Brandeis Magazine

No Class Notes submissions this issue.

After an 18-year career as a litigation attorney, Jamie Kleinman is the director of executive leadership at JGO: The Jewish Grad Organization, which supports Jewish graduate students on more than 150 higher-education campuses in North America. She qualified for and ran the 2024 Boston Marathon. Jamie writes, “It was amazing being back in Boston, showing my husband around, and catching up with Josie (Leyman) Elias ’02 and Hannah (Johnson) Bornstein ’02.”

In February 2024, Evan Schultz celebrated the publication of his first book of poetry, “Morning, Noon, and Night: Poetry in the Language of Jewish Time.”

Rachel Segaloff, GSAS MA’05, Heller MBA’05, created Beantown Baby Diaper Bank, a nonprofit that addresses diaper need in her local Greater Boston community. The organization annually distributes 120,000 free diapers to seven partner agencies.

Paul Rockower, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Phoenix, received the FBI Director’s Community Leadership Award for his support of the Jewish community and other vulnerable communities as they deal with extremism in Arizona.

Ben Van Steinburgh is an associate attorney at Roberts & Stevens, where he focuses on medical malpractice and insurance defense. Ben and his wife and four children moved to Asheville, North Carolina, in 2024. Earlier, he spent more than a decade practicing in Raleigh.

No Class Notes submissions this issue.

A short story by Nuia Menda, “Si Kere El Dio,” won the 2023-24 Muestras Konsejas “Our Tales” International Sephardic Essay Competition, sponsored by the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Washington, in partnership with the Sephardic Jewish Brotherhood of America.

Irene Lehrer Sandalow and husband Nathan Sandalow ’03, both P’28, were excited to drop off their eldest son at Brandeis last summer as he began his first year as a college student. “Twenty years later, we are back on campus,” Irene writes.

Chanda Ouk Wolf in October 2024 celebrated the publication of her illustrated children’s book “A Dozen Delicious Donuts: A Sweet Cambodian American Story,” inspired by her experience of growing up within the American and Cambodian cultures. Focusing on the universal theme of family, the book shares a message of love and resilience.

Joshua Ritz welcomed his second daughter, Mira Eloise, in March 2024.

Becky Stern is senior counsel in the divorce and family law practice at Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, a New York law firm.

Catherine Heffernan Gibson and Megan (Rook-Koepsel) Parker ’05 joined Aaron Miller and his wife, Lauren (Apfelbaum), at a “bar mitzvah” reception celebrating the 13th year of Aaron’s rabbinate at Washington Hebrew Congregation, in Washington, D.C.

Monica LaBoskey is vice president of administration and operations at Community Vision Capital & Consulting, a community development financial institution serving Northern California. She lives in Oakland with her husband, Jeff, and two children.

Joanna Girndt-Lazar performs alongside her husband in a band called Death and the Poetess, which has released its fifth album, titled “Potions of Pre-villainy.” Joanna is editor of the “Poetic Conversations” column in Anomalous Press’ ANMLY blog on Medium.com. She also edits and writes poetry book reviews, lyric essays, and interviews.

Julia Gordon is a partner at the Meadow Law Firm, in Phoenix. Julia handles mass tort cases, and leads the firm’s litigation in the areas of video gaming addiction and brain disease.

Heather Klein and her husband welcomed their first child, Samuel Robert Lastella, on May 27, 2023.

Preston Neal is a financial adviser at Pinsker Wealth Management, in Greensboro, North Carolina.

After living in the Middle East for more than six years, John Farr and his wife have moved back to Washington, D.C., where he holds a global sales role at a technology company. He looks forward to reconnecting with other Brandeisians in the area.

Mark Folickman, who graduated from Boston University’s Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine in 2013, recently purchased a dental practice in Franklin, Massachusetts. Mark lives in Natick with wife Michelle, GSAS MAT’12, and their three children.

Mikhail Keyserman is a managing director at LifeSci Capital, an investment bank focused on the life sciences sector.

Tessa Venell, Heller MPP’25, a program administrator at the Heller School, is the author of a memoir, “A Small Miracle,” about her remarkable recovery from a severe brain injury suffered in a car accident before her senior year at Brandeis.

Last summer, Zachary Aronow wrote to say that he and Doris Parfaite-Claude ’06 were expecting their first baby in late September.

Laura Cohen married Matt Trojan on Oct. 13, 2024, at Blithewold Mansion, in Rhode Island. Jessica Blumberg served as maid of honor. Laura, who lives in Boston, is a vice president at Eli Lilly and Co., where she focuses on issues related to Alzheimer’s disease.

Daniella Friedman and husband Mordechai Tasma have welcomed their second child, Moshe Tasma.

Ian Guss is senior PR manager at Nintendo of America.

Jennifer Press and husband Peter Spaet welcomed daughter Alexandra on June 27, 2023. Jennifer is the founder of Press Interiors, an interior design firm.

Aaron Rosenberg and his wife, Lydia, celebrated the birth of son Jonah, on Oct. 13, 2023. The family lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Danielle Sunberg’s book “Atlas of Being” (Follow Our Leap, 2023) won a bronze medal in the personal development/growth category of the 2023 Living Now Book Awards. In spring 2023, Danielle gave a TEDx talk titled “Making Uncertainty Your Ally.”