The Ambassador Fostering a community of inquisitive learners and independent thinkers, inspired to be their best selves, empowered to make a difference.
KATHY LUEDERS ’81
On NASA’s return to the moon
Fall 2020
MIGUELL MALACAD ’12
And his career as a software engineer at TRI-AD
The American School in Japan
CHRISTIAN BROWN ’12
On his career in enterprise AI
SENA CHANG ’24
Explores the concept of mindset
World-Class Faculty Outstanding teachers are critical to the success of our students and ASIJ as a whole. To deliver on our strategic vision we need to recruit and retain a world-class faculty. Unrestricted gifts to the ASIJ Annual Fund help us provide teachers with a wide variety of professional learning opportunities that ensure we are able to move forward with the initiatives outlined in the vision. The professional learning our teachers engage in has a direct impact in the classroom and our students’ own learning.
In this Issue Features
06
Return to the Moon
24
Driving Technology
27
14 19
Kathy Lueders ’81 NASA’s head of human space flight
Letian Wang ’23 talks to Miguell Malacad ’12 about autonomous vehicles
Data-Driven
Christian Brown ’12 on his career in enterprise AI and data science
Jar of Keys
Sena Chang ’24 explores the concept of mindset in a personal essay
Island Life
Fifth-graders create their own island environments
30
Strength and Courage Award
Ashley Cornwell ’20, recipient of this year’s award
More 03 \\ Head of School’s Message 04 \\ ASIJ Highlights 33 \\ Fundraising Update 51 \\ Alumni Portal 52 \\ ASIJ Alumni Connect 54 \\ Artifacts 56 \\ ASIJ Bingo 57 \\ Class Agents 59 \\ Obituaries 64 \\ The Big Short
(Martin Voss)
Director of Communications Matt Wilce Assistant Director of Communications Jarrad Jinks Graphic Designer Ryo Ogawa Communications Assistant & Graphic Design Matthew Worsley Director of Institutional Advancement Clive Watkins Assistant Director of Institutional Advancement Mary Margaret Mallat Assistant Director of Development and Alumni Relations Claire Lonergan Data Specialist Catherine Iwata Photography Jarrad Jinks Ryo Ogawa Illustration Matthew Worsley Editorial Inquiries communications@asij.ac.jp alumni@asij.ac.jp —
The American School in Japan 1-1-1 Nomizu, Chofu-shi Tokyo 182-0031, Japan The Ambassador is published by The American School in Japan ASIJ alumni, families, faculty, and friends receive The Ambassador Although some photos taken for this issue depict subjects who are not wearing masks all photo shoots followed strict safety protocols with staff and subjects, distancing and wearing masks at all other times.
2
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
HEAD OF SCHOOL
In this issue of The Ambassador, we’re taking a closer look at the role that technology continues to play in shaping our lives. Our current students and alumni—including those featured here—are poised to make a difference in many fields that will impact humanity. None more so, perhaps, than Kathy Lueders ’81, who as the first female head of human spaceflight at NASA is blazing a trail back to the moon and beyond to Mars. As Kathy herself says in her interview, it took her several years to find her element, but after identifying engineering as her passion, she has gone on to build a fascinating career at NASA. Those missions will have a long-term impact on all our futures. Continuing the futuristic theme are profiles of two of our more recent alumni who both got their start in computer science at ASIJ. Miguell Malacad ’12 is developing software at Toyota’s TRI-AD and Christian Brown ’12 is a senior data scientist at C3.ai. They’ve spoken with us about their cutting-edge projects in artificial intelligence, and their careers post-ASIJ.
Message
should also allow alumni from all eras to connect with each other to share their professional and personal passions; I am very pleased, therefore, to let you know that our first ASIJ Connect: Industry Meetup will take place on December 9. You’ll find full details on page 52. It’s hard to comprehend that we are approaching the oneyear anniversary of the moment that the word, “COVID-19” entered our lexicon. Since then, ASIJ’s students and teachers have remained resilient, adaptable, and positive. Great learning continues in our classrooms and online everyday, as you’ll see from the content in these pages. Although the usual events that bring us together must be delayed for the time being, please know that I wish you and your family good health during these difficult times, and I look forward to the day when we can welcome welcoming parents and alumni back to campus. In the meantime, stay connected to your fellow Mustangs and stay safe. With warm regards,
Coordinating an effective alumni network is a time-intensive endeavor, but it’s deeply important that we understand what our alumni are doing in the world, and that we create opportunities for our alumni to share their experiences and expertise with our current students. To that end, we continue to invest in our Advancement Program, and to provide resources for outreach for our new Director of Strategic Partnerships, Ryosuke Suzuki. An effective alumni network
Jim Hardin Head of School
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
3
ASIJ
Highlights
ATHLETICS
Serving it Up Our volleyball teams played their first games of the season on October 2 and 3 against Yokohama International School. Our 2020 lineup includes ASIJ’s first-ever boys volleyball team and the return—in a modified format—of the Yujo Tournament. Congratulations to all our teams on a successful fall season.
4
REOPENING
ENVIRONMENT
NEWS
Road to Reopening
Global Climate Action Day
Making A Difference
As students returned to campus, we launched our 4 Ws of safety— Wear a Mask, Wash Your Hands, Watch Your Distance and Work Together. Campus was transformed with signage, additional sinks and bathrooms and over 1,000 bottles of hand sanitizer. We were able to move to face-to-face learning in the Early Learning Center and Elementary School from October 19.
Our middle school clubs— Fighters for Future and Students Advocating for the Environment— turned Global Climate Action Day into Global Climate Action week! On September 25 the two groups and our Maintenance Manager, Yasu Nakayoshi ’90, took to the roof to discuss the school’s solar panels and environmental impact.
Seniors David Bass and Julie Iverson made the cover of Tokyo American Club’s INTOUCH magazine for their nonprofit company, Bass Handcrafted Sanitizers. They’ve been making, delivering and donating hand sanitizer since the beginning of the pandemic.
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
ASIJ
Highlights
HALLOWEEN
BOO! What do a donut, dinosaur, vending machine, and a mustang all have in common? They were all in our annual elementary school Halloween parade! The route was a bit different this year for safety reasons and we streamed the parade for our families at home, but the weather was beautiful and the costumes were exceptionally creative. Happy Halloween!
CULTURE
GROWING
ARTS
Way of the Samurai
One Potato, Two Potato...
Chamber Orchestra
The Japan Center invited Mr. Zushonosuke Terada, a modernday samurai, to speak with our seventh-grade humanities classes on bushido code and samurai armor. Some of our students even had the opportunity to wear the armor.
Our early learning center students once again got their hands dirty on their annual potato dig!
Our high school Chamber Orchestra practiced with an audience of fifthgrade students on October 15. Why let good music go to waste?
They visited Shimada Seifun-jo, a small farm in Setagaya, to harvest sweet potatoes, which they’ll use to further their learning—measuring, counting, peeling, and cooking.
They are currently preparing for their fall performance that will be shared virtually this semester.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
5
Return to the Moon Kathy Lueders ’81, NASA’s head of human spaceflight, talks to Matt Wilce about her career, working with commercial partners and putting the first woman on the moon.
(NASA/Kim Shiflett)
6
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
“Living in space is really hard!” As the woman tasked with putting American “boots on the moon” for the first time in half a century, Kathy Lueders ’81 should know. With its Artemis program, NASA aims to land the first woman and the 13th man on the Moon by 2024, and with her appointment as associate administrator of the Human Exploration and Operations (HEO) Mission Directorate, Lueders is leading the next generation of human spaceflight. A return to the moon is the first stage in their plan before NASA takes its next giant leap and sends astronauts to Mars. So how did the daughter of a Lutheran minister who spent her childhood in Japan, end up coordinating humanity’s quest to visit other planets? The Space Shuttle was an icon of the eighties and America’s supremacy in the Space Race. The first reusable spacecraft capable of taking astronauts beyond the atmosphere and returning to Earth, the Shuttle was the cornerstone of NASA’s human spaceflight program for three decades, flying a total of 135 missions from 1981 to 2011. The Space Shuttle launched and recovered satellites, delivered the payloads used to build the International Space Station (ISS), pointed the Hubble Space Telescope to look out at the edges of the universe, and made astronaut and cargo transit routine jobs. It put Steve Smith ’77 into space four times (see Fall 2011 Ambassador) and took former ASIJ faculty member Dan Tani (FF ’16–’18) to the ISS on Expedition 16. The Shuttle program also provided two key moments in Lueders career and the catalyst for her current role. Back in 1992, Lueders took her first job at NASA joining the propulsion lab at the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico to work on the Shuttle program. “At the time they were just trying to figure out how to start repairing the engines off of the
shuttle orbiters in house—orbiters are the part of the Shuttle that returns and flies that kind of look like a big airplane,” she says. “I really lucked out because I came in brand new and they at the time didn’t understand anything about the kinds of processes that needed to be in place to be able to process flight hardware. And so I started off, and ended up, being the person that knew how to process flight hardware.” This would lead to Lueders becoming the depot manager of the Space Shuttle Program Orbital Maneuvering System and Reaction Control Systems, overseeing the repair of engines and other components that were exposed to hypergols, the toxic propellants that fueled the Shuttle. Lueders developed this new capability for NASA and her team processed the hardware on all the orbiters. “I would just go look at the orbiters and I knew all the numbers, all of the serial numbers that I’ve worked on... it was a very fun job for me and I worked on lots of flight hardware. I got to go to the Cape and got to go up on the elevator and go see my babies.” While working at White Sands, Lueders completed degrees in Industrial Engineering at the University of New Mexico, getting her Bachelor of Science in 1993 and her Master’s in 1999. Lueders had already graduated college with a BA in finance and initially begun a career in another industry. Her college roommate was a mechanical engineer and Lueders was intrigued by the kind of problems she was working on and thought she’d like to try to solve them herself. Nothing came of it at the time as “missionary kids don’t have a lot of money, you know. Your main goal is graduating and getting out with your student loans as minimized as possible,” she quips. Marriage and children came along and it wasn’t until later that Lueders explored engineering as a career.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
7
With two young children it might have seemed crazy to some, but she thought “you only get one shot to go do something and go solve the problems that you really want to go solve.” Her engineering education gave her “a new toolbox” and she discovered that her finance degree was relevant at NASA too. “It’s been a nice mix having that systems engineering background and the finance background—it’s made me a better program manager,” she says. On July 21, 2011, mission STS-135 and the Space Shuttle program came to an end when the Atlantis orbiter touched down at the Kennedy Space Center. The final Shuttle mission marked the end of an era and left the United States without the means to put their own astronauts into space for the first time since the 1960s. From here on, NASA would be hitching a ride for its crew and cargo on someone else’s rocket. For Lueders this meant a move to the International Space Station Program where she served as transportation integration manager, leading commercial cargo resupply services to the space station. She also became responsible for oversight of spacecraft from NASA’s international partners visiting the space station. These included the European Space Agency’s Automated Transfer Vehicle, the H-II Transfer Vehicle built by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and the Russian space agency Roscosmos’ Soyuz and Progress spacecraft. “When we started work on the International Space Station program, we began to bring on new countries—JAXA hadn’t built a human space platform before, you know. Them building the HGV and the H2 was a new process—for us, too,” she says. Building and operating the ISS was integral to NASA’s understanding of how to live in space and the bridge to their current goals to return to the moon and send humans deeper into space than ever before. “When we first started going to the space station, people sometimes would go, why don’t you just go all the way to Mars?” Lueders says. “And you’re like, well, hang on a second. We learned a lot. People don’t realize that living in space is really hard. And, you know, there’s all these things that you learn in space. When you’re going to a different environment, you will learn because everything kind of operates differently,” she adds. “We’ve been out on the space station for 20 years—every day, every minute, you know, living and working in space. And what we’ve learned from doing that is how to psychologically live in space, but also how to manage things and be able to do things like normal maintenance and live that way.” Extrapolating this experience and building on it is the next step in the Artemis program. “The biggest engineering challenge is not knowing that environment and still being able to build your hardware, go figure out your planning and then go operate in that environment. And what we’ve learned from the space station is that we will learn things as we are trying to figure out how to operate in that environment.” Learning how people will react in that environment once they get to the lunar surface, how equipment will perform
8
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Dan Tani (FF ’16–’18), STS-122 mission specialist, poses for a photo on the flight deck of Space Shuttle Atlantis shortly after undocking from the International Space Station. (NASA)
Astronaut Steve Smith ‘77, STS-103 payload commander, on Discovery's flight deck, leads the team of space walkers on NASA's third servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope. (NASA)
The Space Shuttle Discovery and its seven-member STS-120 crew head toward Earth-orbit and a scheduled link-up with the International Space Station on October 23, 2007. On board is Dan Tani (FF ’16–’18) and the other mission specialists. (NASA/KSC) THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
9
Kathy Lueders views Artemis hardware inside the Rotation, Processing and Surge Facility at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on June 25, 2020. Manufactured by Northrop Grumman in Utah, the solid rocket booster segments for the Space Launch System rocket are in view. The first in a series of increasingly complex missions, Artemis I will test the Orion spacecraft and SLS as an integrated system ahead of crewed flights to the Moon. (NASA/Kim Shiflett) 10
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
and how to live there sustainably for an extended period are just a snapshot of the challenges the program faces. “It is going to take us learning and figuring out how to live in that environment where you can’t just go pick something up.” Lueders draws a parallel to her own family’s experience overseas. “My parents started out in Des Moines, Iowa, got an airplane and went to Tokyo, Japan. They had to learn how to operate in a totally different environment there.” Her father, a Lutheran Missionary, first landed in Japan in 1959 and Lueders was born in 1963, joining four older sisters—her brother Mark ’83 entered the scene a couple of years later. The struggles to buy food, figure out where to live and how to get places were challenging for the family “but at least the gravitational forces were the same and their bodies were operating kind of consistently” she jokes. “Now we’re taking people and we’re putting them in a new environment with their hardware and you are changing the laws of physics and you’re trying to figure out then how do we work in that environment and then can we keep continuing?” She continues, “I know as somebody that grew up in Japan until I was 14 years old that when I moved to the States, just having that different environment teaches you a lot about yourself. It’s the same thing with going into space, you know.” Adding that, “you don’t realize how much you learn about yourself on the planet until you go into space. It’s the same kind of thing that happens when you go on to a different country.” In 2013, Lueders moved to the Kennedy Space Center as acting Commercial Crew Program Manager, becoming head of the office the following year. Building on the experience of working with other sovereign nations on the ISS, the next step in NASA’s evolution was extending similar partnerships into the commercial sector. “The biggest challenge was the trust, and I’d say it was the same challenge when we first began working with our international partners,” Lueders reflects. “You know, different companies talk a little bit differently, just like different countries,” she adds. Developing confidence in new commercial partners was a huge hurdle. “Can they take the data that we’ve collected over many years of human space flight experience, merge it with their years of experience, and then come up with a product where they can deliver our crew and cargo safely?” Lueders asked. “That’s a big leap of faith.” Figuring out how to get American astronauts back to the moon is one thing—even with commercial partners—but doing it in a global pandemic is another. “Honestly, I feel like this was a huge year for all my teams. I mean, this was a year where we were bringing crew transportation back to US soil. At the same time, we were getting ready to fly the biggest booster since Saturn Five,” Lueders says. “And the team honestly has been working their butts off trying to accomplish it even while dealing with COVID.” On the transportation side her team kept working, putting in place contingency plans to operate in different ways that accommodate social distancing. “We actually did not slip our demo to launch and have stayed really close to our crew launches. But the SLS team—the big booster team—stood
down for a couple of months and just to get it and everybody started again obviously was tougher, but we’re still on target for doing our Artemis I launch next fall,” she adds. “I do feel that the team feels very strongly that they’re trying to give people something to be really proud of during this really tough time.” Personally, COVID-19 has also impacted the way Lueders works and she has mostly been working remotely since March with short periods of in person meetings and she still travels when she needs to. “As someone that’s lived in a different country, it’s kind of like going through that experience again— you’re far away from your coworkers and your family and you’re still having to try to be connected. Right? That’s very tough.” When NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley, splashed down safely in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Pensacola, Florida on the afternoon of August 2 this year, they made history. The first American spacecraft to return to earth in a splashdown since 1975 marked the completion of the Demo-2 test flight of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon. The first commercially built and operated American crew spacecraft’s successful return marked a new era in human spaceflight—something that even the corona virus couldn’t derail. “For us to be able to do some of the things we want to do for space exploration—maybe it’s 10 years from now, 15 years from now, 30 years from now—we will be figuring out other ways we can depend on companies to deliver our services just like we do and other facets of our life now.” Developing the hardware needed for human space flight is only one side of the story in NASA’s plan to go to the moon and beyond. The other is the crew that will go beyond where any human has ventured before. “There’s a whole class of superheroes,” Lueders says in reference to the men and women currently training in the program selected from thousands of applicants. “When you look at these people that want to go and their credentials, it’s just amazing. I’m always kind of amazed at the fact that we can really attract what is obviously the cream of the crop of resources out there. And what’s really cool about it is it’s people with all different kinds of experience because of the way the missions are,” she says. “You know, we’re really looking for people in some ways that have been able to deal with being isolated for a while, people that have experience in lots of different kinds of platforms across the world where they’ve had to do different kinds of experimental things,” she adds. “These are people that are also psychologically very, very tough and able to handle huge challenges.” The selection process to get the first woman and the next man on the moon is necessarily competitive and rigorous. “One of my favorite things that one of the Senate Commerce folks told me was when she said, ‘You know, I hate that saying, I don’t know why it can’t be the first two women on the moon.’” Lueders own experience has often seen her be the first or only woman in a traditionally male dominated field. “Thankfully, over time, I think the agencies have gone from
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
11
Lueders speaks during the Boeing CST-100 Starliner spacecraft rollout from the company’s Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility at Kennedy Space Center in Florida on November 21, 2019. Starliner will be secured atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket for Boeing’s Orbital Flight Test to the International Space Station for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. (NASA/Kim Shiflett) those pictures in the 60s that you see where everybody is wearing pocket protectors, white shirts and black ties and all have black framed glasses,” she quips. “Today, you know, you see more and more women in positions within NASA. So I will tell you, when I first got the call about taking the job, the thought of me being the first woman was not the first thing on my mind. I had also been the first woman program manager and I hadn’t realized that at the time.” Lueders didn’t accept the position immediately and asked for some time to think it over. “I got off the phone and my husband was like, you’re crazy. You need to go do this. You’re going to be the first woman to do this job. You need to do this. And, you know, I’ll tell you, man, I thought that it’s not that big a deal, but I was totally overwhelmed with the number of women across the world that reached out to me after it being announced,” she says. “The girls in India and South America and Canada and Japan that said, you know, because you’re in that job, I see that I can have that job someday. You know there’s lots of places in the world today where we need more women to have these kinds of jobs so that girls—and really anybody—can be able to see themselves in a job.” She goes on to say she
12
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
hates the fact that she has to tell people that her husband was right and that gender and appearance shouldn’t play a part in hiring, only skill. “Everybody out there, especially in the science and technology area, we need for the problems. I mean, you know, we’re not trying to do the easy things,” she says. “I’m up here going, I want to go to the lunar surface. And, hey, guess what? I want to go to Mars and I want to go on to other places. These are not easy problems. So I better hope that every person out there that’s got a brilliant brain in their body is willing to come and help us go figure out how to do this no matter what their gender background is.” So given the opportunity to take a seat on one of the upcoming missions, would Lueders take that leap beyond our planet herself? “You know, I would love to go to the moon. I don’t think people realize how tough you have to be to make it through crew training...When I go look at some of those crew members, they’re like superheroes. So I would love to go, but I don’t know if they’d take me,” she says. “I need to start doing my push ups now.”
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket soars upward from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on May 30, 2020, carrying NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley to the International Space Station in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule for the agency’s SpaceX Demo2 mission. Part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, this was SpaceX’s final flight test flight. (NASA/Tony Gray and Tim Powers) THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
13
Driving TECHNOLOGY Letian Wang ’23 talks to Miguell Malacad ’12 about his work as a software engineer at Toyota’s TRI-AD project.
14
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
The first thing I noticed about Miguell Malacad ’12 was his demeanor. Calm, collected and cool were all words that could be used to describe him when I spotted him at the place we’d agreed to meet. As I hurried over to his table, his cooling coffee cup drew my attention—worthy of note as I was 20 minutes early to our appointed time. Quiet preparedness and understated confidence were exactly what I imagined the qualities a software engineer might be. Malacad’s unassuming presence perhaps obscures the cutting-edge work he’s involved with as a software engineer for Toyota’s autonomous vehicle program. Unlike its competitors, Toyota has not only opted to develop a typical self-driving, Blade Runner-esque car. Rather, the company has combined both the dreams for the future and the modern standards of today to invest into Toyota Research Institute - Advanced Development, Inc (TRI-AD). Located in Tokyo, TRI-AD was founded in March 2018 for the purpose of developing innovative products that will enable Toyota’s vision, “Mobility for All.” Its mission is to create new technology and advanced safety systems such as automated driving for the world. TRI-AD also oversees Toyota’s Woven City announced in January 2020, that will serve as an incubator for smart city design, connected mobility, and robotics technology from Toyota and its partners. The unique nature of TRI-AD adds to its many challenges—something that motivates Malacad. Born in Japan in 1994, Malacad’s family roamed the country during his early years until finally settling in Tokyo. He began attending ASIJ in 2006 as a nervous seventh grader, branching out within the community through par taking in ASIJ T V (known then as Media Production) and through running track. His interest in tech became apparent in high school, when he enrolled into Intro to Programming, Intermediate Programming, and AP Computer Science all during subsequent semesters. “Malacad not only worked hard on developing his problem solving skills, but also on the creative aspect of programming,” recalls Kevin Randell, who taught him programming. “He did a lot of programming outside of class...just to fulfill his own interests,” Randall, who now teaches physics adds. “[Malacad] was always immersed in the task at hand and liked to add personal touches to the lab work and make it his own.” Even then, Malacad had already begun setting the framework for his future, which evidently pointed towards the realm of technology. Graduating a proud Mustang in 2012, Malacad moved on to Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. It was here that he first struggled with cumbersome American transportation systems. It was also at University where he had his first brush with the world of automobiles.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
15
“It's not like I woke up one day and I was like, ‘I want to work on vehicles for a living,’” Malacad remarks. Struggling with a capstone project to finish off in the final year of university, Malacad and his group decided on tinkering with a spare racing car to see if it could run fully off computers alone. Although they ultimately failed in creating a working model, this brief but fascinating confluence of cars and tech, along with his annoyance towards US public transport, would pique a previously unknown interest within Malacad. After receiving his bachelor’s degree in computer engineering, he would earn the position of product engineer at Lattice Semiconductor in Manila, in the Philippines, where he would once again experience the woes of inconvenient public transport. Malacad would eventually return to Tokyo in 2018, after realizing that he “wasn’t really interested in [semiconductors]” After a brief period of job hunting, Malacad found an attractive opportunity online recruiting those with tech experience to join Toyota’s then-fledgling TRI-AD project. After some consideration, Malacad joined TRI-AD as a software engineer in 2019, having finally found an opportunity to pursue his two passions: cars and the improvement of public transportation. So far, TRI-AD and Malacad’s work ethic have fit hand-inhand. On a typical day, employees at TRI-AD abide by a very simple schedule: a 15 minute stand-up meeting to address the day’s agenda and an immediate transition to hammering out jobs on a designated task board. This relaxed, Silicon Valleystyle atmosphere is not only evident in the office schedule of TRI-AD, but in the environment as well. After all, not many
16
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
companies have motorized scooters for staff to use in the office, set up hammocks complete with fake grass for work areas, and allocated a designated section for PS4s (typically used for driving simulations). The company’s award-winning office space, which stretches over several floors, provides a wide variety of flexible areas where employees can explore passions and collaborate on ideas, something Malacad is very invested in. “The complexity of my job makes it so that for every little problem you face, another hundred problems come up,” Malacad says. “So collaboration is absolutely critical.” It may come as a surprise that Malacad’s primary role is not actually to engineer tech for the automated driving systems. Rather, it is more about “building internal tools for other areas of work” and the engineering of useful technology that others can use—whether it be the motion sensor or AI department. It is a constant, fastmoving process that can be derailed with the slightest mistake, requiring a steady stream of customer requests and feedback to maintain the necessary momentum. To do this, Malacad and his colleagues abide by sprints: the breakdown of a project into manageable chunks, a specific focus on a particular chunk for two weeks, collection of feedback from the customer, and a repeat of the process with different chunks until the project is finally completed. “This way, whenever there’s a slight deviation to what they want, the customers can tell us ‘hey, this is what I'm looking for’,” Malacad explains. “It minimizes mistakes, saving time for both us and the customers.”
“The complexity of my job makes it so that for every little problem you face, another hundred problems come up”
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
17
Toyota’s e-Palette Concept Autonomous at the press day of the 46th Tokyo Motor Show 2019. (dpa/Alamy Live News)
“autonomous vehicles could radically change the way society views cars and even technology”
If it wasn’t evident already, Malacad’s job requires him to be in constant touch with people. “The technical part of my job is the easiest, funny enough,” he says. “Often, difficult challenges arise from people not communicating their needs as clearly as they could.” This has especially become apparent during COVID-19, as workers around the world have been forced to work in selfcontained bubbles of isolation. Although TRI-AD’s tech-oriented work has eased its transition into the online world of remote work, the “realness” of face-to-face communication has become something harder to replicate through teleconferencing. But instead of bemoaning what’s been lost online, Malacad has chosen to focus on the silver lining of the digital cloud. “The future of many careers lie in the online world,” he notes. “Right now, COVID has completely changed
18
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
company views on working life. Telecommunication services such as Google Meets or Zoom may become permanent work options for many in the future. Frankly, it's amazing how much humans and tech have grown to work alongside each other.” In the future, Malacad looks forward to taking a leadership role to mentor others eventually, or even finding a start-up company to work with. As for the future of autonomous vehicles, he sees the possibilities for it stretch far and wide. Instead of only making it easier moving from Point A to Point B, Malacad believes “autonomous vehicles could radically change the way society views cars and even technology.” Especially in a technological metropolis like Tokyo, new innovations are not only valued as conveniences, but daily sources of newfound amazement and fascination.
TRI-AD itself continues to draw attention globally, mainly due to its enticing blend of human curiosity, care, and rapidly evolving technology. It is evidence of how when innovation is directed at helping others, both tech and society are able to advance simultaneously. TRI-AD endeavors to maintain the humanity of its technology. The very humanity Malacad personifies through his compassion for people and love for engineering. His simple advice to current students, “explore opportunities and have fun.” Commenting that, “it’s really easy to take your current high school experience for granted. But in the real world, chances to explore your passions are scarce. Use the many chances to explore right now to their fullest, and try to have fun while doing so.”
Data-Driven Jarrad Jinks takes a deep dive into artificial intelligence with Christian Brown ’12
“Hey Siri, schedule an interview with Christian Brown at 5:30 Pacific time for The Ambassador.” As Siri catches the tail end of my request, I turn my attention back to Gmail. Christian Brown ’12 had previously agreed to speak with me about his professional role in data science and Artificial Intelligence (AI). As I continue to type, I tab to autocomplete the common phrases I’m apt to use in similar contexts. A notoriously poor speller, I revisit a couple of red underlines before sending. AI in 2020 is pervasive. So pervasive, in fact, that even the age-old cornerstones of human interaction—written and spoken language—are increasingly impacted by its advent. Siri adds Brown to my calendar, adjusting for my current time zone. The moment I hit enter on the keyboard, Google servers set forth a splitsecond series of events that land my message in Brown’s inbox, before which time his own email servers use an artificially intelligent system to read not just the content of my email, but a slew of additional metadata to assign my correspondence a spam score. It passed.
What is AI? The terms “Artificial Intelligence” and “algorithm” increasingly appear in conversations and headlines. But conveying an understanding of AI proves much more difficult than reporting the significance of its use. Artificial Intelligence is an overarching designation given to any computer system intended to mimic intelligent human reason. It encompasses disciplines such as natural language processing, the manipulation of human language for applications such as autocomplete, translation, and smart assistants; computer vision which allows now-common photo album features such as facial-recognition; and machine learning, where it excels at extracting patterns from large datasets, learning from that data without human intervention, and applying that learning. These and other subsets of AI often overlap to power not just consumer-level life-enhancements, but technologies that drive processes impacting our lives in a much more significant way, influencing enterprise decision-making, global financial markets, the course of academic research, and government policies.
(Martin Voss) THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
19
Teacher Jake Stephens works with a student during a data science class in ASIJ’s Creative Arts Design Center
With such potential at the fingertips of the knowledgeable few who program these intelligences, perhaps Brown can be considered quite a powerful person. As a senior data scientist with enterprise AI software developer, C3.ai, Brown and his colleagues work with some of the world's largest and most influential organizations to understand their data and put it to use for predictive analytics, fraud detection, intelligent management, inventory optimization and a limitless number of practical applications. He touches industries from energy and telecommunications to aerospace and even defense, developing needs-based solutions using the wealth of data those organizations collect. Data science, especially for the development of AI, requires a strong foundation in more than one STEM discipline—math and technology particularly. Brown notes that he’s always had an interest in STEM and identifies one moment in particular that set him on the pathway towards his current industry, “I guess this started, probably back in high school at ASIJ.” Saying that as a junior, “I took an environmental science class that I really liked and that basically sparked this interest for me in energy and environment as a topic.” Brown, who was born in Japan and attended ASIJ from Kindergarten, fondly recalls memories of STEM at school, noting inspiring teachers such as Jane Maczuzak (FF ’09–’13) in the science department and Kristi Hoskins (FF ’99–’19) in mathematics. The computer science landscape has changed drastically in the short time since Brown left ASIJ. In high school alone our computer science course offerings have more than doubled to include robotics, as well as classes on algorithms, data structures and even data science specifically. A clear indicator of the start of this shift towards a more comprehensive and technology-focused curriculum, ASIJ began the 1-1 program the August of Brown’s senior year—requiring each student to have a laptop. Today, technology is embedded throughout the curriculum at all levels and teachers introduce tech to students as early as Kindergarten. Early on, the focus is on digital citizenship and appropriate usage followed by introductions to basic circuitry and even relaying instructions to simple robots. Our middle school students are introduced to contemporary programming languages from sixth grade, when they have
20
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
the opportunity to take a design technology course that walks them through development of a digital pet using Javascript. They’re introduced to further opportunities in seventh grade, when they can program VEX robots, and eighth grade when they have an option to take an AppLab in Javascript or continue on with design technology. These curricular courses are complemented by the Computer Science Discoveries, Mob Programming and Robotics clubs. Computer Science course offerings in high school continue to expand and include options that introduce students to programming, continue that learning with intermediate courses, and apply their skills across a variety of practical scenarios— including those focused on data science and robotics. Our Introduction and Intermediate programming courses have no prerequisite and are focused on developing student skills in Python—the most commonly used language in data science. Students may then proceed to take AP Computer Science, using Java. Recently introduced Data Science and Algorithms & Data Structures courses are also in Python. Brown held onto his passion for environmental science matriculating to Stanford University, intent on continuing his education with a focus on energy and environment. “I did this program called Energy Resources Engineering, which is basically an engineering perspective and approach to energy problems, whether it's oil and gas-related or whether it's renewable energy systems, power systems, utilities, power grid. Over the course of that study, I was exposed to different types of problems.” Brown describes the breadth of challenges the program exposed him to and his particular interest in one particular question—how do you efficiently operate a power grid? “As you can imagine, there's some structure to the power grid, but there's also a lot
of data describing how the power grid is operating. That led me towards an interest in optimization and, broadly speaking, operations research as a topic—which is basically a study of optimal decision making and prediction. How do you make decisions given data, given some understanding of the world or the system you’re trying to model?” Although he continued to approach these particular questions from the perspective of energy and environment, Brown eventually realized that these challenges actually apply broadly, to many industries. “As I broadened my view of the types of problems you can solve, I came across other topics that were more closely related to what we call traditional data science in 2020, like machine learning, deep learning, statistics…I wanted to become a well-rounded professional in that area.” Brown went on to earn both his bachelor’s and master’s in the energy resources engineering program. He feels fortunate to have attended a school with a robust curriculum in computer science, mathematics, and data science that allowed him to focus on his passion for energy during his undergrad and work his way into broader topics, not necessarily unique to energy, during his graduate learning. “When I was looking for jobs out of grad school, I contemplated a career purely in energy. I was also looking at careers in data science and the reason I joined C3.ai is because it sort of marries the two things. It was kind of like a technology and data science company that certainly was involved in the energy industry and could certainly benefit from having that experience in energy. But they looked at industry a little more broadly and holistically, and I was looking to dip my toes in that...Maybe I'll find my way back into energy one day.” Until then, Brown feels challenged by and fulfilled in his work with C3.ai. He describes their complex mission at the highest level, “it's a software platform that basically makes it easier to develop and deploy AI and big data software applications, at scale, across an enterprise.” As with AI at the consumer level, the most practical way to understand what enterprise AI looks like is through an example. Brown illustrates, hypothetically, “A classic example might be, at a company such as Royal Dutch Shell—they operate, several hundred offshore oil rigs and they have sensor data for all these offshore oil rigs. I'm interested in having a unified view of all this data. I want to be able to access it easily, make sure it's consistent, the quality is good, and I want to be able to leverage it specifically with respect to some application. An application might be to use sensor data to predict when the compressor valves are going to fail on the old rigs.” He describes that type of predictive analysis as both a technically and methodologically difficult task. “It's not easy to have software do that, so the whole premise of the company is to support that type of use-case.” A nearly 500-person strong company, C3.ai employs Brown as part of a global team of about 50 data scientists who scope projects, wrangle data, and develop the respective AI. Brown and his teammates’ responsibilities are not limited to the
technical data exploration and coding, but also encompass collaboration and outreach, “We specialize in hearing what business problems the customer is interested in solving and translating that into a tangible data science task that is welldefined, approachable, and solvable.” Brown details his role, “I'm often involved in the end-to-end life cycles of different types of engagements with customers. I help scope the type of work, see if there's a business problem that the customer is potentially interested in solving, whether our technology could help them with that and then I’m also responsible for designing and developing or translating their business into a data science task—a task that we are going to answer by data and the associated technique.” Brown reminds me that AI is not just an enterprise tool to churn profit or a consumer commodity to help us choose our next Netflix binge. He sees the technology used in health and medicine, the nonprofit sector, and clean energy—areas with the most significant impacts on quality of life and sustainability. But as with any powerful technology, questions of ethics and misuse soberly balance the pros with the potential cons. Brown perks up when asked about how AI can be misappropriated. “I’ll tell you about something that's been on my mind a lot recently...have you heard of deepfakes?” Deepfakes are a form of synthetic media built upon an existing image or video in which a person’s likeness is altered so that they appear to be someone else. The process primarily falls under the AI umbrella of “computer vision,” though extends not only to still and moving images, but audio and voice alterations as well. Relatively convincing examples of these doctored videos can be found on YouTube and the technology is only improving. Deepfakes are an especially apropos example of AI misuse in a time when “fake news” is at the forefront of recent election cycles and organizations such as Cambridge Analytica have demonstrated the influence AI can have on democratic processes. “I think that's super dangerous from the misinformation perspective, and I think and I worry about it a lot because I don't really see a meaningful way to control it.” Brown refers to the unprecedented accessibility to information, learning materials, and open-source software that makes some AI technologies, at least at a low level, obtainable and usable for those wishing to learn. The barrier-to-entry is minimal for both good and bad actors. Though, as Brown reflects, to affect the greatest change, you need some serious resources. He makes an example of something that seems outwardly trivial—AlphaGo. AlphaGo is a program designed by DeepMind Technologies (now owned by Google), to play the board game Go. In March 2016 it became the first computer to beat a nine-dan professional Go player, four games to one. Since then, AlphaGo has been succeeded by two, more advanced programs, AlphaGoZero—currently the world’s top Go player—and AlphaZero which also plays chess and shogi. AlphaGo made headlines for cracking the complexities of Go at least ten years ahead of predictions. At the time, typical AI’s would
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
21
test all possible moves at any particular point in a game and chose the strongest option. Go, however, has far too many potential moves in any given turn to efficiently compute, so AlphaGo utilized a new method involving what are called deep neural networks and reinforcement learning to learn the game over the course of millions of plays—first against humans then against itself. AlphaGoZero improved upon the formula by removing the human equation—playing only against itself and learning strategies without the limitation of human influence. But, as Brown reminds us, “it costs $40 million of compute to train. It had to play literally millions of games. But that is entirely impractical and out of reach for the vast majority of people.” A fully trained model of any AI program can be made available for public use, should the creators who fronted the compute and development costs choose. In an industry grounded in academia and research, the idyll of open source information can come with potential negative consequences. This poses one of many problems that regulators face in addressing these technologies, complicated by the speed at which they progress. As a result of these regulatory challenges, some of the industry’s largest names have taken to self-regulation. Developers, such as those at Elon Musk’s OpenAI, decided not to make their latest natural language processing model available to the public. One OpenAI project, GPT-n, aims to generate any amount of human-like text, given a prompt. Due to concerns over malicious applications of their technology, OpenAI only publicly released an untrained version of their second generation model, GPT-2, and only opened a partially trained version to researchers. Similarly, OpenAI recognizes that their third-generation model, GPT-3, is vulnerable to misuse should they make it available though open source. As such, they’ve completely limited access to approved customers, use cases, and through a channel that they can carefully control. Brown outlines an additional concern, “the second thing that comes to mind for me is, with respect to the learning, is that they're very powerful, but they're very difficult to interpret. The earliest precursors to machine learning, for example, is basically a set of rules, and a set of rules is a very easy thing to interpret and you can follow exactly the decision that a model or an algorithm is making to reach its final decision.” As these models become more and more complex and powerful, they also become much more difficult to understand. “If I have an algorithm that's outputting predictions that are of major consequence, maybe it's the type of drug I'm going to give somebody and they're going to live or die if I give them wrong one, and a doctor looks at the outputs and they can’t understand why the model is suggesting this—to blindly trust an algorithm is a dangerous thing.” When asked where he feels we currently stand in terms of AI being a force-for-good, Brown says “I think we're figuring it out honestly and there's some really promising applications. I think automation is an area where it is proven to be effective.”
22
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
He carefully notes the difference between automation that complements and empowers human productivity and the automation that destroys livelihoods, citing the time-consuming task of dredging through mountains of email spam—a nearly non-existent task thanks to AI. “I think medicine is an interesting area as well. There's been examples of these models showing success and very quickly identifying breast cancer, for example. If the doctors can spend less time diagnosing breast cancer and more time addressing it, I would say that's a good thing.” The Oxford Internet Institute in collaboration with Google further notes that “AI is proving crucial to advancing science and tackling some of our biggest global challenges.” They specifically identify examples such as apps that cross-reference databases to help farmers pinpoint issues with their crops, and programs that help airlines both maximize cargo space as well as find more efficient flight paths, reducing carbon emissions. Similarly, they identify AI systems dedicated to monitoring climate change through “vast and constantly evolving datasets,” that help model glacier melt, predict sea rise, and identify new chemical structures necessary to create more efficient solar cells, among other uses. Brown is equally optimistic of the future of data science and AI. “I think it will grow and I think, in a sense, the reason it's going to grow is because we're living in a world that's increasingly digitized. And what digitizing means is there’s going to be more and more data that you can leverage. You don't need to work at, like a Google or something, where you have billions of people's data coming in every second, every day, to do something useful.” He paints a picture of a field that is approachable at every level and reiterates that the desire to take advantage of data is common to every industry. “It feels so empowering to be able to leverage that and I hope to see at least a basic skill set or competency and understanding around data, and the taking advantage of data to make its way into all sorts of different professions.” He speculates that the computational expense currently required to perform deep learning to the extent of programs such as AlphaGo may someday be irrelevant, “What if there's a way to make computation way cheaper than it is today? Like if quantum computing is accessible and cheap and legitimate you can better enable these types of tasks.” Short of advancements in hardware, an alternative pathway is to make the algorithms themselves more efficient. “How do you teach an algorithm to drive a car without it needing to watch two-hundred thousand years worth of car driving footage to understand what it means to drive a car? Humans don't need that.” By comparison to computers, people have an amazing ability to see a picture of a cat a single time and learn how to identify cats for a lifetime, while a computer, as we are currently capable of developing them, would need to see a million pictures of things that are cats and are not cats. Answers to these questions could further catalyze the advancement of artificial intelligent technologies.
South Korean professional Go player Lee Sedol, right, plays in the Google DeepMind challenge in 2016. (DeepMind) AlphaGo took part in the 2017 Future of Go Summit in China, the birthplace of Go. Designed to help unearth even more strategic moves, the summit included a match with the world’s number one player Ke Jie seen here with Demis Hassabis, co-founder of DeepMind. (DeepMind) those two subjects. That's kind of the foundation needed to really understand machine learning, and a set of algorithms to kind of facilitate that.”
Leap-and-bounds notwithstanding, artificial intelligence will continue to improve. For the potential AI and data science poses to remain a force for good, and for us to advance it to shape our lives and our world in a positive light, we need passionate people, interested in the associated industries to make a difference. “Data science is such a nascent field. Honestly, people weren't calling themselves data scientists, like ten years ago but people have been doing similar work for a long time. Now it is sort of this umbrella term, so there's a whole spectrum of types of activities you could be doing as a data scientist.” He details what he refers to as “different flavors of the work,” continuing, “are you good at navigating through data or performing data monitoring activities? Or, do you have a keen eye to the catch patterns in the data and tie it directly to your business? Another flavor of the work would be a literal PhD postdoc scientist studying math as it pertains to data science and computing. There's also this third dimension, which is like engineering. There's a role called ‘machine learning engineering,’ where strong software developers develop the infrastructure to support a lot of these cutting edge research or techniques coming out from academia or industry. There's a lot of different ways to approach it. It's a very broad field.” While an individual's particular interests or approach to data science may differ greatly in such a broad field, Brown also points out a number of foundational skills that make breaking into data science a more approachable goal, “At a high level, in my personal experience, what's been particularly helpful is the ability to just code and be comfortable with data and navigate it is pretty critical. No matter what area you go into. Having a strong statistical background is useful as well and, by extension, linear algebra and the marrying of
Diverging for a moment from the technical aspects of the profession, Brown goes on to say that data is nothing without the ability to understand and translate it into something that is valuable, a skill that he speculates requires a broad perspective and the ability to look at problems holistically and to identify trends and patterns. Fortunately for those looking to make the jump, both the technical skills and holistic approaches to data can be learned. “There's so many great resources online to learn this stuff and I don't think you need to have an advanced degree in statistics to be a data scientist or a data science professional. You can do quite a lot just being self-taught.” Brown recommends online courses from sources such as Coursera, Udemy, or Khan Academy as approachable points of entry. He mentions, too, Medium as a platform popular for publishers of data science-related materials and, for practice, Kaggle, which hosts datasets for exposure to data wrangling and task-oriented experience. Finally, personal projects are an invaluable way to learn and explore another interest in the process. “I don't think you need to have a job in data science to learn about data science or make a switch into data science. It's a growing field right now that if you just demonstrate a genuine interest and personal effort, and you can point to a couple of things and say, I've done X, Y and Z, that's going to be really impressive.” Brown looks towards people’s good-willed nature to continue driving the technology in a positive direction, pointing out those who volunteer at non-profits lacking their own internal technical expertises, or those who are using AI to help solve the global energy and environment crisis, “It's not a one dimensional problem. A lot of different people need to work together on it.” And, as data-driven applications become more and more of a mainstay in every level of business, government, environment and daily life, schools, too, will take notice in terms of their STEM curriculum. Our students will certainly be a stepahead as they move on towards university and subsequently, the professional world. Perhaps one of them will improve voice transcription algorithms, help countries get out ahead of the next potential pandemic, or possibly work on the team that develops the next-generation in digital assistant technology. “Hey Siri, remind me to send Brown a thank-you email.”
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
23
Jar of Keys Sena Chang ’24 explores the concept of mindset—one of the six competencies in ASIJ’s Portrait of a Learner—through a personal essay.
The keys I have collected far outnumber the doors I have opened. At age seven, cherubic eyes may widen at the sight of a stuffed animal, or perhaps a multicolored lollipop. Yet somehow, my black irises did not follow this unsaid tradition; instead, they lit up at the sight of old keys, rusty and worn out from years of use. My delicate fingers served as a harsh contrast to the jumbled keys placed in them; for years my affinity for old keys would persist. Any one of these keys may have been passed through the hands of several family generations, yet its unique teeth perfectly grab onto the keyhole of only a single door in the world. In retrospect, perhaps it was this knowledge that ignited fireworks of glee through my veins whenever my eyes caught
24
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
sight of a key. It could lead to a lace-covered palace, the Louvre, Lincoln’s house—the vast possibilities extended exponentially. Tied to the deepest chambers of my heart was an eternal connection to each of these keys—only when I discovered the rich histories engraved into these individual keys did I finally let go.
I have found one hundred keys, and each has led to another door I have yet to open.
my mason jar sent me swerving right and left on my homely railroad; its jagged, unique edges that have passed too many fingers for my mind to comprehend clashed with the monochrome, linear backdrop of my life. Back then, there stood an answer next to every question; when I asked my keys where their houses lay, they just replied in a foreign language of ridges and curves. It was perhaps an innate behavior, this obsession with perfection.
It was my obsession with orderliness that sent me on the very edge of chaos, a word foreign to my dictionary of seven years. I had been cruising along a railroad track repetitive and predictable, its linear path stabilizing my agitated young mind. Yet the keys housed in
I was at war at five years old. I was at war with a deadly creature that threatened to snatch me from my dreams and wreak havoc. When the clock struck nine, its spindly fingers would reach up from underneath every so slowly, creating an element of dreadful suspense. It
fiercely roamed the fortress under my bed, casting shadows across my room. It was a creature that walked the bedroom floors of every child—the monster under my bed.
thought of it; for as long as I had known, I had fulfilled the role of “silent, reserved girl” every consecutive year in the dramatic, theatrical politics of middle school.
Fire-hot blood rushing through my veins, I trembled underneath my sheets with my heart threatening to burst out of my body. A pool of fear gathered in my gut, paralyzing me until I was a lifeless statue lying on my bed.
Yet behind the expressionless mask always hanging on my face was a never-ending universe of literature and philosophies acquired through books, art, and music. With my mouth tightly shut, my brain blasted ideas through the silence, entertaining me to the fullest. Yet when I sought to voice these colorful, vivid ideas, out came a tumble of gibberish and stutters. So fluent was I in the language of thoughts, yet so awkward and unhappy I was in the language of conversation.
It was this exact feeling of paralyzing fear that greeted me when my socially inept middle school self was faced with her greatest enemy—public speaking. As one may predict, a migration of butterflies would get released into my stomach at the mere
My words felt worthless as if they were something to be tossed around and discarded. Soon I learned to stitch my mouth closed, believing that the world did not want to hear—it did not consider me worthy enough to listen to. The foundations of self-esteem upon which man holds himself were as fragile as a china doll for me, my confidence shattering into a million shards by one incorrect answer or a single piece of criticism. To fail this daunting speech in front of everyone seemed absolutely catastrophic to me. Failure, to me, further validated the sense of unintelligence and inadequacy I constantly felt towards myself.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
25
As I walked to the front of the class, a deep crimson blush tinted my cheeks, heat rushing up to my face and ears. A thousand hands were clamped around my windpipe, rendering me unable to form any words. I opened my mouth, my brain dissolving into a million different entities.
And there I stood, an actress waiting to put on the greatest show on Earth. As my mouth opened, the tightly wound knots of ideas in my brain would ever so slightly loosen up, giving way for the wave of words I would speak. To me, my works of writing, art, and music are more than fancy, eloquent pieces of art, but a slice of the universe of ideas I have yet to present to the world. And here I was, being able to speak these truths with confidence and zest, overcoming the fears of embarrassment and awkwardness. It was on that classroom floor that I was able to express the ideas my lips often swallowed back, the truths that my mouth had never uttered. I spoke with true conviction, with emotion and expression. My mind, once a caged bird flying rampant in its cage, I was now flying. Years later, my fingers now journey across the jagged edges of each collected key, trying, somehow, to find the location of the house it belonged to. Perhaps there was something inscribed within the hot alkaline metals it had been molded from—a final fingerprint, or a family crest of some sort. I silently roll my own key between my palms before night, only to realize that I’ve finally become content in my jar—one filled with unsaid conversations and social ineptitude— itself a home to my misdirection and wandering. In times of adolescence, we are often keys waiting in a mason jar, the search for our individual doors never-ending. The jagged, rough edges of our keys itself are compasses to our identities—our final doors and destinations—but it constantly seems that we are in the wrong galaxy, in the wrong era, and in the hands of the wrong person. We constantly long to find a single door whose ridges match ours, riddled with the notion that a perfect door awaits. Riddled with the notion that a perfect girl exists. Yet all one needs is purpose—purpose that a seven-year-old may give to her teddy bear or perhaps, a jar of keys. That is to say, that I have become a being capable of embracing life’s obstacles with might. That is to say, that I have come to the realization that failure is a temporary roadblock to the wonders that wait ahead. That is to say, that I am a key waiting patiently within a jar of many others, ready to unlock all the unknowns in the world. My mindset has established the Sena I am now, molding the ridges of my key to fit any door, to combat any situation come my way. Doors of opportunity come my way, I am now ready to venture out of my jar and unlock them.
26
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Island Life Fifth-graders get to work creating new island environments
Imagine that a new island has formed in the middle of the ocean and you’re tasked with designing its purpose and use. What kind of ecosystem might inhabit it? Who should get to live there? What industry might it support? This was the hypothetical problem fifth graders were recently tasked with solving.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
27
The fully-integrated project brought together many strands of the curriculum with a focus on collaboration, one of the key competencies in ASIJ’s Portrait of a Learner. “Our goal was to help students improve their interpersonal and team-related skills, as well as to help them with managing team dynamics and challenges,� says teacher Laura Faulk. Students began by designing individual models of their islands before forming groups to bring their designs together into a final concept. They then created 2D map drawings on a coordinate grid to plan their islands. Using the concept of scale, students used these drawings to transfer their design to the large cardboard coordinate grids that they then built their islands upon. Students worked in the Creative Arts Design Center with design technology teacher Hardi Fichardt, using many different design tools, including the laser cutters and 3D printers, to create their islands. Of course, a lot of cardboard, paint and hot-glue were also put to use. Islands were planned out by drawing maps to decide the location of important features
Students built the bases of their islands out of cardboard and paper, then painted over them
Students designed 3D models for buildings using Tinkercad in the Creative Arts Design Center
28
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Some projects included 3D-printed elements such as houses and other buildings
Students also had to create plans to protect the island from natural disasters, such as typhoons and flooding, by drawing on what they’d learned through their Earth Systems unit. Energy needs and ecosystems were also considered and integrated, as students researched geographical features and biodiversity in order to create ecosystems and food chains on their island that would make sense. Students used Newsela articles, websites, and videos to gather information and then wrote an island protection plan to keep their residents safe. In the culmination of the project, an exhibition of each group’s model allowed students from other classes, teachers and administrators to see the realization of their ideas. QR codes on the models directed visitors to the presentations that detailed the choices each group had made and provided further information. Each island included a QR code that could be scanned to reveal additional information The QR codes led to presentations with detailed explanations of each group’s island
ach group prepared their E island to be shown off in front their peers and teachers. Some groups presented outside to help with social distancing.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
29
Strength and Courage Award
30
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Ashley Cornwell ’20, the recipient of this year’s Strength and Courage Award, speaks to us about her service work and her reaction to receiving the award. The fifth annual Strength and Courage Award was given to Ashley Cornwell ’20 in June of this year. The prize of ¥1 million (approximately $10,000) is presented annually to an ASIJ senior who has displayed courage and personal strength during their time at ASIJ. “I was honestly pretty surprised. I didn’t think I would receive such a high honored award let alone be nominated for something like that, considering how there are so many other people in my grade who really devote their time to service and helping others,” Ashley said reflecting on what it meant to receive the award. Deserving students are nominated by faculty, counselors, and administrators at the end of the first semester, and invited to submit an essay describing the ways in which strength and courage played a role in their lives (and in a project or initiative they had led). Submissions are reviewed by the Child Protection Task Force composed of students, counselors, administrators, and members of the Board of Directors. Nominees are then interviewed by the task force, as part of the selection process. Those nominating Ashley mentioned her outstanding qualities saying “Ashley contributed nothing but positivity to our community here at school, becoming an outstanding academic but also a giving community member.” Ashley began her ASIJ experience as a freshman when she relocated to Tokyo from San Diego. Making the transition to a new school, and life in Japan, Ashley decided to start volunteering at Hands on Tokyo, a service organization with “a mission to contribute to society, instill volunteerism, and develop leaders by providing a meaningful place for volunteer activities that meet the needs of the community in two languages.” Over four years, her volunteer activities spanned a variety of settings including a welfare home for children, dance activities for autistic children, and visiting with the elderly at a senior center. Ashley explains how she came upon this particular form of service. “Part of the reason I actually joined Hands On Tokyo was to improve my Japanese. Having lived in the US before moving to ASIJ freshman year, my Japanese
wasn’t the strongest and so I actually did it as a way to both volunteer and to improve my conversational Japanese. What I really liked about Hands On [Tokyo] in particular was that even if you are not the best at Japanese, people are willing to want to learn English and speak English with you and want to communicate. And so the language barrier wasn’t much of an issue.” One of the most memorable activities Ashley experienced continues to motivate her today. A combined trip with Hands On Tokyo and ASIJ continues to motivate her commitment to service. “We went on a trip to the Tohoku region. We helped this local farmer with his crops and he was explaining to us how the tsunami had struck their town and so many people were missing and lost their lives. Hearing his story about that was kind of difficult to hear because it was so heartbreaking and then the next day we actually visited one of the schools that had collapsed due to the tsunami and earthquake and I think seeing that, I think it motivated me in a way to want to interact with people more because people go through so many hardships and you don’t really know about that. So I think that was a very big moment for me and made me proud to be part of an organization that really focuses on the community here in Japan.” But Ashley’s motivation goes well beyond immersion in Japan, as she describes why she continues to be drawn to service experiences that are “very rewarding after you interact with these people for a couple of hours. And you get to learn about their experiences and their hardships. And then it is really rewarding knowing that you brought a smile to their face. And afterward, you just feel that helper’s high and that just makes you want to keep going back and encourages you to do more.” Ashley explains that the “helper’s high” was an impromptu phrase she first used in her interview for the Strength and Courage award with the Child Protection Task Force, but upon further research, she found it is an actual term to explain why volunteers are drawn to service activities and defined as the positive feeling experienced after completing an act of kindness.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
31
Ashley (second row from front, second from right) was an active member of the Hands On Tokyo club in High School Ashley receiving the Strength and Courage award from Safeguarding Coordinator, Monica Clear
Now, as a Northeastern University freshman, studying online for the first semester from Tokyo, Ashley continues to navigate the impact of COVID-19, which limited her volunteer work last spring in Tokyo. She seeks events with personal interaction, the aspect of volunteering that she highly values. “My original plan was to do something similar to Hands On [Tokyo] where I could interact with either children or senior citizens and visit them once a week. But because I am not on campus it is difficult finding opportunities where you can interact with people one-on-one because I prefer to interact with people rather than doing other types of service work. I just find it more meaningful when you get to talk to them and learn about their life.” Ashley says that by chance she stumbled upon an opportunity to teach English online through Northeastern and applied for the position, went through the interview process, and took a few courses they provided. “I just finished my first lesson a few hours ago, with a refugee,” she tells us. Adding that it was “very interesting to hear her experiences about wanting to move to the US for a better life for her children.”
32
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
When asked how service might factor into her future, Ashley shares that she plans to “keep with this tutoring service, and then when I go to Boston next semester probably find more opportunities to really meet with people. Hopefully, by then COVID will be better and so I can find more opportunities and try out different things to find out what I want to do.” Her impromptu mention of a “helper’s high” as part of the interview for her award, actually captures Ashley’s path to service. Her deep desire to connect with others and uncover the less well-known challenges others face motivates her. Her future plans include “hopefully working for a non-profit or some sort of an organization that is centered around helping people.” We wish Ashely all the best as she continues to pursue further volunteer opportunities that reward her—and those she works with—in so many ways.
FUNDRAISING UPDATE
19–20 Dear ASIJ Community,
What a pleasure it is to join such a welcoming and supportive community! In early spring, as the pandemic began to spread around the globe and independent schools debated how best to respond to the crisis, many that lacked a real culture of philanthropy drew back from fundraising. While the costs of continuing to provide a first-class education rose, these schools, counterintuitively, decided to stop asking for help at the precise moment for which such funding is a necessity. But not ASIJ—and the ASIJ community responded vigorously, propelling the school to a COVID-19 response that has been emulated by other international schools around the world. As you’ll see in the following pages, thanks only to the generosity of ASIJ supporters, the number of donors to the Annual Fund increased by 23%, and grew the total raised in 2019–20 by 14%. These numbers show a community that understands that, pandemic or no pandemic, bold aspirations have a real cost, and that those costs cannot be met by tuition revenue alone. Thank you for the trust you place in the faculty and staff of ASIJ to not only provide the region’s finest education, but to follow a path of constant improvement. Your continuing and growing financial support gives ASIJ confidence to reach further each year, in our ongoing effort to achieve our aspirations. Thank you again for the warm welcome that I have received. I look forward to meeting everyone who shares the pride of ASIJ’s history and the promise of its future. In the meantime, please don’t hesitate to contact me directly using my contact info, below. Warm regards,
Clive Watkins Director of Institutional Advancement cwatkins@asij.ac.jp
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
33
in 2019–20
ANNUAL FUND UPDATE 2018–19 ¥66,125,526
ASIJ Annual Fund
Thank you for your commitment and generosity toward ASIJ. With your support we raised a total of ¥76M for the 2019–20 Annual Fund and set a recent record with 660 households contributing to ASIJ. Your participation helped us surpass our goal of 600 and represented a 23% increase overall. Many of you are named on the following pages for your contributions to our Annual Fund which go to support the school’s operating budget and the many programs that help ASIJ be a defining moment in the lives of our students. Thank you to each and every one of you for making a difference and helping us go further faster.
14% Increase
2017–18 ¥48,676,409 2017–18 ¥48,676,409
¥76,556,896 Total Raised in 2019–20
2018–19 ¥66,125,526
14% Increase
2017–18 ¥48,676,409 Fund Year 19/20 Goal
Participation 660 Households 23% Increase
Giving by Constituency
Fund Year 19/20 Fund Year Fund18/19 Year 19/20 Fund Year 18/19
505 505
34
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
121 229
170250 Fund Year 19/20 Goal
121 121
170 170
57 121 57
170
505
240
Alumni
229
250 ¥10,084,296 170 ¥6,114,361 18–19 ¥10,084,296
Alumni Parents
660
250 240
Parents Alumni
Parents
600
229
Alumni Parents Parents
Donations listed here were made between July 1, 2019 and June 30, 2020.
660
240
Alumni
Faculty Fund Year Alumni &19/20 Staff Parents Fund Year Faculty 18/19 & Staff
600
Fund Year 19/20 Goal
121
121
19–20 19–20
600
660
Quadruple Decade Club
DECADE CLUBS
Burkart, Ned ’48 & Pauline Downs, Vicky Glazier, Ken ’67 Shimizu, George ’39
Triple Decade Club Adams, Jim & Nancy Blizzard, Jan ’71 & Craig Boatwright, David ’73 Carlin, Chris & Donna Cohen, Rick ’69 & Topper-Cohen, Barbara Crandall, Les & Aiko Haines, Andrew ’60 & Lisa Harnik, Peter ’69 Huskins Family James, Larry & Sharon Kemmerer, Ruthli & Walter Kobayashi, Albert ’42 & Betty Livingston, Jerry ’81 & Bonnie Lund, Andy ’81 & Denise Magnuson, Jody ’73 & Clark McCoy, Will ’59 & Lynne McVeigh, Rod ’70 & Rebecca Moss, Carolyn ’73 & Hawkins, Daniel Nicol, Joanna ’52 Pietraszek, Henry & Margaret Schaffer, Sally ’76 Walsh, Bob ’81
Double Decade Club
Bruzek, Patty & Ken Chitani, Yinsei ’68 & Yoshio Coopat, Tom & Cheryle Cooper, Peter & Pam Duke, Sue ’83 Ewart, Emilie ’97 & Jake Fattal, Leon ’57 & Suzanne Francischetti, Mark ’72 Fujishima, Julie ’84 Huo, Eugene ’96 Huo, Jeffrey ’94 Jones-Morton, Pamela (PhD) Kidder, Paul ’76 & Terry Lury, Dick ’65 & Gemma Mera, Yuhka ’81 Meyer, Mary ’65 Morgenstern, Fred ’83 & Kendra Pierce, Lucia ’68 Plum, John & Mimi Porté, Thierry & Tashiro-Porté, Yasko Sanders, Mike ’87 & Jun Squier, Mid & Carol Stokes, Paul & Rose Tunis, Jeffrey Vehanen, Marty ’61 Wakat, Barbi ’88
Decade Club
Berkove, Ethan ’86 & Kyra Bernier, Jeff & Seiko Cannon, Alan & Kitakado, Fuyumi Ehrenkranz, Andra ’83 & John Greig, Katherine ’94 Harte, Esther Hayase, John ’85 & Allison Kamano, Hiroyuki & Harumi Kuroda, Mitzi ’77 Martino, Bill ’63 & Betsy Meller, Louise ’63 Miller, Scott & Mary Nagata, Paul ’74 & Susan Nishida, David & Tina ’85 Norris, Peggy ’65 & Charles Piez, William & Mary Pontius, Pamela ’97 & Rankin, Greg Schlichting, Richard & Cynthia Seltzer, Susan & Theodore Snell, Richard & Fran Sult, Nathan ’75 Taffel, Max ’04 Takada, Yuko Turner, Sally ’66 Wilce, Matt Yao, Alejo & Lusan
Decade Clubs recognize donors who have given for 10, 20, 30 or more consecutive years. Donations of any amount count toward Decade Club status. Decade Club members have a tremendous impact at ASIJ with their sustained support. If you wish to secure your spot in a Decade Club, please consider enrolling in recurring donations through Give2Asia at www.give2asia. org/asij. Your donation will be automatically charged to your credit card each year and will be taxdeductible in the United States.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
35
GIFT CLUB MEMBERS Second Century Circle ¥5,000,000+
Kanazawa, Yugo & Akemi
1902 Society
¥1,000,000—¥4,999,999
Budge, Todd & Lori Caldwell, Dale & Megumi Cannon, Alan & Kitakado, Fuyumi Endo, Kristy ’01 & Theil, Jules Kawakami, Junpei & Mai McCready, Amanda & Jim Murakami, Yumiko & Moses, Todd Noddin, Bob & Janette Park, Chiman & Seo, Alice Ryu, Roy ’77 Sasanuma, Catherine & Taisuke Seltzer, Susan & Theodore Tahara, Kunio & Eriko Tsujiguchi, Hironobu & Maki Uruma, Fred Yoshikawa, Tatsuo & Miho Zee, Jinly ’90
Courtyard Circle
¥500,000—¥999,999
Anonymous Connor, Chip ’67 & Jacque Dan, Basil & Chieko Fu, Mingxia & Nishikawa Fu, Hiroko Fujishima, Julie ’84 Furuta, Taketora & Saiko Gorantla, Ramana & Kiranmayi Harada, Mary ’81 & Peterson, Greg Lee, David ’86 & Kaori Mizuno, Toshizumi & Junko Neureiter, Kirk & Mariko O'Donovan, Erin & Tim
36
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
O'Shea, Stephen & Saigusa O'Shea, Kie Pierce, Peter & Sare, Steven Platek, Nir Porté, Thierry & Tashiro-Porté, Yasko Rekate, Jason & Anna Semaya, David & Masako Sowder, Stuart & Yuson, Rusty Takamiya, Toshiro & Shino
Headmaster’s Circle ¥200,000—¥499,999
Bernier, Jeff & Seiko Chuang, Peter & Harumi Chuchro, Katie & Doug Conwill, Steve & Cathy Daver, Roxana & Massion, Peter Davidson, Jack ’75 & Allison Dennis, Thurman Downs, Vicky Edmunds, Eric & Misa Epstein, Jonathan & Liu Fink, Jim & Mika Folsom, Richard & Stephanie Fukikoshi, Akihiro & Tomoko Hardin, Jim & Marti Higa, Ernie ’70 & Aya Hyland, Jason Imai, Eiji & Hiromi Kamano, Hiroyuki & Harumi Kohler, Barbara & Skorski, Joseph Kondo, Taro & Reiko Kuwana, Yumi ’82 & Eiichiro Kwan, Sora & Jason Lane, Nick & Holly Laughlin, Morgan & Sato-Laughlin, Rumiko Ledbetter, Phaedra ’81 & Mark Lee, KJ & Monica Mallat, Mary Margaret & Deck, David Matsudaira, Aki McNeill, Jeffrey & Kazuko Mito, Koichiro & Kiyomi Muir, Jim & Kanai, Miwa Nakamura, Mariko & Hiro Nakashima, Amane & Chizuru Nishimi, Tetsuya ’94 & Kiyoko
Okada, Hikaru & Yoshiko Okamoto, Tet ’98 & Eri Okuno, Marcus & Kazuko Oshima, Robert ’68 Piez, William & Mary Rahman, Farida ’68 Reese, Lenore & Isenberg, Joshua Reilly, Kenneth & Debbie Schultz, Mark & Disa Slattery, Ronald & Toshiko Sloan, Erika ’04 & Schaeffer, Kevin Takebe, Tsuyoshi & Maki Takahashi Anton, Yuriko ’84 & Anton, Philip Talbot, Jay & Yuki Tsusaka, Miki & Jun Ueda, Yoshihiko & Karen Yamasaki, Paul & Afifah Zahedi, Ardeshir
Black and Gold League ¥100,000—¥199,999
Anonymous (2) Akaishi, Masahiro & Maki Amemiya, Kenta ’91 Becker, Allan Bender, Brian & Ayako Boatwright, David ’73 Cheng, Jill ’63 & Hung Cheung, Jasper & Takako Chitani, Yinsei ’68 & Yoshio Cremers, Vincent & Savona, Rebecca DiCicco, Daniel ’89 & Yuko Ehira, Hiroaki & Nao Ehrenkranz, Andra ’83 & John Fisher, Mike ’88 Guillot, Frank ’65 & Ann Hassan, Matthew & Ojima, Mari Hirano, Pina & Yoko Hotta, Michael & Masako Igarashi, Koji & Mie Ishibashi, Kenzo & Seiko Ishihara, Yoichiro & Katsui Ito, Masatoshi & Kumi Kagimoto, Tadahisa & Eve Kasamatsu, David Jun & Rika
Kikuchi, Naho & Shumsky, Ron Kindred, Jon & Sachiko Kobayashi, Terumi & Takashi Koike, Junji & Aya Konishi, Ryu & Rie Kota, Hideo & Noriko Luedeke, Maria ’92 Majid, Nasir & Chie Marini, Buddy ’85 & Hitomi Matsui Koll, Kathy & Koll, Jesper Matsuo, Yuki Lee & Taro Mera, Yuhka ’81 Miller, Tony & Melin, Cecilia Miyazaki, Masato & Naoko Morgenstern, Fred ’83 & Kendra Nelson, Brian ’85 Nelson, Michael & Laurie Nishida, David & Tina ’85 Nishimura, Hiroyuki & Etsuko Nohara, Kosuke & Fumika Norris, Peggy ’65 & Charles O'Neill, Stephen & Karen Ogawa, Andy ’90 & Makoto Ohashi, Hiromasa & Momoko Okamura, Alto & Risa Okuda, Jun & Natsuko Ozeki, Arthur & Kaya Pike, Kathy Plum, John & Mimi Plush, Marcus & Fiona Polashek, Michael & Hashiuchi, Mitsuko Possman, John & Shoko Rivera, Damaris & Fahy, John Sakemi, Takeshi & Mie Schmelzeis, Joe ’80 Shang, Bill ’75 & Chen, Stella Sharp, Robert ’87 Shirakawa, Kotoe ’03 Silecchia, Tom & Tate, Saori Smith, Charles & Emi Sumida, Shiori ’99 Sun, Shulin & Imamura, Mica Suzukawa-Tseng, Linda ’72 Takada, Yuko Takai, Kota & Megumi Xu, Yeren & Wang, Fan Yan, Jack & Moriyama, Natsuko Yang, James ’62 Yokosuka, Mariko & Masato ’98 Yoshida, Kumiko
Mustangs Club ¥50,000—¥99,999
Anonymous (2) Anderson, Rusty ’76 & Lori Armstrong, Peter ’52 Asano, Takahiro & Naoko Bardowell, Miguel & Oh, Jisa Barry, Matt ’90 & Amie Basnayake, Aruna & Sukagawa Basnayake, Tomomi Bennett, Steve & Carrie Casadesus-Masanell, Ramon & Gonzalez-Palomares, Ana Conrad, Andrew & Chitose Cooper, Peter & Pam Cromwell, Penny ’67 Dornoff, Jeff & Deanne Elyaddasse, Laroussi & Butler, Edina Eto, Batara & Midori Fujii, Dan ’82 & Yuki Fukuda, Taeko Fukuma, Lalaka ’93 Fuller, Jody Gilmartin, Ed Gunji, Harry & Mia Haddad, Scott & Caroline Hastings, Paul ’00 & Wissel, Debbie ’99 Hata, Mitsuhiro & Kim, Julie Hattori, Hitomi ’83 & Seikou Hiramoto, Hideyuki & Shiobara, Fumiko Jain, Raj & Kang, Claire Kawasaki, Lauren & Tatsuo Kobayashi, Takashi & Toshiyo Kozloski, Richard & Laura Kuwahara, Kei ’09 L'Heureux, Marc & Heidi Lebrun, Ken & Laurie Linsley, Peter & Ritsu Lury, Dick ’65 & Gemma Macarios, Henry & Yuriko Marini, Nina ’88 Martino, Bill ’63 & Betsy Matsuda, Reisa ’15 Matsumoto, Toyokazu & Naomi Meyer, Joseph & Minako Miller, Mark Nagao, Jonathan & Fusako Nagata, Paul ’74 & Susan
Neale, David Nelson, Michael & Sabina Nixon, Nik & Choi, EunYoung Oline, Mark ’78 & Rebecca Parsons, Terry ’65 Roy, Robert & Karrie Schlichting, Richard & Cynthia Schulz, Robert & Mayuko Silver, Nick & Yumiko Socci, Anthony & Kristin Suzuki, Erie & Tamami Taffel, Max ’04 Takano, Kyoko & Hiroyuki Toppino, Stephanie & Jon-Paul Turner, Sally ’66 Ueda, Takafumi & Misaki Whitson, Tom & Misty Witt, Gene & Janet Yamada, Leslie ’64 & Tachi Yamashita, Atsushi & Akari Yoshioka, Sayuri Young, Joseph & Liu, Suying Yukevich, Stan & Maki
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
37
COVID-19 RESPONSE Donors
Anonymous (3) Acton, Jeff & Akiko Adobe Systems Inc. Akaishi, Masahiro & Maki Ando, Kunimasu & Ayako Aram, Alexander & Kim, So Myung Asano, Takahiro & Naoko ASIJ PTA Avondet, Gilbert & Avondet Homma, Yuriko Bardowell, Miguel & Oh, Jisa Basnayake, Aruna & Sukagawa Basnayake, Tomomi Bass, Steven & Riku, Toshimi Brooke, James ’08 Calagui, Joy & Yanase-Calagui, Yumiko Cannon, Alan & Kitakado, Fuyumi Carr, Noah & Kimberly Carreon, Courtney & Brian Casadesus-Masanell, Ramon & Gonzalez-Palomares, Ana Chang, Yu-Tsung ’86 & Yamato, Shoko Che, Karl & Yasuda, Naomi Chuang, Peter & Harumi Conwill, Steve & Cathy Douglas, Brian ’98 & Megumi Elyaddasse, Laroussi & Butler, Edina Eto, Batara & Midori Fackler, Martin & Yukari Foster, Mio & Malcolm Fujii, Dave ’83 & Makiko Fujishima, Julie ’84 Fukuda, Tomio ’82 & Kami ’84 Gorantla, Ramana & Kiranmayi Gunji, Harry & Mia Haddad, Scott & Caroline Harada, Matthew & Yumiko Hashimoto, Takeshi Hashimoto, Yutaka & Hisae Hata, Mitsuhiro & Kim, Julie Igarashi, Koji & Mie Ishibashi, Atsuko & Yuichiro Ishido, Masayuki & Keiko Jain, Raj & Kang, Claire Jedrey, Peter & Eri Kahn, Raymond & Motoko Kanazawa, Yugo & Akemi Kanematsu, Tohru & Yoko Kawakami, Junpei & Mai
38
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Kawasaki, Lauren & Tatsuo Kim, Yang-Ho & Kato, Chie Ko, James & Yukari Kobayashi, Takashi & Toshiyo Kohler, Barbara & Skorski, Joseph Kohri, Shinichiro & Lisa Konishi, Ryu & Rie Koslow, Bryan James & Yuko Kothari, Vivek & Preeti Kozloski, Richard & Laura Lane, Nick & Holly le Roux, Riaan & Wilna Ledbetter, Phaedra ’81 & Mark Maeda, Ikuyo Manda, Krishna & Kaori Marini, Buddy ’85 & Hitomi Matsudaira, Aki Matsumoto, Izumi & Delaney, William Matsuo, Yuki Lee & Taro Matsutoya, Tamako McNeill, Jeffrey & Kazuko Melson, Robert Miyazaki, Takaya & Mikiko Mizuno, Toshizumi & Junko Montgomery, Will & Miwa Moores, Chris & Kumiko Muir, Jim & Kanai, Miwa Murai, Noriko & Yeskel, Bill Murakami, Yumiko & Moses, Todd Nakamura, Mariko & Hiro Nakano, Akinori & Mariko Nakayama, Tetsu ’84 & Ayumi Nixon, Nik & Choi, EunYoung Noda, Roy & Keiko O'Brien, Kelly ’02 O'Donovan, Erin & Tim O'Hearn, Patrick ’07 O'Shea, Stephen & Saigusa O'Shea, Kie Odagiri, Akito & Kaoru Ogawa, Ryuzo ’99 & Tomoko Ohashi, Hiromasa & Momoko Okada, Hikaru & Yoshiko Ozeki, Arthur & Kaya Pitale, Jon & Laura Pivko, Mario & Yeong Hee Platek, Nir Plum, John & Mimi Plush, Marcus & Fiona
Rabindran, Prasad & Heho, Monica Reed, Tracey Rogers, Edward & Betsy Roy, Robert & Karrie Saitoh, Yasuhiro & Yayoi Schulz, Robert & Mayuko Seltzer, Susan & Theo Sho, Tomoyuki & Masako Silver, Nick & Yumiko Sumino, Eri ’14 Takamiya, Toshiro & Shino Takebe, Tsuyoshi & Maki Tanihara, Hideto & Ayaka Tekin, Ahmet & Derinoz Tekin, Emel Thirouard, Philippe & Kikuchi, Akiko Thomas, Scott & Terra Toppino, Stephanie & Jon-Paul Tsuchida, Carol Tsujiguchi, Hironobu & Maki Ueda, Takafumi & Misaki Ueda, Yoshihiko & Karen Vidyarthi, Paraj & Singh Vidyarthi, Puneeta Watanabe, Yasutora & Hiromi Welckle, Steve & Noll, Karen Wiswell, Bill & Akane Witt, Gene & Janet Woods, Bob & Mary Gene Yamamoto, Takeshi & Waka Yamashita, Yoshimitsu & Kaoru Yokokawa, Junji & Yuki Yoshikawa, Tatsuo & Miho Yukevich, Stan & Maki
Increased giving to the Annual Fund helped ASIJ make the following enhancements in response to COVID-19: • New HVAC system in the ASIJ Theater and high school music rooms • Redesign and enlarging of classrooms • Purchase of additional furniture for classrooms • Additional sinks throughout Chofu campus • Remodeling of middle school bathrooms on 2nd and 3rd floors • Additional projection and sound systems for classrooms • Flexible walls for middle school classrooms • Campus-wide signage • Additional capacity in the Health Center • Purchase of hygiene and sanitation supplies
Like the generations of families before us, we give in hopes of positively impacting the quality of education and the learning environment for current and future students and the ASIJ community. It is with gratitude to others' generosity that our children have been blessed with a school filled with wonderful teachers who respect, recognize and celebrate them for who they are.
—Susan and Theodore Seltzer Current Parents, 1902 Society
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
39
ALUMNI DONORS 30s
’39 Shimizu, George
40s
’42 Kobayashi, Albert ’45 McKnight, Ronnie (Schwartz) ’48 Burkart, Ned Markley, Pat
’49 Smith, Geoff
50s
’50 Lenz, Pam (Alexander)
Tucker, Rosemarie (Lendenmann)
’51 DeLong, Paul ’52 Armstrong, Peter
Nicol, Joanna (Strother) Story, Morris
’53 Eills, Nancy ’56 Hadley, Lydia (Chawner) ’57 Bell, Ted
Fattal, Leon Swann, Barbara (Bowles) Thompson, Heather (McCune)
’58 Rasmussen, Stirling ’59 McCoy, Will
Nielsen, Jeannette (Elsener) Zimmerman, Sue (Long)
60s
’60 Bergt, Dave
Caudron, Cody Haines, Andrew Lyons, Phyllis McKee, Craig
’61 Harris, Bonnie (Bongard)
Sapala, Beth (Danker) Skagen Munshi, Melanie (Skagen) Vehanen, Marty
’62 Meyer, Fred
Yang, James
’63 Cheng, Jill (Tsui) Martino, Bill Meller, Louise
’64 Yamada, Leslie (Davis) ’65 Gorham, Joyce
Guillot, Frank Kory, Kaye (Hedeen) Kurahashi, Nancy (Nagase) Lury, Dick Meyer, Mary Norris, Peggy (Tsukahira) Parsons, Terry Rubenfeld, Linda (Steele)
’66 Bronsal, Jeanne (See) Hass, David Marsh, Daniel Turner, Sally (Noll)
’67 Connor, Chip
Cromwell, Penny Glazier, Ken Kerr, Spicey Lockwood, Julia
’68 Brousseau, Ruth (Tebbets) Chitani, Yinsei (Chang) Colville, Glenn Oshima, Robert Pierce, Lucia (Buchanan) Rahman, Farida Sakamoto, Dave
’69 Cohen, Rick
Harnik, Peter Neff, Suzi
70s
’70 Gadsby, Ellen
Higa, Ernie Huskins, Debbie McVeigh, Rod Tsai, Linda (Yen)
’71 Blizzard, Jan (Schaale)
Hayao, George Holloway, Kathy (Holloway) Sanoden, Jim Shorrock, Terry Weiss, Steve Wilson, Dave
’72 Davis, Jenny (Skillman)
Flynn, Karin (Jagel) Francischetti, Mark Ludlow-Ortner, Jules (Ludlow) Rainoff, Brad Suzukawa-Tseng, Linda (Suzukawa)
’73 Boatwright, David
Clough, Julie (Van Wyk) Kleinjans, Connie Leybold, Sandy (Colville) Magnuson, Jody (Kroehler) Melnick, Mark Moody, Brian Moss, Carolyn Reiser, Jeanie (Cohen) Smith, Karen (Frost) Thomas, Tory
’74 Ghoda, Lucy
Nagata, Paul
’75 Davidson, Jack
Katayama Esse, Tracy (Katayama) Kidder, Jon Niimi, Reiko Schaffer, Rob Shang, Bill Sult, Nathan Wakamatsu, Ernie
’76 Anderson, Rusty
Feldman, Andy Horwitz, Liz (Yanagihara) Kidder, Paul Rich, Miriam Schaffer, Sally
’77 Honaman, Andy Kuroda, Mitzi Ryu, Roy
40
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
’78 Bailey, Mark
Matsumoto, Kent Oline, Mark Struebing, Joel
’79 Whitehead, Chuck
80s
’80 Breer, Charles
Eimon, Ivar Kirby, Kyoko (Ono) Schmelzeis, Joe Walsh, Will
’81 Harada, Mary (Che)
Hinz, Joel Kanda, Miki Ledbetter, Phaedra (Onuma) Livingston, Jerry Lund, Andy Mera, Yuhka Walsh, Bob
’82 Adams, Michael
Fujii, Dan Fukuda, Tomio Kuwana, Yumi (Mera) Piez, Catherine
’83 Duke, Sue
Ehrenkranz, Andra (Bowman) Fujii, Dave Hattori, Hitomi (Wakita) Krisher, Joe Morgenstern, Fred
’84 Takahashi Anton, Yuriko
Baumhover, Judith (Walsh) Fujishima, Julie Fukuda, Kami (Inoue) Nakayama, Tetsu Takahashi, Tomi
’85 Hayase, John ’86
Marini, Buddy Nelson, Brian Nishida, Tina (Yamano) Berkove, Ethan Chang, Yu-Tsung Lee, David Nakamatsu, Greg
’87 Beitchman, Greg
Kohl, Kari (Wilkinson) Sanders, Mike Sharp, Robert Simon, Hali (Greenberg)
’88 Abe, Minako
Cobb, Bitsy (Horn) Durfee, Peter Fisher, Mike Marini, Nina Morgenstern, David Munson, Chris Sasaki-Saito, Anna (Sasaki) Wakat, Barbi
’89 DiCicco, Daniel
Vaughan, Kathy
90s
’90 Barry, Matt
Curnutt, Heather Ghosh, Bapi Jiang Yamaguchi, Kiki (Jiang) Krisher, Ako (Inatomi) Ogawa, Andy Rimlinger, Kevin Zee, Jinly
’91 Amemiya, Kenta Kaser, Patrick
’92 Luedeke, Maria (Gamble) Sands, Jon
’93 Christopher, Allison (Babb) Fukuma, Lalaka (Ogawa) Nakayama, Mayumi
’94 Corcoran, Michael Greig, Katherine Huo, Jeffrey Nishimi, Tetsuya
’95 Chapman, Marc Kirk, Philip Sundquist, Alex
’96 Anonymous
Huo, Eugene
’97 Ewart, Emilie (Fisher) Pontius, Pamela Whitworth, Brooke
’98 Douglas, Brian
Morohoshi, Shinobu Okamoto, Tet Yokosuka, Masato
00s
’00 Garrett, Greg
Hastings, Paul Sack, Jonathan
’01 Endo, Kristy
Thomas, Sarah Woods, Matt
’02 O'Brien, Kelly ’03 Hara, Rina
Leslie, Dave Shirakawa, Kotoe Sloan, Sean
’04 Sloan, Erika Taffel, Max
’05 Leslie, Roshan (Nozari) Wakutsu, Shuji
’06 Araki, Yumi
Dirkse, Tai Jacobsson, Timmy Thornton, Michael
’07 O'Hearn, Patrick Wakutsu, Kohei
’08 Brooke, James ’09 Bender, Will Kuwahara, Kei Suzuki, Misato
10s
’10 Anonymous
Deck, Michael Kanzawa, Janet Takano, Mimi
’11 Heideman, Alexander ’13 Conwill, Louisa Deck, Andrew Wakayama, Takuya
’14 Nakayama, Erica Sumino, Eri
’15 Matsuda, Reisa
’99 Ogawa, Ryuzo
Pontius, Beth Sumida, Shiori Wissel, Debbie Woods, Bob
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
41
ALUMNI PARENTS Donors
Anonymous (3) Abdulla, Rangana & Mikaal Adams, Jim & Nancy Adams, Michael ’82 & KaalekahiAdams, Rolly Ann Ando, Keiko & Phelps, William Ando, Kunimasu & Ayako Aoki, Shigeaki & Hiromi Aram, Alexander & Kim, So Myung Avondet, Gilbert & Avondet Homma, Yuriko Barber, John & Sue Barry, Jim & Martha Becker, Allan Bernier, Jeff & Seiko Blizzard, Jan ’71 & Craig Blodgett, Seth & Sandy Brinsley, Catlan & John Budge, Todd & Lori Bywaters, John & Ellen Caldwell, Dale & Megumi Cannon, Alan & Kitakado, Fuyumi Carlin, Chris & Donna Chang, Yu-Tsung ’86 & Yamato, Shoko Chitani, Yinsei ’68 & Yoshio Clark, Diane & James Conwill, Steve & Cathy Coopat, Tom & Cheryle Cooper, Peter & Pam Cosby, Jeannette DiCicco, Daniel ’89 & Yuko Dornoff, Jeff & Deanne Downs, Vicky Edmunds, Eric & Misa Estrem, Paul & Eileen Fackler, Martin & Yukari Farrell, Tiffany & Moorefield, John Folsom, Richard & Stephanie Foster, Mio & Malcolm Fu, Mingxia & Nishikawa Fu, Hiroko Fujii, Dan ’82 & Yuki Fukuda, Tomio ’82 & Kami ’84 Ghosh, Bapi ’90 & Miwa
42
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Gogerty, Dan & Lana Gorantla, Ramana & Kiranmayi Haddad, Scott & Caroline Harte, Esther Hastings, Paul ’00 & Wissel, Debbie ’99 Hattori, Hitomi ’83 & Seikou Hayakawa, Linda & Hajime Hermann, Beatrice & Kenneth Higa, Ernie ’70 & Aya Hotta, Michael & Masako Howe, Dale & Tsuchii, Noriko Huang, Joyce & Pai-Lu Huskins Family Hyland, Jason Ishibashi, Kenzo & Seiko Islascox, Susan & David Ito, Masatoshi & Kumi James, Larry & Sharon Jiang Yamaguchi, Kiki ’90 & Yamaguchi, Tetsuro Johnson, Mark & Gessert, Rebecca Kanzawa, Elizabeth & Shunsuke Kawasaki, Lauren & Tatsuo Kikuchi, Naho & Shumsky, Ron Kindred, Jon & Sachiko Kirby, Kyoko ’80 & Peter Knode, Barbara Kwan, Sora & Jason Lahad, Meenakshi & Samir Lane, Nick & Holly Laughlin, Morgan & Sato-Laughlin, Rumiko L'Heureux, Marc & Heidi Macarios, Henry & Yuriko Majid, Nasir & Chie Mallat, Mary Margaret & Deck, David Matsui Koll, Kathy & Koll, Jesper Matsumoto, Toyokazu & Naomi Matsuo, Yuki Lee & Taro McNeill, Jeffrey & Kazuko Mendoza, Eli & Chizu Meyer, Joseph & Minako Michels, William
Miller, Mark Miller, Scott & Mary Miller, Tony & Melin, Cecilia Miyazaki, Takaya & Mikiko Mizuno, Toshizumi & Junko Montgomery, Will & Miwa Morgan, John & Carolyn Morgenstern, Fred ’83 & Kendra Murai, Noriko & Yeskel, Bill Nakashima, Amane & Chizuru Nakayama, Mayumi ’93 Nelson, Brian ’85 Nelson, Michael & Laurie Nishida, David & Tina ’85 Noddin, Bob & Janette Norris, Peggy ’65 & Charles Ogawa, Andy ’90 & Makoto Ohashi, Hiromasa & Momoko Okuno, Marcus & Kazuko Pierce, Peter & Sare, Steven Pietraszek, Henry & Margaret Piez, William & Mary Pike, Kathy Platek, Nir Plum, John & Mimi Pontius, Beth ’99 & Clark, Andrew Pontius, Pamela ’97 & Rankin, Greg Porté, Thierry & Tashiro-Porté, Yasko Possman, John & Shoko Prasad, Srilalitha & Sharma, Venkatesh Prasad Prewitt, Dave & Carol Rabindran, Prasad & Heho, Monica Reckord, Josh & Nancy Relnick, Phil & Nobuko Rimlinger, Erica Rivera, Damaris & Fahy, John Rynerson, Barbara & David Sasaki-Saito, Anna ’88 Sasanuma, Catherine & Taisuke Schlichting, Richard & Cynthia Schultz, Mark & Disa Schulz, Robert & Mayuko
Semaya, David & Masako Shang, Bill ’75 & Chen, Stella Shirakawa, Kotoe ’03 Silecchia, Tom & Tate, Saori Snell, Richard & Fran Squier, Mid & Carol Stokes, Paul & Rose Sun, Shulin & Imamura, Mica Suzukawa-Tseng, Linda ’72 Takada, Yuko Takahashi, Tomi ’84 & Miho Takano, Kyoko & Hiroyuki Talbot, Jay & Yuki Tanimoto, Hiroshi & Michiyo Toppino, Stephanie & Jon-Paul Tsusaka, Miki & Jun Tull, Mandi & Justin Tunis, Jeffrey Ueda, Takafumi & Misaki Ueda, Yoshihiko & Karen Umezaki, Margit Uruma, Fred Vergel, Pete Wakamatsu, Ernie ’75 & Yuko Wakutsu, Kyoko & Hiroshi Wardell, Linda Welckle, Steve & Noll, Karen Whitson, Tom & Misty Wiswell, Bill & Akane Witt, Gene & Janet Woods, Bob & Mary Gene Xu, Yeren & Wang, Fan Yamasaki, Paul & Afifah Yao, Alejo & Lusan Yoshida, James & Sumiko Yukevich, Stan & Maki
Grandparents Kindred, Jon & Sachiko Knode, Barbara Macek, Gary Tawara, Nakao Witt, Gene & Janet Yoshida, Katsuhisa
After 20+ years since graduation, I’ve had the fortune to interact with the school from a different capacity and noticed that while many tangibles have changed with the growth of the school, its core values to enhance the experience and quality of education for each individual and its respect for diversity and its community have been preserved. This encourages me to be an avid supporter of ASIJ for many years to come.
—Tetsu Nishimi ’94
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
43
PARENT DONORS Donors
Anonymous (7) Abe, Minako ’88 & Shelton, Michael Acton, Jeff & Akiko Akaishi, Masahiro & Maki Al Mawass, Samih & Idriss, Dania Ando, Kunimasu & Ayako Aram, Alexander & Kim, So Myung Armstrong, Ryan & Rieko Asano, Takahiro & Naoko Avondet, Gilbert & Avondet Homma, Yuriko Barboriak, Laura & Eric Bardowell, Miguel & Oh, Jisa Basnayake, Aruna & Sukagawa Basnayake, Tomomi Bass, Steven & Riku, Toshimi Becker, Allan Bender, Brian & Ayako Bennett, Steve & Carrie Benning, Miyuki Bernier, Jeff & Seiko Blodgett, Seth & Sandy Burpee, Mark & Nakamura, Machi Calagui, Joy & Yanase-Calagui, Yumiko Caldwell, Dale & Megumi Cancella, Jason & Eileen Cannon, Alan & Kitakado, Fuyumi Carr, Noah & Kimberly Carreon, Courtney & Brian Carrillo, Christy & Littlefield, Tim Casadesus-Masanell, Ramon & Gonzalez-Palomares, Ana Chang, Yu-Tsung ’86 & Yamato, Shoko Chapman, Marc ’95 & Matsuhisa, Yoshiko Che, Karl & Yasuda, Naomi Cheung, Jasper & Takako Chuang, Peter & Harumi Chuchro, Katie & Doug Clark, Diane & James Confer, Dwain & Miah Conrad, Andrew & Chitose Cremers, Vincent & Savona, Rebecca Dan, Basil & Chieko
44
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Daver, Roxana & Massion, Peter Davidson, Jack ’75 & Allison Davis, Lennie & Tamera Douglas, Brian ’98 & Megumi Durfee, Peter ’88 & Megumi Edmunds, Eric & Misa Ehira, Hiroaki & Nao Elyaddasse, Laroussi & Butler, Edina Epstein, Jonathan & Liu Eto, Batara & Midori Fackler, Martin & Yukari Fini, Francesco & Ma, Son-Thuy Fink, Jim & Mika Foster, Mio & Malcolm Fujii, Dave ’83 & Makiko Fujishima, Julie ’84 Fukikoshi, Akihiro & Tomoko Fukuda, Tomio ’82 & Kami ’84 Furuta, Taketora & Saiko Ghosh, Bapi ’90 & Miwa Gorantla, Ramana & Kiranmayi Gunji, Harry & Mia Haddad, Scott & Caroline Harada, Matthew & Yumiko Harigaya, Masatomo & Tomoko Harrison, Jeff & Manon Hashimoto, Takeshi Hashimoto, Yutaka & Hisae Hassan, Matthew & Ojima, Mari Hastings, Paul ’00 & Wissel, Debbie ’99 Hata, Mitsuhiro & Kim, Julie Herzenberg, Jon & Davenport Herzenberg, Carla Hiramoto, Hideyuki & Shiobara, Fumiko Hirano, Pina & Yoko Hundleby, Natalie & Fukaya, Keisuke Igarashi, Koji & Mie Imai, Eiji & Hiromi Ishibashi, Atsuko & Yuichiro Ishido, Masayuki & Keiko Ishihara, Yoichiro & Katsui Jain, Raj & Kang, Claire Jedrey, Peter & Eri
Jessee, Michael & Miyuki Jiang Yamaguchi, Kiki ’90 & Yamaguchi, Tetsuro Johnson, Mark & Gessert, Rebecca Kagimoto, Tadahisa & Eve Kahn, Raymond & Motoko Kahrl, Eric & Keely Kakihara, Saori & Chang, Yongjin Kanazawa, Yugo & Akemi Kaneko, Tetsuya & Sofia Kanematsu, Tohru & Yoko Kasamatsu, David Jun & Rika Kashiwagi, Blake & Jill Kawakami, Junpei & Mai Kawasaki, Lauren & Tatsuo Kim, Yang-Ho & Kato, Chie Knapp, Kevin & Jessica Ko, James & Yukari Kobayashi, Takashi & Toshiyo Kobayashi, Terumi & Takashi Kohler, Barbara & Skorski, Joseph Kohri, Shinichiro & Lisa Koike, Junji & Aya Kondo, Taro & Reiko Konishi, Ryu & Rie Koslow, Bryan James & Yuko Kota, Hideo & Noriko Kothari, Vivek & Preeti Kozloski, Richard & Laura Kumar, Bramha & Prajapati, Shraddha Kwan, Sora & Jason Laughlin, Morgan & Sato-Laughlin, Rumiko le Roux, Riaan & Wilna Lebrun, Ken & Laurie Lee, KJ & Monica Lewis, Ben & Miwa Liu, Jiongwu & Wang, Ruiheng Macek, Craig & Debby Maeda, Ikuyo Manda, Krishna & Kaori Marini, Buddy ’85 & Hitomi Matsudaira, Aki
Matsueda, Atsushi & Lee, Myoungseon Matsumoto, Izumi & Delaney, William Matsutoya, Tamako McCready, Amanda & Jim McCullough, Jake & Angie Melson, Robert Miller, Mark Mito, Koichiro & Kiyomi Miyazaki, Masato & Naoko Miyazaki, Takaya & Mikiko Mizuno, Toshizumi & Junko Montgomery, Will & Miwa Moores, Chris & Kumiko Morgenstern, Fred ’83 & Kendra Muir, Jim & Kanai, Miwa Murai, Noriko & Yeskel, Bill Murakami, Yumiko & Moses, Todd Nagao, Jonathan & Fusako Nakai-Ishida, Tomoko Nakamura, Mariko & Hiro Nakano, Akinori & Mariko Nakashima, Amane & Chizuru Nakayama, Tetsu ’84 & Ayumi Nelson, Michael & Sabina Neureiter, Kirk & Mariko Nishimura, Hiroyuki & Etsuko Niwa, Hideo & Kazuko Nixon, Nik & Choi, EunYoung Noda, Roy & Keiko Noddin, Bob & Janette Nohara, Kosuke & Fumika Odagiri, Akito & Kaoru O'Donovan, Erin & Tim Ogawa, Ryuzo ’99 & Tomoko Ohashi, Hiromasa & Momoko Okada, Hikaru & Yoshiko Okamoto, Tet ’98 & Eri Okamura, Alto & Risa Okuda, Jun & Natsuko Okuno, Marcus & Kazuko O'Neill, Stephen & Karen O'Shea, Stephen & Saigusa O'Shea, Kie Ozeki, Arthur & Kaya Park, Chiman & Seo, Alice Pivko, Mario & Yeong Hee
Platek, Nir Plush, Marcus & Fiona Polashek, Michael & Hashiuchi, Mitsuko Prairie, Shane & Ginny Rabindran, Prasad & Heho, Monica Raub, Josh & Mihoko Reese, Lenore & Isenberg, Joshua Reilly, Kenneth & Debbie Rekate, Jason & Anna Ricci, Vince & Amemiya, Mari Rivera, Damaris & Fahy, John Rogers, Edward & Betsy Rolls, Grant & Harris-Rolls, Joanne Roy, Robert & Karrie Saitoh, Yasuhiro & Yayoi Sakagawa, Leila & Kenichi Sakemi, Takeshi & Mie Schultz, Mark & Disa Schulz, Robert & Mayuko Seltzer, Susan & Theodore Semaya, David & Masako Sho, Tomoyuki & Masako Silva Mittelstedt, Linda & Mittelstedt, Mark Silver, Nick & Yumiko Slattery, Ronald & Toshiko Smith, Charles & Emi Socci, Anthony & Kristin Sowder, Stuart & Yuson, Rusty Stocker, Michael & Haruyo Sun, Shulin & Imamura, Mica Suzuki Tatar, Vuslat & Mika Suzuki, Erie & Tamami Tahara, Kunio & Eriko Takai, Kota & Megumi Takamiya, Toshiro & Shino Takebe, Tsuyoshi & Maki Takigayama, Yue & Hiroaki Takizawa, Nicola & Takao Tanihara, Hideto & Ayaka Taylor, David & Sue Tekin, Ahmet & Derinoz Tekin, Emel Thirouard, Philippe & Kikuchi, Akiko Thomas, Scott & Terra Timms, Ryan & Yamaura-Timms, Aya Toppino, Stephanie & Jon-Paul
Tremarco, Joseph & Clear, Monica Tsuchida, Carol Tsujiguchi, Hironobu & Maki Tull, Mandi & Justin Ueda, Yoshihiko & Karen Upadhyay, Bhupesh & Sajala Uruma, Fred Vasquez, Paul & Jackson, Wendy Versteeg, David & Jennifer Vidyarthi, Paraj & Singh Vidyarthi, Puneeta Wang, Zhankun & Chen, Fei Watanabe, Yasutora & Hiromi Welckle, Steve & Noll, Karen Wilcox, Scott & Sheila Wilkinson, Bryan & Randi Wiswell, Bill & Akane Yamamoto, Takeshi & Waka Yamashita, Atsushi & Akari Yamashita, Yoshimitsu & Kaoru Yan, Jack & Moriyama, Natsuko Yokokawa, Junji & Yuki Yokosuka, Mariko & Masato ’98 Yoshida, Kumiko Yoshikawa, Tatsuo & Miho Young, Joseph & Liu, Suying
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
45
FACULTY DONORS Faculty & Staff Ando, Keiko Apel, Tricia Apel, Warren Bell, Gloria Bell, Mike Bennett, Carrie Bennett, Steve Benning, Miyuki Berg, Josh Blodgett, Sandy Blodgett, Seth Branstetter, Genta Burpee, Mark Cancella, Eileen Cancella, Jason Carreon, Courtney Carrillo, Christy Cash, Paul Clark, Diane Claudio, Milan Clear, Monica Colosimo, Anna Confer, Dwain Confer, Miah Crissy, Beth Curtis, Pip Davidson, Allison Davis, Lennie Davis, Tamera Denver, Amy Dirkse, Tai ’06 Douglass, Jackie Duncan, Max Eimon, Ivar ’80 Faulk, Laura Fichardt, Emily Fichardt, Hardi Fisico, Misael Foster, Mio Fuller, Jody Garrison, Greg Gessert, Rebecca Ghadimi, Mary Ghosh, Bapi ’90 Ghosh, Miwa Gilmartin, Ed Hara, Rina ’03 Hardin, Jim
46
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Hardin, Marti Harris-Rolls, Joanne Harrison, Jeff Harrison, Manon Hatagami, Masami Hawes, Emma Heidt, Nick Hertrick, Olivia Hertrick, Scott Herzenberg, Jon Hill, Joseph Hirano, Sumino Howe, Dale Huang, Joyce Hundleby, Natalie Islascox, Susan Jacobsson, Timmy ’06 Janewicz, Laurel Jessee, Michael Jessee, Miyuki Jinks, Jarrad Johnson, Mark Kakihara, Saori Kanoh, Aileen Kanzawa, Elizabeth Kita, Hiroyuki Kita, Virginia Knapp, Jessica Knapp, Kevin Koizumi, Mary Krisher, Ako ’90 L'Heureux, Heidi L'Heureux, Marc Lahad, Meenakshi Lewis, Ben Lonergan, Claire Macek, Craig Macek, Debby Mallat, Mary Margaret Markovich, Annie McCullough, Angie McCullough, Jake Miller, Jessica Miller, Mark Morgan, John Morohoshi, Shinobu ’98 Murray, Jilene Nakai-Ishida, Tomoko
Nakamura, Machi Neale, David Nelson, Michael Nelson, Sabina Nguyen, Thinh Nickle, Carole Nickle, Kathleen Noll, Karen Ogawa, Ryo Ortwein, Megan Ostermiller, Jenny Pettit, Nami Pfeiffer, Mary Pitale, Jon Pitale, Laura Power, Candace Prairie, Shane Prairie, Ginny Prasad, Srilalitha Przybylski, Wesley Puhr, Jesse Puma, Beth Quinto, Jeff Raub, Josh Raub, Mihoko Reed, Jane Rekate, Anna Richard, Jamie Rivera, Damaris Rodriguez Cains, Samarie Rolls, Grant Sack, Jonathan ’00 Sakagawa, Leila Silva Mittelstedt, Linda Spencer, Luke Storey, Hillary Sudani, Keiko Sugiya, Minako Sutter, Sarah Suzuki, Ryosuke Takano, Kyoko Takano, Mimi ’10 Takigayama, Yue Takizawa, Nicola Tang, Foun Taylor, David Taylor, Sue Tokoro, Midori
Tremarco, Joseph Tsuji, Koshiro Tull, Mandi Upadhyay, Bhupesh Upadhyay, Sajala Vergel, Pete Voigt, Suzanna Vriend, Amy Vriend, Pete Wacha, Duane Wacha, Jennifer Wakutsu, Kyoko Welckle, Steve Wilce, Matt Wilcox, Scott Wilcox, Sheila Wilkinson, Bryan Wilkinson, Randi Wood, Lo Worsley, Matthew Wu, Min Yamanaka, Christine Yasuno-Mulholland, Keiko Yokosuka, Mariko Yoshida, Hiromi Yoshioka, Sayuri
Former Faculty & Staff Adams, Nancy Anonymous Araki, Yumi ’06 Bruzek, Patty Carreon, Brian Chen, Stella Chitani, Yinsei ’68 Colfelt, Amy Colfelt, Todd Cooper, Pam Cooper, Peter Crandall, Les Dennis, Thurman Downs, Vicky Faulk, Andy Fukuda, Taeko Gogerty, Dan
Gogerty, Lana Hayakawa, Linda Hoffman, Joe Ingebritson, Wally Islascox, David Jones-Morton, Pamela (PhD) Kemmerer, Ruthli Kikuchi, Naho Knode, Barbara Morikawa, Tairoku Nelson, Erin Pierce, Peter Pietraszek, Margaret Prewitt, Carol Prewitt, Dave Reckord, Josh Reckord, Nancy
Reed, Tracey Relnick, Nobuko Rynerson, Barbara Rynerson, David Snell, Fran Snell, Richard Spechalske, Gregory Squier, Carol Squier, Mid Tull, Mandi Umezaki, Margit Vasché, Polly Witt, Gene Witt, Janet Woods, Mary Gene
I donated to ASIJ because I truly believe in the mission and vision of the school. I am honored to work with such dedicated professionals and I donated in order to support my colleagues as they continue to create engaging and enriching learning experiences for all students.
—Amy Denver
Second Grade Teacher
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
47
DONORS Endowment
ASIJ PTA Reese, Lenore & Isenberg, Joshua
Tribute Gifts In Memory of Richard Moss ’39 Shimizu, George ’39 In Memory of John Ellis ’46 Eills, Nancy ’53
Friends Kamano, Hiroyuki & Harumi Kroll, Cody Zahedi, Ardeshir
Gift-in-Kind Cashell, Kieron & Haga, Kotoha Takano, Kyoko & Hiroyuki
Corporate Adobe Systems Inc Aflac Manzoan
Strength And Courage Adams, Michael ’82 & KaalekahiAdams, Rolly Ann Bruzek, Patty & Ken Lund, Andy ’81 & Denise Sharp, Robert ’87 Suzukawa-Tseng, Linda ’72 Wang, Zhankun & Chen, Fei
48
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Corporate Contribution Program A3A Partners LLC Accenture Corporation adidas Japan K.K. Aflac Insurance Japan Agos Japan, Inc. Air Liquide Japan G.K. Alcon Japan Ltd Amicus Therapeutics KK Asia Resources Family Office LLC Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Biotronik Japan, K.K. Bulgari Japan Ltd. Carl Zeiss Co., Ltd. Chubb Insurance Japan Cisco Systems Inc. Danone Japan Co., Ltd. Deloitte Tohmatsu Corporate Solutions Doehler Japan Corporation ELC Japan KK Fastly K.K. Geometry Ogilvy Japan GK Heidrick & Struggles Heitman LLC Japan Cloud Computing K.K. K.K. Halifax Associates LVMH Watch & Jewelry Co., Ltd McDonald's Company (Japan) Momentum Japan Inc. Morrison & Foerster Asia Services MRM Worldwide Inc. Oliver Wyman Group Orbotech Japan Co., Ltd. PAG Investment Management Limited Pernod Ricard Japan PGIM Real Estate PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP Schenker-Seino Co., Ltd. Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP
Siwelco LLC Squire Gaikokuho Kyodo Jigyo Horitsu Jimusho STMicroelectronics Swiss Re International SE, Japan Branch T. Rowe Price International Ltd. Japan Branch tesa tape K.K. Teva API Japan Ltd. THAT Japan K.K. The Capbridge Group KK The New York Times TowerJazz Panasonic Semiconductor Co., Ltd. Toyota Research Institute - Advanced Development Inc. WineInStyle Zeamarine Japan Inc.
THE GATE SOCIETY
Members
The Gate Society is ASIJ’s giving society for those who have arranged a planned gift. One option is to make a bequest in your will or living trust. You simply name ASIJ (or in the USA, “Give2Asia/ASIJ) as the beneficiary. You can pledge a fixed amount or a percentage of your estate. A bequest allows you to: Make a gift to ASIJ. • Provides you with continued access to your wealth. David Nicodemus ’33 left ASIJ a bequest of ¥4.1 million when he passed away in 1999. He was a professor of physics at Oregon State University where he worked on their cyclotron project. Anderson, Irene ’74 & Somes, James Bergt, Dave ’60 & Jeannine Cohen, Frederick ’69 Cooper, Peter & Pam Dennis, Thurman Downs, Vicky ‡Downs, Ray ’50 Forgrieve, Bruce ’77 Glazier, Ken ’67 Harada, Mary ’81 ‡Harris, Frederick ‡Haven, Robert Hesselink, Ann ’71 & Naour, Paul ‡Hoffsommer, Abigail ’27 ‡Hoffsommer, Walter ’29 Huddle, Jim ’70 Jones-Morton, Pamela (PhD) Ludlow-Ortner, Jules ’72 & Ortner, Robert Muhl, Dick Nichols, Kerry & Lynn Proctor, David Shibata, Hideko ’66 ‡Snyder, Ronald ‡Sullivan, John Sundberg, Carl ’77 Suzuki, Chizu ’64 Tunis, Jeffrey Ware, Brent ’74
• Gives you the flexibility to change your mind. • Eases any concerns about outliving your resources. • Provides estate tax deduction. • Creates a lasting legacy at ASIJ.
Planned Giving is Easy! ¥ or
Bequest Step 1 Name ASIJ as a beneficiary
Estate Tax Gift to Deduction ASIJ Step 2 Your estate receives favorable tax benefit
$
Step 3 Your estate delivers an enduring contribution to ASIJ
Another option is to name ASIJ as a beneficiary on your IRA, 401K or other retirement account. If you have already added ASIJ to your estate plans, please let us know so we can recognize your generosity by including you in the Gate Society.
‡ Deceased
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
49
Save the Date!
December 1, 2020 Please join us on ASIJ’s Giving Tuesday; a global effort to support organizations that are vital to your community. Gifts of any amount are welcome and will go towards ASIJ’s Annual Fund used to enhance the overall experience for our students. Gifts on Giving Tuesday will allow us to go above and beyond what tuition can provide. Join us in making a tax deductible donation on Tuesday, December 1.
50
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Stay Connected
It’s all about connections... ... that’s why our new alumni portal is designed to make it easier than ever for you to stay in touch with us and your fellow ASIJers around the globe. Mustangs Online is a dynamic site for alums, alumni parents and former faculty packed with news, information about upcoming events and reunions, photo galleries, internship and job opportunities, and directory. It will also host digital copies of yearbooks going back to 1919, past issues of The Ambassador magazine and a selection of Hanabi articles and content from the archive. To make the most of this service, we’ll need your email so we can send you information about the launch and help you get started. If we don’t already have your up-to-date email, please take a moment to drop us a line at alumni@asij.ac.jp.
Our Alumni Services Alumni Directory Alumni Events ASIJ Alumni Connect Industry Meetups Internships & Jobs Ambassador Magazine Monthly Newsletter Regional Receptions Class Reunions Photo Galleries Yearbook Archive Alumni Portal Transcript Services
Don’t miss out! Contact us: alumni@asij.ac.jp https://asij.ac.jp/alumni (+81) 0422-34-5300 ext 703
Follow us on social media: asij_official
asijtokyo
asij
asij
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
51
ASIJ Alumni Connect: Industry Meetup
Join fellow alumni to share professional insights and expand career connections across the ASIJ community. With 12,000 alumni in our network, you might meet your next business partner in these virtual events. The inaugural event will be held December 9, at 10am JST (December 8, 8pm EST) with a focus on entrepreneurship. Curious about this industry? Interested in catching up with other alumni in the field? Participating couldn’t be easier! Won’t you join us?
December 9, 10am JST (December 8, 8pm EST) Scan QR code to register
52
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Entrepreneurship Panelists
Brian Nelson ’85
Phillip Seiji Vincent ’07
Brian is described as an entrepreneur’s entrepreneur. Now Principal Advisory in Japan to Kelly Slater Wave Company, Brian is also the Co-Founder and Director of BNC Co Ltd, Advisor to Salesforce.com, and founder and former CEO of ValueCommerce Co Ltd. Brian took ValueCommerce public in July 2006 on the Tokyo Stock Exchange (Stock Code: 2491). Serving as a mentor and judge for Startups and Startup pitch competitions, Brian is a graduate of the University of Southern California with a BA in marketing and economics.
Phillip is the Founder, Managing Partner and CEO of Plug and Play Japan which is focused on creating the largest innovation platform in Japan connecting startups and larger corporations worldwide with hubs in Tokyo and Kyoto. Plug and Play Japan currently supports 38+ corporate partners and has accelerated 300+ companies since its opening in 2017. Locations in Japan include Tokyo and Kyoto. He previously held an Account Executive position with Uniglobe Kisco. Philip holds a BA in economics from San Diego State University.
Kay Teo ’12
Hee Gun Eom ’12
Kay has spent the last eight years dedicating herself to the food industry. First as a co-founder of a restaurant incubator which launched seven restaurants, followed by working as a consultant at McKinsey & Company focused exclusively on food-related strategy projects, and then managing the Southeast Asia franchise market for a private equity firm's fast food restaurant arm. After graduating from Yale with a degree in neuroscience, she lived in NYC and Southeast Asia for several years, before returning to Japan. She now resides in Tokyo and is a director at Dining Innovation.
Hee Gun is a very “hands-on” leader with an amazing ability to hear ideas and implement them seamlessly through the organization. Before joining Skillzilla, an AI-driven recruitment platform, he ran a successful coworking space and project management bootcamp in Tokyo, working with students as well as leaders in companies large and small, called Nishiogi Place. He is now in the early stages of launching Salezilla. A Purdue University graduate, Hee Gun holds a BS in multi-disciplinary engineering.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
53
Artifacts
The train map below depicts what is now known as the Tokyu Meguro line circa 1927. The pink areas at each end show Yokohama, to the left, and Tokyo, to the right, bound by the Yamanote Line. The map is written in kyujitai, old forms of kanji used until the 1950s, and Tokyo interestingly uses the character for city, 市 (shi), rather than metropolis, 都 (to), reflecting its size in the period. The map was probably used by a member of the ASIJ community to show the commute from Yokohama to Meguro, where ASIJ’s Nakameguro campus opened in 1927. At the time, many families lived in the foreign settlement on The Bluff in Yokohama and easy access to ASIJ’s newly-constructed campus would have been an important consideration.
54
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
55
Alumni Bingo Hosting a virtual gettogether or an online reunion? Looking for a quick activity to engage friends or family? Try Mustang Bingo! How many squares can you check off? Complete your bingo card, post it on social media and tag #ASIJ and we’ll pick five lucky Mustangs to get some swag.
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
WAS IN A SPRING MUSICAL
SWAM IN THE ASIJ POOL
RODE THE BUS MET SPOUSE OR TO SCHOOL PARTNER AT ASIJ
STILL HAVE FRIENDS FROM ASIJ
ATTENDED FOR AT LEAST 3 YEARS
ATE CHICKEN KATSU IN THE CAFETERIA
WAS IN A FAR EAST TOURNAMENT
HAD MR SEEVERS AS A TEACHER OR COACH
BEEN TO WINTERFEST/ HOLIDAY HAPPENING
BOUGHT CHAHAN NEAR TAMA STATION
HAVE A SIBLING WHO ATTENDED
FREE SPACE
HAVE BEEN TO A REUNION OR SCHOOL EVENT
WAS A CHEERLEADER
HAD MR BENDER AS MY ELEMENTARY SCHOOL PRINCIPAL
TOOK A PHOTO UNDER THE SCHOOL GATE
HAVE A PARENT WHO IS ALSO AN ALUM
WAS A BUS MONITOR
WENT TO HIROSHIMA IN 8TH GRADE
TOOK ART WTH KI NIMORI
ATTENDED MEGURO CAMPUS
REMEMBER THE HAMBURGER INN IN ROPPONGI
HAVE VISITED CAMPUS AFTER LEAVING ASJ
STILL HAVE A YEARBOOK
GO MUSTANGS!
TAG A FELLOW MUSTANG
#STAYHOME #STAYGOLDEN
56
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
ALUMNI
Class Agents
Classes pre-1955 and those noted below need class agents. Please contact alumni@asij.ac.jp if you are interested.
1955 William L. Cryderman
wcryderman@comcast.net
1965 Scott Hutchinson
jshutch47@gmail.com Susan Broe Parmelee Sparmelee2@gmail.com
1956 Mei Sun Li
meisunli@comcast.net Sandra L. Maclver Thompson sandra.thompson3@comcast.net
1957
Charles C. Wu wucc57@gmail.com
1958
Class Agent Required
1959 Class Agent Required 1960 David E. Bergt
dbergt@comcast.net
1961 Stu Bennett
stu.bennettCEO@ SanFranciscoSeamaster.com
1962 Katherine C. Bauernschmidt Clarke kcbclarke@gmail.com
1963 William L. Martino
txmartino@yahoo.com Nancy Wu naninvan@me.com
1964 David Bonner
dbonner@regenevita.com
1975 Reiko E. Niimi
rniimi@gmail.com
1976 Elizabeth M. Yanagihara Horwitz liz@lizhorwitz.com
1966
Annie Nichols Campbell campbell.annie@gmail.com
1977 Carl E. Sundberg
carl_sundberg_ja@yahoo.com
1967
Grenda F. Penhollow Moss grendamoss@yahoo.com
1978 Deanna Adams Smith
deannasmith1959@gmail.com
1968
Nicholas D. Connor ndconnor@yahoo.com David T. Sakamoto dave.sakamoto@infoontheweb. com
1969 Laura B. Hertenstein Swanson laura@swanson.com
1970 Daniel Garnitz
dangar46@yahoo.com
1971 Kathy K. Kobata
kkobata21@gmail.com
1972 Linda Suzukawa-Tseng
sutseng@wonder.ocn.ne.jp
1973 Class Agent Required 1974 Class Agent Required
1979 Cheryl Wise
shareallwise@gmail.com
1980 Class Agent Required 1981 Sherry L. Davis Tighe
tighezoo@sbcglobal.net
1982 Lisa Bastick
omalasq@mac.com
1983 George Mimura
georgemimura@yahoo.com
1984 Judith Walsh Baumhover
baumhover@earthlink.net
1985 Sandra L. Orton Tweed
sandra@prestonmatthews.com
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
57
ALUMNI
1986 Diane E. Stewart Wack diwack@msn.com
1987 Robert L. Sharp
robert@redgiant.com
1988 Sergei P. Hasegawa
sergei@purekitchen.com Kathrine L. Schmitt Simon schm0495@gold.tc.umn.edu
1989 Linnea M. Hasegawa
tamagomeshi@yahoo.com Samantha Fritz Hurd samf@austin.rr.com
1990 Kentaro K. Relnick krelnick@me.com
1991 Maiko Galles
Class Agents
1999 Naomi D. Hayase
naomidhayase@gmail.com Tamina M. Plum taminaplum@gmail.com
ktsakuma@yahoo.com McMahon T. Reid homereid@mit.edu
1994 Midori Kano
mkano128@gmail.com Margaret R. MacCallum margaretreiko@gmail.com
1995 Yuki P. Maddox Vos
pearlvos@hotmail.com
1996 Hisashi A. Shimizu
sunny_shimizu@hotmail.com
1997 Vicky (Carter) Chen
vickycarter@hotmail.com Sarah Godfrey sgodfrey617@gmail.com
1998 Rose E. Hastings
rosehastings@gmail.com Kacie E. Rosenberg Leviton kacie_r@hotmail.com
58
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Philip T. Tseng philtseng7@gmail.com
2012 Seung Joon Sung
2001 Kyoko Minegishi
2013 Lia Camargo
gtyamada@gmail.com
kyoko.minegishi@gmail.com
2002 Anna L. Tuttle Delia
annalynnosu@gmail.com Mitsuhiko Tsukimoto moonbook@gmail.com
2003 Class Agent Required 2004 Jason Mothersill
jasonmothersill@gmail.com
2005 Tatsuya Izumi
izumtat@gmail.com
dbrandttennis@gmail.com
1993 Katherine S. Sakuma Moore
hannahtsiegel@gmail.com
2000 Gary T. Yamada
maikomizutani@hotmail.com
1992 Daniel Brandt
2011 Hannah T. Siegel
2006 Tai Dirkse
tdirkse@asij.ac.jp Mana Sasaki Kalohelani mkalohelani@gmail.com
2007 Carly Baird
baird.carly@gmail.com Rosalind E. Onions rosalind.onions@gmail.com
2008 Miles Bird
miles.t.bird@gmail.com Jemil Satterfield jemilsatt05@gmail.com
2009 Caitlin E. McHose
sjsung94@gmail.com
lollia1108@gmail.com Andrew Deck andrewdeck227@gmail.com
2014 Akira Camargo
akinicamargo0125@gmail.com Sayuri Sekimitsu sayuris@stanford.edu
2015 Mina F. Hattori
minahattori@me.com Haruka Higo jjriko@aol.com
2016 Jayne K. Harris
16jkharris@gmail.com Ray M. Hotta ray.hotta@yahoo.com
2017 Allessandra Rogers
rogeal01@luther.edu Andy Takagi andy.takagi@gmail.com
2018 Hikari Shumsky
hikarishumsky@gmail.com
2019 Kenichiro Bernier
b.kenichiro@gmail.com
2020 Arman Balian
caitlin.mchose@gmail.com
armanbalian@me.com
Ashley Teslik ashleyteslik@gmail.com
Celine Maeda-Tarumoto celinemaedatarumoto@gmail.com
2010 Janet H. Kanzawa
janet.kanzawa@gmail.com Kana Maeji kanamaeji12@gmail.com
ALUMNI
Obituaries
Sayonara HIROYUKI KITA (FF ’13–’20) passed away suddenly on July 4, 2020 at the age of 42. Hiro, who taught Japanese at ASIJ, and his wife Virginia had returned to Nagasaki prefecture, which is where Hiro grew up, during ASIJ’s summer break. Hiro was diving and fishing with childhood friends, while Virgina stayed with his family in his hometown. While diving, Hiro was separated from his friends, who were unable to locate him. Following a search-and-rescue mission, Hiro’s body was found the following morning. He had drowned while spearfishing. Hiro is survived by his wife, Virginia Kita who teaches Spanish at ASIJ. Hiro received his BA in education from Saitama University, which he attended on a soccer scholarship to play on the university’s team for four years. After beginning his teaching career in Japan at Kakeduka Elementary School in Shibuya, where he received the Teacher of the Year Award, Hiro moved to Vancouver, Canada in 2005 to pursue a TESOL certification. Following that he moved to Fort Wayne to pursue a MSc in elementary education at Indiana University–Purdue University. While studying for his master’s, Hiro ran the local Japanese Saturday School. On
his return to Japan, he taught at several schools including New International School of Japan. Hiro initially joined ASIJ in 2011 as a middle school Japanese teacher, covering a maternity leave, before becoming a full-time member of the faculty in 2013. He began teaching in the Elementary School’s Japanese department and later moved to teach in the High school. Hiro was an enthusiastic and popular teacher both in the classroom and as a soccer coach on the field. He was known as a happy, generous colleague and friend and valued member of the ASIJ community. “He was a great man, teacher, coach, and husband, and always a positive, optimistic, and happy person. I recall he had his first ASIJ experiences with us in the MS division when I was the Principal,” wrote Scott Adams (FF ’05–’17). “I knew right away he was a naturally-gifted teacher, one who developed warm, supportive relationships with students and colleagues. He was a supportive, caring colleague, too, and made you a better person because of having worked with him.”
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
59
ALUMNI THEODORE BELL ’57 born in Shanghai on January 11, 1941, passed away on July 8, 2020. He moved to Tokyo, Japan with his family in 1950, attending ASIJ 1952–57. After graduation, Ted attended UC Berkeley, completing law school at Boalt Hall in 1964. In 1963 he met and married Barbara, and the couple made Los Angeles their permanent home. Ted opened his own law practice there and became an American citizen in 1967. The couple had four children.
ROBERT (BOB) CHEN ’55, husband of Aie Teck Lau and brother of William Chen ’56 and Moon Chen, Jr. passed away on October 14, 2020, at the age of 82. A thirdgeneration Chinese American, Bob attended the University of Michigan for his undergraduate degree and MBA, and served honorably as an infantry platoon leader, paratrooper, and Captain in the US Army. Following his military service, Bob built a successful career in finance as an M&A investment banker in Singapore and New York. From 1957 onwards, Bob served as a respected member of the F.F. Fraternity, the oldest Chinese-American fraternal organization in the United States. Bob was co-founder and managing director of Raffles Capital Group, Inc and an active member of the Second Congregational Church in Greenwich, serving as a deacon and council member. In recent years, Bob worked tirelessly to help pass bipartisan legislation awarding the Congressional Gold Medal Award to WWII veterans of Chinese-American descent.
ROBYN GREER HALLOCK ’76 passed away on October 2, 2020. Robyn was born in Greenwich, CT, on January 30, 1958, joining her two brothers, W. Kirk Greer ’71 and John Greer ’73. When her father John’s job with IBM required a move to Tokyo, Japan in 1970, the family went along. Robyn spent her three middle school years at ASIJ. After graduating from Greenwich High School in 1976, Robyn attended Skidmore College in Saratoga, NY, where she earned her degree in psychology
60
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Obituaries and education in 1980. She began her career as a teacher, but soon switched to the travel industry. Among her many achievements, Robyn was elected as President of the Corporate Travel Council, and President of the Connecticut/Westchester Business Travel Association, earning the Corporate Business Travel Service Award along the way. She is survived by her spouse and partner of 26 years, David, her daughter Sarah, and her brothers.
JOHN S. HSIA ’57 of Columbus, Ohio, passed peacefully at First Community Village on July 27, 2020 at the age of 81. John was born in Shanghai, China on December 16, 1938. He recalled that: “When Mao Tse-Tung’s Red Army advanced toward Shanghai, chaos was rampant. Our mother pulled us out of school in Shanghai as wild stories of brutalities committed by the advancing troops of the conquering forces generated panic. Father was in Japan on one of his business trips and advised us to go to Hong Kong, then a British protectorate, to await visas to Japan. The ship that carried us from Shanghai to Hong Kong was said to be the last legal ship out. It was a wonder that it didn’t sink. It was completely full, with passengers positioned everywhere, on virtually any available empty space. We remained in Hong Kong for several months before exit visas to Japan came through to take us to Tokyo.” John and several of his siblings attended St. Joseph’s College in Yokohama before he and his sister Nancy ’62 transferred to ASIJ. John would go on to join one of his older brothers at Brown University in the United States following graduation. There he enrolled in the engineering program, before switching to a five-year dual-degree program which would lead to bachelor’s of both arts and science. After Brown, he studied theoretical mathematics at MIT, receiving his doctorate in 1966, before accepting a position as an assistant professor of mathematics at Ohio State University. He was promoted to a full professorship in 1976. John’s research was focused on Number Theory, a classical branch of abstract mathematics that has contemporary applications in communication and information technology. Much of his research work, which is published in over 50 papers in internationally-recognized journals in mathematics, was funded by grants from the National Science Foundation and the National Security Agency. In addition to his own research, he edited volumes of conference proceedings and served on the editorial boards of leading journals in his field.
ALUMNI SHIRLEY E. HUSKINS (AP ’62–’67) passed away suddenly on December 27, 2019. Shirley arrived in Tokyo in 1955, with her husband, William E. Huskins, Jr., who worked for Northwest Airlines, and her toddler daughter, Deborah ’70. She quickly realized a pre-school was needed, and, with a couple of other parents, founded the Community Nursery School, which continues to this day as ASIJ’s Early Learning Center. In 1958, son William Charles (Charlie) ’76 was born, and they continued to live in Tokyo from 1955–59 and 1961–67. Shirley embraced the cultural opportunities of living in Japan, studying the language, flower arranging, and silk brush painting. On their return to the United States she was a founding member of the JapanAmerica Society of Minnesota, served on the Board of the Normandale Japanese Garden for nearly 40 years, and participated in cultural events in the Twin Cities produced by the St. Paul-Nagasaki Sister City Committee and others. In 2009, she was awarded the Walter F. Mondale Award for Japan-Minnesota Partnership by the Japan America Society of Minnesota. She is survived by her son and daughter and their spouses, three grandchildren, and one great-granddaughter.
NORMAN LESLIE JENKINS (AP ’76–’79), father of Lynn ’78, Rick ’82, and Dave ’84, passed away after a short battle with COVID-19 in April 2020. Norman attended Yale University on an ROTC scholarship and after serving in the Navy, he earned an MBA from Harvard Business School and began a long marketing career with Esso Eastern (later Exxon). His work took his family to Thailand and Japan created opportunities to travel widely in Asia, Europe, and Africa.
RUBY KORVER (AP ’64–’68, ’68–’79), passed away peacefully on June 22, 2020 at the age of 95 in Green Bay, WI. Ruby was born in Tokyo, the oldest daughter of Johannes Barth, a German businessman, and Chiyo Barth, a Japanese national.
Obituaries She spent most of her working life in Japan as a missionary, together with her late husband, Ronald George Korver. Ruby and Ron had four children, all born in Tokyo, who attended ASIJ from kindergarten through graduation: Kathern ’71, Michael ’72, Mark ’77, and Kristy ’79. Ruby is survived by her four children and their spouses, eleven grandchildren, and three greatgranddaughters.
MARILYN LOWE (FF ’71–72), Marilyn Cordon Lowe was born in 1932 in Berkeley, CA, and was an alumna of the University of California, Berkeley. After graduating she embarked on a career in elementary education, teaching in California, Hawaii, West Berlin, Brazil, and Japan. She taught fourth grade at ASIJ for one year in 1971 before returning to the United States. In 2016 she moved to a retirement community in San Francisco, and passed away there peacefully in January 2019.
DOROTHY KIKUE REDLINGER (AP ’68–81) died peacefully at home on August 7, 2020 from congestive heart failure. She was the mother of George ’78 and Bob ’81 Redlinger. Dorothy began her career working for the Foreign Ministry with the occupying US forces in postwar Tokyo. In 1950, she answered an ad for English speaking staff from a company called International Textiles Incorporated, where she met Oswald Redlinger from Vienna, Austria. They wed in 1953. Following the birth of their sons, Dorothy became an active member of the ASIJ and local community and one of the top women bowlers at the Tokyo American Club. In 1981, Dorothy emigrated with her family to Canada.
VICTORIA PRATT YOU ’69 passed away on August 23, 2020. Victoria attended ASIJ from 1964–66 along with her sisters Heather Elisabeth ’77, Allison Pratt ’74, Stephanie Wells’ 65, and her husband Joseph You ’67.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
61
ALUMNI ELAINE SOMMERS RICH (AP ’66–’69, ’72–79) age 94, died peacefully on September 27, 2020 in North Manchester, Indiana. Elaine is survived by her four children Jonathan ’72, Andrew ’73, Miriam ’76, Mark ’80 and six grandchildren.
THOMAS J. ROWE JR ’00 of Alexandria, VA died on March 25, 2020, after a brief illness. Thomas was born on May 31, 1982 in Singapore, and subsequently lived in Brussels, London, and Tokyo and Bryn Mawr, PA, before finally settling in the Washington, DC area. He graduated from The Pennsylvania State University, University Park in 2003 with a degree in management science and information systems. Following graduation, he pursued a successful career in computer modeling in the defense industry with Metron Inc. He is survived by his sisters Mary ’04 and Stephanie and their parents Thomas and Marguerite (AP ’98–’00).
JAMES H. RYAN ’48, died on September 1, 2019 aged 88. He attended ASIJ for two years in 1946–48 along with his sister Martha ’53. James graduated from the West Point US Military Academy in 1955 and was commissioned in the Infantry. He served in combat in both the Korean and Vietnam wars and was decorated seven times for bravery and meritorious service in combat. As a Lt. Colonel, he was assigned to the office of the chief of personnel on the Army General Staff in the Pentagon where he was awarded the Legion of Merit. Jim retired from the Army in 1972 and went to work in his brother’s worldwide business for a few years; after that he took over a small security guard agency in the Washington, D.C. area. He earned an MA at the University of Pennsylvania in both English Language and English Literature and spent three years teaching English and formal logic at West Point. He attended Harvard Business School, completed an MBA from George Washington University and finished work for his PhD. Jim served on the International Board of Governors of the USO (United
62
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
Obituaries Services Organization) for nine years. In 1993 he was elected President of The International Association of Professional Security Consultants, President of the Historic Petersburg Foundation and President of the Rotary Club of Petersburg, Virginia. Jim wrote articles on security in a variety of publications, and was admitted as a forensic expert witness in both state and Federal courts. He wrote articles and lectured on Petersburg and Virginia history. He was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award of Rotary International.
JACOB SHAPIRO ’47 passed away on July 15, 2020 at the age of 92. He is survived by his wife Teruko, and his three daughters Hanako, Akiko, and Yasuko. Jacob was born Yakov Konstantinovich Shapiro and was born on August 26, 1928, in Harbin China. His family moved to Yokohama in 1929 and he attended various schools including Waseda Kokusai Gakuin, a school for foreigners and children of expatriates who had returned to Japan. In 1946 Jacob entered the Tokyo American School and graduated in 1947. Jacob went on to study at the Peers’ School University (Gakushûin Daigaku) in Tokyo, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in political science in 1958. During his university days, Jacob also dabbled in the import-export business, at which he succeeded admirably, enabling the family to immigrate to America, although he did not follow until 1960, when he moved first to New York as an executive trainee in the International Division of Columbia Pictures, returning to Tokyo in 1961 as Assistant General Manager for Columbia in Japan. In 1965 he became Columbia’s General Manager in San Juan, Puerto Rico. This first experience in the film business was to determine the rest of his career. Jacob returned yet again to Japan in 1968 as Columbia’s General Manager in Japan. In 1981 he moved to 20th Century Fox where he became Vice President for the Far East and Australasia.
JUN TAKAMURA (AP ’01–’03) father of Kei Takamura ’03 passed away in 2017. He is survived by his daughter and his wife, Midori.
ALUMNI LOUISE PICON SHIMIZU ’64 passed away on April 27, 2020 at her home in North Bethesda, MD, after a threeyear battle with cancer. Born on July 5, 1947 in Arlington, VA, Louise attended ASIJ between 1960–64 along with her siblings William ’66 and Ellen ’62. She is survived by her husband Masaharu and their children Edowa, Thomas, and Ken, their partners, and her grandchildren.
DAWNA VOYLES SPRUIELL ’49 passed away on May 16, 2019 after a long battle with Alzheimer’s. She attended Narimasu High School for her senior year in Tokyo and stayed connected to ASIJ when Narimasu closed. She went on to Southeastern Louisiana University, where she was awarded Phi Kappa Phi. She married Franklin Spruiell and followed him in his career in coaching, cheering on the Terrebonne Tigers before he moved to the Louisiana High School Athletic Association where he served as commissioner and she worked in the office. Dawna is survived by her daughter, Dawnette Shelton and her son, Franklin Spruiell, Jr.
JOHN MORTON VAN SCHOONHOVEN (FF ’60–’61) passed away on December 21, 2012. He was born in Cove, OR, in 1928 and his education began in a one-room Shanghai School, and was completed with a Doctorate in Education from the University of Oregon. He served as principal at a school in Milton-Freewater and later as Elementary Principal at ASIJ. He was later selected to serve as principal of Greenbelt Center Elementary School. The school became a model for providing after-school care to at-risk children and was also selected by the US Department of Education as a Blue Ribbon School.
Obituaries ALFRED “AL” F. WARE (AP ’71–’74), died November 3, 2020 at the age of 93 after a short illness in Franklin, TN. Al earned his bachelor’s degree from the West Virginia University College of Physical Activity and Sport Sciences in 1950 and his master’s degree in speech/communications from WVU in 1952. While in college Ware was a member of Delta Tau Delta, served as Cadet Colonel of Army ROTC, was captain of the Men’s varsity debate team and letterman in both cross country and track. In 1954, Ware began his professional career in the textile industry. For 20 years his administrative positions included vice president of Manufacturers Hanover Corporation, director of Manufacturers Hanover Trade Corporation, president of Burlington Industries International Division and CEO of Mitsubishi-Burlington, Ltd. In 1977, Ware and his wife, Dee, formed Amherst International, Inc. He later became managing director of Amherst Fiber Optics, overseeing Amherst markets, fiber optics sales and services, optoelectronics and allied laser products for telecommunications and cable companies. While working in Tokyo, Ware served as chair of ASIJ’s Board of Directors 1973–74 while his sons Brent ’74 and Scot ’76 attended the School. Ware is survived by Brent ’74 and Judy Ware, Scot ’76 and Sharon Ware, as well as nine grandchildren.
JIM WATERHOUSE ’74, passed away July 23, 2020 in Melbourne, FL. He attended ASIJ for two years between 1972–74.
THE AMBASSADOR \\ FALL 2020
63
The Big Short Big questions, Short answers
Kathy Krauth has been a member of the social studies department at ASIJ since 2000. Prior to this she was a member of the staff of Teaching East Asia at the University of Colorado. Her husband Greg is currently ASIJ’s director of transportation and their two children Sophia ’12 and Sam ’10 both graduated from the School. Where are you from? Minnesota and Colorado. What kind of student were you in school? I was not a pretty girl. I was a smart girl, competitive, a little sassy. Why did you choose to go into education? I like to learn and teaching gives me that opportunity every day. If you weren’t a teacher, what would you do? Work for the UN in human rights or with refugees or work in some capacity at The Asian University for Women What is your favorite thing about Japan? I love its long history. I love the people. I love the natural beauty.
Which words or phrases do you most overuse? Seismologically active archipelago. Which talent would you most like to have? I would like to be able to run fast. Who are your favorite writers? Roxane Gay. Yosano Akiko. Norma Field ’65. Which historical figure do you most identify with? Maybe not identify with but envy: Beate Sirota Gordon ’39.
Which living person do you most admire? Shiori Ito When and where were you happiest? Whenever I am with my family and my good friends. Where doesn’t matter if I am with them; a concrete parking garage would be fine. Who are your heroes in real life? My mother. RBG—RIP. What is your most treasured possession? The conjuncture of my own life choices and life’s contingencies have forced me to relinquish any real emotional attachment to stuff.
What is your favorite thing about ASIJ? Students, colleagues, alums, families, JSEM, Students Advocating for Gender Equality (SAGE), English Circle, trips—especially to Okinawa! What advice do you give your students? The United States is all about race. Nobody in my adult life has ever asked me what my high school GPA was.
Illustration by Matthew Worsley 64
THE AMERICAN SCHOOL IN JAPAN
SUPPORTS THE
Grants and Speakers Series at ASIJ If your company would like to join in supporting this program, please contact donate@asij.ac.jp
Advancement Office The American School in Japan ASIJ / FBC USA 7055 Marcelle St Paramount CA 90723 Address Service Requested
Industry Meetup: Entrepreneurship December 9, 10am (JST) December 8, 8pm (EST)
Š The American School in Japan
Register here
Details on
PAG E
52
