern Language department was renamed the Department of Modern and Classical Languages. Latin was re-introduced into the curriculum after a 40 year hiatus in 1999, and Greek was taught for the first time (2006) since 1956. Mike notes that he holds a joint appointment in Philosophy and Classics, which makes him the first Classics Professor at SRU in half a century.
Adam M. Dubé, After teaching Greek, Latin, and English for 3 years at Columbia Indpendent School (2001-2004), I decided to try my hand at making money (teaching is not the most profitable of professions). A year and a half of working sales for a technical school that trains automotive and diesel technicians sent me running to, of all places, Seoul, South Korea. I have spent the past 15 months working as an ESL teacher and program administrator for a private school in Seoul. My family and I (I now have 3 children - my 2nd son was born in Seoul last October) have enjoyed our time abroad, although I am the only one who likes eating kimchi. All of this time away has helped me to realize that my true desire is to be in education, even if it means being poor. My family and I will be moving to NYC in August to attend Columbia University, where I was recently awarded a full scholarship to complete an MA in Private School Leadership. I would love to hear from any of my Classics friends ( adamdube@gmail.com), and I will be in Columbia, MO this summer for about a month and a half.
Henry Dyson, a recent graduate (Classics MA 05, after an earlier PhD in Philosophy) writes from Michigan, where he and his wife Melissa share all of their wonderful news: "Melissa and I indeed have some great news. She is pregnant and we are expecting our first child in December. It is the first grandchild on my side of the family, so everyone is quite excited. In other news, we love living in Michigan. It is absolutely beautiful here. We got off pretty easy this winter, but even then the area is just lovely in the snow. We actually live about 15 minutes west of Ann Arbor in the little village of Dexter, along the Huron River. The village is known around here for its bakery, cider mill, and an old drive-up A&W restaurant. This Sunday I am going to run a half marathon that snakes along the river from Dexter to Ann Arbor. As for academics, the Philosophy and Classics departments here are unbelievable and everyone has been very welcoming and supportive of my work. I taught a senior seminar last fall on Epistemology in Ancient Philosophy. In the winter term I taught a course on Law and Ethics in Antiquity. I am currently teaching Roman Philosophy and will teach another section next fall. I have a couple of papers out at journals right now ("The Passionate Pursuit of Philosopy: Hume on the Ancient Schools" and "Were the Stoics Cosmopolitans?"), another one on the way soon; and my dissertation, "Prolepsis and Koine Ennoia in the Early Stoa," is being considered for a book contract with Routledge. Oh, and I just got back from giving a paper at the Canadian Classical Association meeting at the University of Toronto. So, you know, keepin' busy. Melissa is thriving in her position at the Michigan Medical School. Her work from Missouri has already been published and she will be taking her specialty board exams in just three weeks." Henry sends his best to everyone at the department. Congratulations, Henry!
Jason Edmonds (04) a former undergraduate in Classical Studies, now a medical school student, sends along a number of splendid pictures capturing the historic beauty of Rome. Jason took this trip with his father last fall.
James Farris ( giacomo1946@yahoo.com) (BS '68, MEd '74) continues to teach upper-level Latin and Classical Studies part-time at Jefferson City High School. He will fully retire in May, 2007. Currently he is planning an adult tour of Italia for the summer of 2007. James notes that he has sent innumerable alumni to Mizzou's Classics Department.
Nora Frisch Nor2themax@aol.com sends us greetings and informs us that she is pursuing medical studies.
Caroline Grinham writes that she will be teaching 6th, 7th, and 8th grade Latin at the University School of Nashville commencing this fall. She looks forward to working with the children in an area of teaching she loves.
Brent Halvonik sends us a note to say that he moved moved with his wife Anabelle and their two young children, Brian and Adriana, to Costa Rica, May 29, 2005. Brent sends that he has found work by day at a Spanish Institute and four nights a week teaching English. He also has an article coming out in Latomus later this year.
Tim Mayo MA ('87) writes: "Hope it's warming up back in Columbia. I'm still teaching Mathematics at Mohave Community College in Lake Havasu City, AZ. I was in Kuwait and Iraq on active duty with the Navy last year, however, and you can imagine I'm glad to be back! Please keep sending me the Mercurius ." Will do, Tim!
Caitlin Moriarity (BA Classics 2002, MA History 2004) sends us news that she is living in Silicon Valley, working at Google and striving to get more freelance articles published. She has written articles on Fulvia, wife of Marc Antony, and Artemisia I of Halicarnassus (prehistory to 476 CE) for Great Lives in History (Notorious Lives from Salem Press, to be published in 2007), and she mentions she is a travel columnist for Hostelling International in St. Louis. She highlights that she enjoyed a trip to Italy and Greece last May, which included visits to Crete and Delphi.
Lee Patterson writes that he is finishing his year contract at the College of Charleston and has accepted another one-year contract as Visiting Assistant Professor at Centre College in Danville, KY. Lee's teaching schedule is slated to include a couple of sections of the freshman humanities sequence, an advanced Latin course on Livy, an advanced history course on Alexander the Great, and another course of his own design on ancient and modern uses of myth. Lee is still working on his book, to be entitled Kinship Myth in Ancient Greece, and he expects to approach a publisher about it early in the fall.
Geoffrey and Alice Revard and family (daughters Emma and Delia) send greetings. The Revards update us that they are finishing up the year and have been happy to move into a house close enough to school that they "scarcely need the car. The added space (we were in a 2 bedroom apartment) is also a wonderful thing. Now I can practice Cato's first three rules of farming in my own yard again. What a joy!" They mention an address change to 3712 Seventeenth Avenue West; Bradenton, FL 34205. Congratulations to Geoff are in order, who has also been elected president of the Classical Association of Florida.
Bob Rowland Rowland@loyno.edu, a former faculty member of the department, sends us news to update us of his activities for the past while. He mentions that in 2001, after seven years as Dean of College Park, he took a year's sabbatical and came out with The Periphery in the Center: Sardinia in the Ancient and Medieval Worlds . His current research with Steve Dyson is just about complete for a further book to be published this summer. Bob has taught two history classes and one Classics course each semester, including World Civ. to CE 1650, Roman Empire, and Latin 100. He mentions that Carole and his four "scattered" children and seven grandchildren are all doing well.
Robert Simms ('04) is heading with his family for New Zealand where he will be studying for his PhD in Classics (with full support) at the University of Otago.
Johanna Sandrock (M.A., 1993; Ph.D. 2003) is still in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where she and husband Ed Tyler (B.S.E. in Education and Counseling Psychology, 1983; M.A. in English 1984) weathered Hurricane Katrina. Johanna is still teaching Latin, Greek, and Classical Studies at Louisiana State University. In Summer 2005 she taught German for LSU in Germany, a six week summer study-abroad program. This summer, she will teach Latin (Tacitus' Germania) and a special topics course "The Romans in Germany and Austria" for LSU in Germany.
Dave Spotts (MA '95) sends that he began in 1995 teaching Latin on the elementary and secondary level at Covenant School in Huntington, WV. However, after leaving there in 2001, he began teaching secondary level courses via the Internet to support homeschoolers around the world. Hence, The Potter's School. Dave reports that he now has a full complement of Classics courses, which meet weekly to hold a video/audio conference.
Chase Unruh writes that he has been accepted into an optometry program and is enjoying his studies. Chase had just completed an MA at the University of Colorado, at Boulder, where he had enjoyed continuing the study of Classics begun at MU. He sends his best wishes to former professors and classmates. All the best, Chase!
Moxi Upadhyaya will have completed her two-year clerkship for Judge Eric T. Washington on the D.C. Court of Appeals in August, and she has accepted an offer to practice with a law firm in D.C. starting in the fall. She includes a note: "I would love to hear from my friends in the Classics department anytime: moxiu@hotmail.com ."
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Last modified: Wednesday, 18-Jun-2008 09:44:30 CDT