FIRST ADOPTERS Menlo College Students
SUMMER 2018
The First Adopter—Today’s Menlo College Student Google, located ten miles from Menlo College, was founded in 1998, transforming the world in ways we are still discovering. Most Menlo College students were born in or near that same watershed year. Thus, their cohort, along with their contemporaries across the nation, has become the beta group testing the profound changes wrought by Google and related technologies. Think about it. Today’s Menlo students and their peers are the first humans to have never known a world without a user-friendly internet. Facebook, just a few miles down the street from the college, was founded the year these students turned age twelve, on the cusp of becoming teenagers trying to define their social selves. Their existence is a kind of experiment to see all the effects of these new technologies, their improvements to life and, some would say, their destruction of some social interactions. Considering the proximity of Google, Facebook, and the rest of Silicon Valley—in both place and time—we explore in this issue the enormous impact of technology on today’s Menlo student. Student Cady Chessin ’18, interning at a high tech company, discusses the brave new world of attending meetings where she’s the only non-bot (aka human) in attendance. Yufan “Evan” Wu ’20 explains the ways international students benefit from technology to communicate in new cultures and to get in touch with loved ones back home. Dr. Melissa Michelson, Professor of Political Science, describes her study on reaching Brazilian voters through WhatsApp, and English Adjunct Professor Kathryn McQueen defines the exploding possibilities for research with technological inventions. Other features highlight advances in education with tools invented within the last year or two. Managing all the new technology possibilities—legally, ethically, and personally—can be exciting and frightening. Literature Adjunct Professor Caroline Casper looks into recent developments in net neutrality and Menlo graduate Michaela Courand ’17 describes the way that addiction to social media and fear of missing out (FOMO) can rob an individual of optimism and productivity. Our students, like so many young people today, struggle with the strangely isolating effects of social media while facing a world where collaboration and emotional intelligence are prized. A recent study by Microsoft showed employers increasingly look for “social and emotional competencies” in new hires, often even more than technical skills. Though we can connect with more people globally, can we connect over the worktable? In a feature on creativity and collaboration, Dr. Bruce Paton, Professor of Management and the teacher of Menlo’s course on Design Thinking and Business Innovation, addresses this issue for our students, the generation facing the task of making technology a friendly force for improving life. Some students may eventually join a group of Silicon Valley technologists, early employees at Facebook and Google, who in January 2018 created a union of concerned experts called the Center for Humane Technology. The mission of this group is to educate users about the dangers of technology while also creating a “Ledger of Harms,” a website to guide rank-and-file engineers who “are concerned about what they are being asked to build,” according to the New York Times (see Bowles, Nellie. “Early Facebook and Google Employees Form Coalition to Fight What They Built.” Feb. 4, 2008). Our Menlo College graduates will help create the next generation of technological tools. They have already begun to think deeply about how to use these tools to make the world a better place, not one that’s blinded by technical virtuosity. On the cover, Menlo College students, left to right: Hannah Willard, Angela Peralta, Bruce Valdez, Maurice Gobel, Trevor Stewart, and Precious Zeno. On this page, clockwise: Precious Bell, Bianca Barros, Montana Rutledge, and Maurice Gobel. Photos: Andrey Poliakov.
A DVA N TAGE M AG A ZINE | SUMMER 2018
First Adopters: Menlo College Students The features of our Summer 2018 issue of Advantage Magazine shine a light on different aspects of the technology that we have adapted to so quickly that it has become like the air we breathe. In our departments, such as Athletics, we’ve also underscored new technologies used by Menlo students, faculty, and staff. We hope you enjoy this issue!
In This Issue 1 From the President 2 Letters to the Editor 2 Board Chair Geir Ramleth at Forefront 4 Trustee Spotlight: Micah Kane Features: 5 7 8 9 10
First Adopters Net Neutrality University Innovation Fellows eGamers Break New Ground Revolution in Research WhatsApp in Brazil
Faculty and Classroom 11 Decade of Ethics in Action 12 Adjunct Faculty Recognized 13 Faculty News 15 Simple Technology Solutions 15 MOLE—Not Just Cute 16 Technology and International Life 17 FOMO—Fear of Missing Out 23 Menlo’s Biohacker Internships 19 An Internship at the Cutting Edge Student Life 21 FEI Scholarship 22 Pioneer Club 23 Martin Luther King Day
24 25 27 29 31 33 34 35 36 36 43
Guest Speakers on Campus Apollo Night Adventure Club Career Fair Holiday Party and Retirements El Vestido Verde New Spaces CalCPA Ambassador CalCPA Recognizes Students A Place for Day Students Menlo’s Lu’au
Commencement 37 Allow Your Failures to Teach 39 Find Your Something Alumni 45 46 47 49 51
Alumna Reflection The Success of Saeed Amidi ’81 Oaks-in-Industry Obituaries Dorothy Skala Alumni Center
Athletics 54 55 56 60
Tech and Sport Streaming Games A Record Season Athletics Banquet
PUBLISHER Steven Weiner EDITOR Pamela Gullard MANAGING EDITOR Caroline Casper CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Aaron Gillespie Jodie Austin Erik Bakke Brian Brownfield ’17 Rosetta Clay Terri Givens Pamela Gullard Melissa Michelson Marianne Neuwirth Zach Osborne Bruce Paton Andrea Peeters Angela Schmiede Steven Weiner DESIGN Marsha Gilbert PHOTOGRAPHY AND GRAPHICS Andrey Poliakov OaksSports.com Justine Fiesta ’19 Hunter Dupee ‘18 EDITORS Lauren John Linda Teutschel CHAIR OF THE BOARD T. Geir Ramleth ’87 BOARD OF TRUSTEES Thomas (Tom) Byers Alma Clayton-Pedersen Andrea (Andy) Cunningham Howard (Howie) Dallmar ’74 James (Jim) A. Davlin Chris Garrett ’94 J. Michael (Mike) Gullard David C. Irmer, Sr. ’58 Micah Kane ’91 Jordan Long ’09 Larry Lopez ’84 T. Geir Ramleth ’87 Laurie Shaw Tyler Edelstein Tuttle Benjamin (Ben) Wagner EMERITI TRUSTEES John Henry Felix ’49 Julie Filizetti Charles “Chop” J. Keenan III ’66
The Menlo Advantage, published by the Menlo College Office of the President, brings news of the college and its community to alumni, parents, and friends. 1000 El Camino Real, Atherton, California 94027-4301 Tel: 800-55MENLO, editor@menlo.edu, www.menlo.edu
A Message from Menlo College President Steven A. Weiner Congratulations to the class of 2018! You have outrivaled the competition at national investment contests, excelled in CalCPA Awards, brought home athletic honors, and—most important—with a college degree, vastly improved your chances to find doors open to you as you launch your careers. To those of us who witness your academic accomplishments and your subsequent professional successes, the voices raised against the value of higher education sound terribly misguided. The vast majority of Americans still believe that education after high school is important for our economy and our communities, but the minority who hold opposing views are managing to get their voices heard above the din. There’s a real risk that the future of higher education could get caught up in the culture wars. Though we educators have much to learn about increasing educational opportunity and the pathways to success for a growing and changing nation, we need look no further than within our own campus to appreciate the value and importance of closing equity gaps in higher education. Neither race, nor income, nor zip code determines a student’s chance for success at our college; leveling of the playing field informs everything we do here at Menlo. We will continue to push to have institutions like ours recognized for the very special position we have in higher education, one that is based on inclusivity and social mobility. Our students – and the generations that follow – are counting on us to be persistent advocates for closing equity gaps in higher education. Our students get it. And as President of Menlo College, I am committed to ensuring that the voices heard above the din become theirs.
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Letters to the Editor Dear Editor, Received my issue of Menlo Advantage Magazine for Winter 2018 today and was surprised to see the article I wrote in 1971 for the Menlo Oak welcoming women students for the fall term (see page 34). I even got to pick out the photo of the female applicant profiled in the article! I can never forget my teachers Peter Arnovick, English; Joe Bertrand, History; Jan Dykstra, Sociology; and soccer coach and history professor Carlos Lopez. Dorothy Skala was a pure joy! She followed me for years. Congratulations to all the women students who have made Menlo a better place! Jim C. Lewis ’72 Loma Linda, CA
Photo: Doug Peck
Dear Editor, I read with sadness of Dorothy Skala’s death in your last issue. I have a strong memory of her on an Alaskan cruise organized by a mutual friend many years ago. Bob Cherry and his wife Tai (who married at Menlo) were some of the people in our small group and it was fun for all of us to reminisce about Menlo. The student body was quite different then—all male, all white, with some Hawaiian students. Fun but much, much better today. I’m really sorry to have missed the alumni center dedication to Dorothy in April—we celebrated my 80th birthday with friends here on that date. I attempt to attend SBA Day, homecoming, and other events each year but since we moved to Sacramento from Los Altos five years ago, we’re finding it difficult to travel back to the campus on a regular basis. I have attended two Menlo events in our area in the past two years, organized by Korbey Buese and Rosetta Clay. Both were fun times but small groups in attendance. Hopefully this will change—I’d be happy to lend support to local get-togethers here. Meanwhile we’re enjoying retirement (HP, TWA) here in Sacramento with grandsons and family near by. Dave Sperry ’61 Sacramento, CA
More letters....see page 3
Menlo College Board Chair at the Forefront of Video Technology Geir Ramleth (SBA ’87), Menlo College’s current Chair of the Board of Trustees, has used his education through a long international career. Since graduating from Menlo he has worked for global companies as well as started new companies from scratch. Currently he is an investor and president of PIX System. The company is based in San Francisco but also has offices in Los Angeles, New York, and London. PIX has built and operates technology that can transmit and transcode (file conversion) huge data files for sending video content, such as the daily film takes that the directors send from on-site locations to editing studios. The company is a trusted partner to the entertainment industry with more than ten years of dedicated service, across thousands of film and television productions, supporting every major studio. A dedicated team of industry experts takes pride in helping studios and production companies successfully and securely manage content review and collaboration throughout the creative lifecycle. At the last Oscars 25 out of 28 nominated movies used PIX during production. At Menlo, Geir states, he got a great education that prepared him for the challenges of building new businesses as well as running large organizations. Go Menlo! MENLO COLLEGE
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Gender Issues in Silicon Valley—A Discussion Dear Editor, I just read the article in Menlo Magazine, Winter 2018, in which Professor McCabe interviewed Andy Cunningham about “Women in the Silicon Valley.” I agree with much of what Cunningham said, especially: “diversity of all kinds is the magic for getting great results.” But I was quite surprised by this quote: “The ’80s in Silicon Valley had none of the stuff we think of now regarding gender issues. There was no bro culture or bullying. Anyone could be in business in Silicon Valley. Age didn’t matter, gender didn’t matter, whether you were gay or straight didn’t matter. What people cared about was your expertise.” It appears Cunningham and I have had very different experiences as women builders of the Silicon Valley. I’ve lived some of the “other” side. In the ‘80s I worked at Hewlett Packard, Sierra On-line, Convergent Technologies and Unisys. Sadly, I have stories from each of these companies where I was personally impacted by “gender issues.” I never complained or went to HR. I just moved on… to keep my career intact and feed my family. I was powerless. Women who complained not only got fired, they could not get hired by another company. Perhaps Ms. Cunningham meant that she didn’t experience gender issues. I don’t think it is helpful for women to claim this is all new behavior. Andy and I are going to meet soon to share our experiences. Frances Mann-Craik SBA ’76 Founder and CEO, Addison Marketing Los Gatos, CA
Dear Editor, Just received my copy of Menlo Advantage magazine. Great job and topical as well with all the #metoo publicity. Tom Scannell Former Menlo College Board Member Mountain View, CA
What do you think? Email: editor@menlo.edu Or write to: Editor, Advantage Magazine Menlo College, 1000 El Camino Real, Atherton, CA 94027 3 SUMMER 2018
Dear Editor, Congratulations on publishing the latest Menlo Advantage Magazine!! It looks beautiful, and will certainly represent Menlo proud. Thank you for the time and efforts you’ve dedicated toward making this magazine the brightness leading into a prosperous 2018! Mahalo. Ian Martins ’21 Paia, HI
Dear Editor, Frances Mann-Craik, an accomplished Silicon Valley business woman, wonders if my experience was unique to me. Perhaps it was. Or perhaps it was sheer luck. Nonetheless, the Silicon Valley I knew in the ’80s was a place where you could succeed based on merit regardless of race, color, sexual orientation or gender. But admittedly the Silicon Valley I knew revolved around Steve Jobs. I want to share my story of a very different kind because I want to show people that male power in the workplace doesn’t have to lead to female submission. I had the honor and privilege to work with Steve for several years in the 1980s through the launch of the Macintosh, his ouster from Apple, the formation of NeXT and the acquisition and launch of Pixar. He was tough. He was nasty. It was never easy or joyful working for him. You risked being fired every day—and I was a handful of times. But if you did your job and you helped him achieve his, you earned your spot on his team and he respected you for it. It didn’t matter what you were—if you were a Martian—he saw through your identity and leveraged you and your skills to create insanely great products. Steve’s agenda was always very pure. He didn’t care about the three pillars of male domineering leadership: power, money, women. He cared about your ability to help him change the world. We were all young, fresh and impressionable and so very fortunate to have been a part of his mission. He stretched us beyond our limits and made us all better as a result. I am forever grateful for my time with Steve and for his capacity to see beyond the surface and expose potential. So many entrepreneurs want to be the next Steve Jobs. They think it means building a “bro culture” and being a jackass. What they don’t know is that Steve’s temper was hot but he kept his libido out of it. The Silicon Valley I grew up in is disappearing. Where have all the women gone? And what is the cost to innovation? Andy Cunningham, Author Get to Aha! Discover Your Positioning DNA and Dominate Your Competition Sausalito, CA
Trustee Spotlight: Micah Kane ‘91 Micah Kāne brings his all to everything he does, including his service to his alma mater, Menlo College. He is Chair Elect of the Board, and has served as Vice Chair as well as the Chair of the Governance Committee. He is also the proud father of future Menlo alumna Ili Kāne! A football and baseball player while a student, he graduated cum laude in 1991. He was inducted into the Menlo College Hall of Fame in 2007, and elected to the Menlo College Board in 2011. Just as he does for Menlo, Kāne wears many hats back at home on the Hawaii Islands. He has been the COO of Pacific Links Hawai’i, a non-profit focused on human trafficking prevention; Chair of the Hawaiian Homes Commission and the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands; and active in many other community-based organizations. He is currently Chair of the Kamehameha Schools Board, and President and Chief Executive Officer of the Hawaii Community Foundation (HCF), an organization with more than $600 million in assets that is dedicated to helping communities across the islands. Kāne says his life’s purpose is to make a difference in people’s lives. The Hawaiian word kuleana is loosely translated to mean "responsibility." Kāne says his kuleana is: “To elevate those lives who are less fortunate. I try to mirror what has been done for me.“ His kuleana has been recognized repeatedly. He has been honored with numerous prestigious awards that recognize his passion for making the world a better place. As someone whose kuleana is to elevate the lives of those less fortunate, he is staying true to his life’s purpose. In addition to his daughter Ili, Micah and his wife Joelle have two other daughters: Sun and ‘Ohu.
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MenloNeutrality Man Net By Caroline Casper, Adjunct Professor of Literature
Today just over 40% of the world’s population use the internet, whereas in the U.S., almost 90% of the population are online. This means the vast majority of people in this country are likely to be affected by net neutrality. What exactly is net neutrality? It’s a simple question with a complicated answer. Basically, net neutrality is the principle that gives each internet user control of their online experience. It allows us to be connected to whatever website we choose, and to communicate freely online. It’s the principle that governments should mandate internet service providers like AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon to treat all internet data the same, and not discriminate or charge differently by user, content or website. It’s the principle that says providers like Comcast can’t, for example, limit its users’ ability to access the New York Times website if it wants to spike traffic to its own news website. It also prohibits providers from “degrading” the quality of the connection to a search engine like Bing if a competitor like Google pays for prioritized access. We’ve never known an internet experience without net neutrality. But on December 14, 2017, the Federal Communications Commissions (F.C.C.) approved Chairman Ajit Pai’s radical plan to gut the net neutrality protections, an action that reversed the agency’s 2015 decision to adopt historic net neutrality rules to keep the internet free and open. The reversal reflects the view of the Trump administration that deregulation will eventually yield innovation and help the economy. The F.C.C.’s plan is considered radical because net neutrality has been around for more than 50 years. It has a complicated past, according to Wired Magazine, tracing back to the Nixon administration and responses to the AT&T monopoly of the late 1960s. But the current net neutrality debate took shape during the early broadband era, beginning around 2000, as many people were still using dial-up services like AOL which relied on the telephone networks and these 1970s rules, which the George W. Bush administration continued to enforce. But broadband providers continued to fight for more control of
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“When the Internet first came, I thought it was just our internet usage and, again in 2012, when some providers, led by Comcast, said Netflix was using too much bandwidth and should pay more for it, the Obama administration strengthened the net neutrality rules again, using the broader and more powerful Title II of the Telecommunications Act of 1934, called Common Carrier, which allows the F.C.C. to regulate wire and radio communication services and spells out the legal guidelines for service providers. But this year, broadband providers may have finally won the fight. The F.C.C. defended the rollback of rules by stating it would eventually benefit consumers because broadband providers would be able to offer users a wider variety of service options, according to the New York Times. The rollback includes cutting the federal government’s role in regulating high-speed internet delivery as if it were a utility, like phone service. Critics of the F.C.C. changes aren’t buying it. They’re arguing that
the beacon of freedom. People could communicate with anyone, anywhere, and nobody could stop it.” – Steve Wozniak, Co-Founder of Apple Computer
consumers will have more difficulty accessing content online, and that start-ups will have to pay to reach consumers. They also say there isn’t enough competition in the broadband market to avoid monopolizing internet traffic. So, what happens now? Menlo College Adjunct Professor of Law John Harding broke it down for me. He said it’s true that without the net neutrality rules, companies like AT&T, Comcast and Verizon will be able to call all the shots and decide which websites, content and applications succeed, or how much data each user is allowed to consume. But will this actually happen? It’s tough to say, according to Harding. Title II regulation prevents certain discriminatory practices, such as “data blocking,” “data throttling” and “fast lanes,” where a broadband provider deliberately prevents transmission or degrades (or improves) transmission speed for some but not other end-users.
The F.C.C. stated in its January 4th ruling that many internet service providers have “committed to refrain from” blocking or throttling lawful internet content, notwithstanding any Title II regulation. But “committed to refrain from” isn’t a policy. It sounds more like a suggestion and a wink. Harding agreed. He said he certainly hopes providers will refrain from discriminatory pricing, and it’s “certainly possible that enlightened broadband providers will take the long view over short-term profits,” but without net neutrality laws, nothing will be mandated. How will this ruling affect Menlo students and alumni? From the consumer standpoint, opponents of the ruling fear that premium, high-speed, online access will be restricted to those who can pay more for it. From the business standpoint, opponents fear that without net neutrality, small businesses (and even some small schools) and entrepreneurs won’t be able to survive online. Or put another way, maybe the next Facebook or Google will never get off the ground. At this point, it’s impossible to predict how this ruling will affect Menlo students, but Harding said that despite the F.C.C.’s insistence that this ruling will only further innovation and investment, he does expect to see more discriminatory practices, such as blocking, throttling and fast lanes. “My view is that they [service providers] will use their regulatory freedom to engage in discriminatory pricing. Some of the earnings, no doubt, will go to the innovation and investment the F.C.C. hopes to see.” And it’s still not over. Lawmakers in at least six states, including California, have introduced bills that would prohibit internet service providers from blocking or slowing down sites or services. And Washington has become the first state to enact its own net neutrality rules that impose strict requirements on internet providers, making it illegal for broadband companies to block or slow down websites. Net neutrality protection is expected to increasingly be adopted by states and cities, suggesting a future that includes a patchwork of different policies and enforcement techniques across the country.
Sources: The researchers of this article relied heavily on past court rulings, as well as fcc.gov, the Pew Research Center, the New York Times, Time, Wired and the ACLU. For more specific information on sources, please contact the writer.
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University Innovation Fellows Apply Design Thinking at Menlo By Dr. Bruce Paton, Professor of Management Technology can be an invaluable enabler, but sometimes it’s the Post-it Note or the face-to-face interaction that sparks creativity. And sometimes, that creativity leads to inventions that become wildly popular—very much like the Post-it Note. As described in the last issue of Advantage, in 2017, Menlo launched a partnership with the University Innovation (UI) Fellow program, funded by the National Science Foundation program, and administered through Stanford University’s Design School (d.school). The drive of the four Menlo students selected to participate as UI Fellows last year led to the adaptation of a chemistry lab in Florence Moore Hall into Menlo’s new Innovation Center. Generous support from a trustee led to the transformation of the former lab into an “innovation ecosystem” to advance ideas by catalyzing collaborations among students, alumni, and faculty to produce a diverse spectrum of early stage innovation. And innovation leads to opportunity. When Esther Funez ’21 applied to Menlo, she had no idea she would have the opportunity to present ideas for modernizing Bowman Library to the President and Provost before her first year was over. But the freshman from Stockton, California also had no idea that she would be selected to represent Menlo as a UI Fellow.
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eGamers Break New Ground at Menlo By Ashlee Hunt ’20
When asked to define “design thinking”, Funez described it as a set of tools and processes for “using empathy to understand what people need and want, and figuring out how to give it to them.” She is part of Menlo’s second UIF cohort. The four fellows from last year’s cohort and this year’s eight student cohort have been working together to create programs to draw students into the new Innovation Center. Participation in the program requires students to identify and help implement an innovation project on their campus. Projects range from curriculum changes to infrastructure innovations. UI fellows Sachal Jogi ’20 and J.C. Maroun ’20 proposed a process for introducing more technology into existing courses, and suggested creating a technology innovation concentration. Their first step will be a proposal for a technology course to be introduced next year. The UI Fellows recently concluded an intensive 6-week training program on design thinking, culminating in an international “meetup” at Google and the Stanford d.school. Fellows toured Google’s Innovation Garage and heard expert talks on topics ranging from managing “moonshot” projects to building collaborative teams. At the d.school, they exchanged ideas with students from across the U.S., and from India, the Netherlands, Nicaragua, and China. The Fellows learned techniques for identifying unarticulated needs, generating new ideas, prototyping, and rapid testing of solutions.
Albert Einstein once said, “If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it.” I think we can all agree that the concept of getting paid to sit and play video games all day is just about as absurd as it gets, yet eSports, where participants do just that, is expected to become the next billion dollar industry in 2019. What exactly is eSports? An eSport is any video game played competitively, for a wide variety of spectators, at a professional level. eSports that have gained a lot of popularity in the last few months include Overwatch, League of Legends, Hearthstone and one of my favorites, Fortnite. Although I haven’t been playing competitively for very long, I’ve been gaming and watching gamers since I was kid. It’s a family tradition among my brother, my dad and me. Early on, I played Madden NFL with my dad on the PlayStation 2, and since then we’ve played almost every gaming console and handheld device that’s been released—all the way from the first Game Boy Advance to the latest WII Switch. In my family, gaming isn’t just a hobby, it’s our way of bonding with one another and having fun. Considering my role as a game player, I feel that eSports has an immense potential to be a unisex industry. The industry is currently dominated by men, but as a player myself, I can tell you that being a woman in the eSports industry in no way limits your ability to succeed or to have fun playing or watching. Currently, the eSports industry, according to The Guardian, is 85% male, and the reason for this huge disparity isn’t because there’s a lack of interest among woman. Rather, a woman has much more difficulty gaining legitimacy as a gamer and breaking through female stereotypes in order to gain a substantial number of followers/spectators and capture public interest. And because women face such a strong barrier popular female gamer, Stephanie Harvey, commonly known by her gamer name MissHarvey, created a streaming platform called MissClicks, a welcoming and inclusive platform for female gamers to stream their videos. In addition to MissClicks, there are plenty of other organizations that are battling this lack of gender diversity in the eSports industry, so even if you are a woman trying to go pro, you’re not restricted in how you can make a living doing what you love. You can start following your passion at our new eSports team on campus! Join us and I’ll show you some of the tips I taught my father.
Participation in the UI Fellows program is attracting new students to Menlo. Lucia Casadei Parlanti ‘20, from Parma, Italy, said she found Menlo when she was searching online for U.S. colleges with an emphasis on innovation. She saw a page on the Menlo website that showcases the UI Fellows from last year’s cohort, transferred to Menlo, and is now a newly minted Fellow herself. Photos: Andrey Poliakov
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Revolution in Research Enabled by By Kate McQueen, Adjunct Professor of English Google is the first port of call for all kinds of researchers, including students in my writing classes at Menlo College. Used in isolation it’s a risky information source. But if you know how to look, internet search engines provide information access no previous generation could have possibly imagined. For all Google’s ubiquity, it’s easy to imagine that the digital revolution in academic research tools began with the rise of Silicon Valley start-ups twenty years ago. In fact, it started in the Midwest much earlier, when the Ohio College Library Center created the first online public access catalog (OPAC) in 1971. These innovators realized the advantages online systems could offer over the card catalogs of the past: easy access, flexible search terms, and instant retrieval of references. Early generation OPACS, however, relied on clunky intranet systems and struggled to deliver on these promises. Things changed when tech companies optimized the internet search in the early 2000s. Google’s user-friendly graphic interface in particular made it easy to explore the rapidly growing inventory of web pages, including the websites of research institutions. In 2004—the year I started graduate school— the company reached out explicitly to academics by launching Google Scholar, a search engine that indexed scholarly literature. Researchers no longer need to be physically present at libraries to do good work. Catalogues of primary and secondary material, and even digitized copies of collection content, have become available on institutional websites. It’s hard to overestimate the impact on fields like mine, literary history. Projects that once required time-consuming, expensive travel have become manageable, even for
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students. This included my own dissertation on the Viennese Press, which was made possible thanks to the digitized collections of historical newspapers accessible through the Austrian National Library’s website. Today students have an even larger number of online research tools within reach. Bowman Library’s website alone offers links to 59 different academic catalogues and databases. The deluge of available data opens doors to limitless research topics. It also comes with its own set of challenges, most of all a need for discernment when evaluating the relevance of online information. Technology has displaced the library’s traditional role as the retainer of physical collections but, thankfully, they are still places to hone crucial information literacy skills. Menlo’s librarians offer group and individual instruction on how to refine searches, evaluate material, and use information effectively within research projects. Students may arrive for assistance in navigating online portals but they stay, for the free coffee, the padded chairs, and the collegial atmosphere, much like the generations before them.
Technology
WhatsApp in Brazil:
Mobilizing Voters through Door-to-Door and Personal Messages By Dr. Melissa R. Michelson, Professor of Political Science Democracies are sustained by active participation of the governed, and political scientists like me have long been interested in ways to increase voter turnout. Multiple studies conclude that face-to-face and live telephone communication increases participation, but target populations are increasingly difficult to reach using these methods. My coauthor Dr. Mauricio Moura and I recently published a paper on the cutting edge of this area of research, describing a set of Get Out the Vote (GOTV) experiments conducted in Brazil. Our experiments used the WhatsApp smartphone app and a series of video messages developed by real candidates. These experiments were the first to test the power of WhatsApp video messages as a voter mobilization tool, and are also the first to intentionally test GOTV messages in a regular election in Brazil. We began our GOTV experiments by inviting candidates for legislatures in Brazil to cooperate with us. In each geographic area, participating candidates reached out to voters with information about themselves, their record, and their platform. Candidates controlled the content of the messages; our role was to randomize the treatment and control groups, and instruct the campaigns about which voters to target with each type of message (a doorto-door visit, a robocall, an email, or a WhatsApp video message). Voting is compulsory in Brazil for adults aged 18 to 70; thus, we focused on those segments of the electorate not included in compulsory voting laws (those aged 16 to 17 or over 70). Methods used in each municipality varied based on the preferences of the local candidate. Given previous research, we hypothesized that door-to-door canvassing would consistently increase turnout, that WhatsApp messages would increase turnout among younger voters, and that email messages and robocalls would fail to mobilize voters. Our hypotheses were all correct. Youth who were sent a WhatsApp message about the election were significantly more likely to vote. (In one state where Smartphones are less widespread, the difference in youth turnout was negligible.) Older voters sent WhatsApp messages were no more likely to vote. Door-to-door canvassing was effective for both older and younger voters, while email messages and robocalls did not increase turnout. The use of multimedia text messaging is widespread and growing in both the U.S. and around the world. While not all voters are WhatsApp users, the expanding use of smartphone-based communication and lack of legislation that constrains WhatsApp use provides an opportunity to reach large numbers of voters at minimal expense. GOTV using these messages has the potential to have large effects on turnout among the increasingly wired populations of industrialized and developing countries. We found that WhatsApp messaging is a powerful method of moving youth to vote in Brazil. This is a potentially powerful and cost-effective method of increasing turnout in a traditionally low-turnout group (young voters). As social networks and interpersonal interactions move online and onto smartphone-based apps, both for youth and older cohorts, GOTV methods should follow. MENLO COLLEGE
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FA C U LT Y N E W S Professor Sekerka Celebrates a Decade of “Ethics in Action” Leading Menlo’s Center Celebrating over a decade of good works is a perfect time to reflect on Professor Sekerka’s accomplishments as Director of the Ethics in Action Center. “A point of Menlo pride is that the Center continues to enable students to connect with others in unique ways, elevating the importance of ethics in everyday life,” said Sekerka. Among the Center’s activities, the Ethics in Action Guest Speaker Program welcomes professionals to campus. Sekerka has brought over 100 speakers to campus since the program’s inception, enabling students to learn first-hand about the value of ethics from those who lead organizations. These sessions provide networking opportunities for students, often leading to internship connections or future employment (e.g., VISA, NewDay, Gap, NetApp, Google). They also demonstrate the ease of sliding down the “slippery slope.” Healthsouth CFO, Aaron Beam returned to campus, describing how good people can fall off the edge – and land in prison. Sekerka’s contributions go beyond Menlo’s classrooms. The second book in her children’s Being a Better Bear ethics series is now available, entitled: Flying Higher with Ethics. The third book, The Ethics of Cheesee Pleasees, is now in development. The professor has become a frequent keynote speaker and invited guest expert at Duke University, Brigham Young University, Santa Clara University, and Georgetown University. Referred to as a “pioneer in ethics education and research,” by Ann Skeet, Executive Director of Santa Clara University’s Markkula Center of Applied Ethics, Sekerka is a positive force for ethics in research, education, and practice. Her actions reach learners at every age and, in turn, strengthen the moral fiber of our society. Thanks to generous grants from the James Hervey Johnson Charitable Educational Trust, Sekerka’s leadership as Director of Menlo’s Ethics in Action Center promotes moral strength on campus, in our community, and throughout the world.
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Photo: Ian Morken
Adjunct Faculty Recognized Menlo College benefits enormously from many long-standing relationships with adjunct faculty. To recognize the value of ongoing engagement with Menlo students, the college established a path that allows Adjunct Faculty members to advance to the rank of Senior Adjunct Professor. Nineteen of our adjunct faculty qualified for this promotion earlier this academic year. Congratulations for the well-earned recognition for their service to Menlo: Erik Bakke, Jesse Bingham, Roy Blitzer, Robert Campbell, Ruth Conza-Roman, Curt Francis, John Harding, Zaki Hasan, Barbara Hecker, Caitlin Jeffrey, Bob Mulvey, Zach Osborne, Michael Pauker, Jessica Perla-Collibee, Jennifer Pittman, Lou Riccardi, Paul Stegner, Arthurlene Towner, and Hiram Willis.
Dr. Thomas Plante, guest speaker in Dr. Leslie Sekerka’s Businesss Ethics class. He discussed how one addresses ethical challenges in today’s world.
Photo: Amaryon Bates
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FA C U LT Y N E W S Faculty Updates An article by marketing Professor Stephanie Dellande that addressed “Temptation’s Itch: Mindlessness, Acceptance, and Mindfulness in a Debt Management Program” was published last year in the Journal of Business Research. The article caught the interest of a freelance writer, who is going to feature it in a forthcoming article. Professor William Devine recently had two articles published in Inside Compliance, a journal of the Loyola University Chicago School of Law: “QB Reminds Higher Ed of Regulatory Truth” and “A Post-Regulatory Recipe for Economic Leadership.” Professor Devine teaches Legal & Societal Issues in Sports Management, where this semester research papers written by Menlo students addressed such topical matters as: Should football be prohibited because of CTE? Should marijuana be legalized for professional athletes? Should performance-enhancing drugs be regulated instead of prohibited? How can we create more opportunity for disabled athletes? Should transgender athletes be allowed to compete against the gender they identify as? In March, Technical Services and Electronic Resources Librarian Qi Huang received two conference grants: one from Bay Area Independent School Librarians to attend the 13th Electronic Resources and Libraries Conference, and a second from the Statewide California Electronic Library Consortium to attend their Product Review Committee meeting. The library of 2018 is technology-intensive, and Menlo’s Bowman Library reflects that. We use Google Data Studio to analyze and visualize database usage and interlibrary loan services, Google Analytics to track website and e-resources user activities, Tableau Public to analyze inventory data, and Google Site to manage e-resources. A visual algebra system developed by mathematics Professor Michael Laufer was used as the basis of a presentation by the Prison University Project at their national conference on higher education in prisons. Professor Laufer also continued his media blitz: interviews were published in the German magazine Die Zeit, as well as in Wired Italy, Wired USA and Cyborg Profiles; broadcast interviews were featured on a show in Japan, on CNN, on FreeThink, NOW THIS, and Future Grind. He was also the keynote speaker at the Please Try This at Home conference, and gave talks at the BDYHAX conference, and is a co-organizer of the upcoming BioSummit MIT conference. In June, Professor of Economics Craig Medlen will be presenting a talk at the Conference for the Western Economic Association on his recently published article entitled “Piketty’s Paradox, Capital Spillage and Inequality.” Following a visit to the Anderson Collection at nearby Stanford University, students in the Modernism/Modernity/American class taught by English Professor Lisa Mendelman wrote their final course papers on a work of modern art. Professor Mendelman continues her research at the intersection of science and literature. Following the semester’s end, she gave a talk on gender and germ science in 1920s America, “Modernist Pathologies,” at the American Literature Association Conference. Her article “Character Defects: The Racialized Addict and Nella Larsen’s Passing” addresses race and addiction in 1930s America and is forthcoming in the journal Modernism/modernity. Professor of Political Science Melissa Michelson recently published three articles: “Gender, Masculinity Threat, and Support for Transgender Rights: An Experimental Study” (co-authored with Brian F. Harrison) in Sex Roles; “Back in the Shadows, Back in the Streets.” in PS: Political Science & Politics; and “Trumped Up Challenges: Limitations, Opportunities, and the Future of Political Research on Muslim Americans” in Politics, Groups, and Identities. She is also the co-author of the 7th edition of a textbook accepted for publication in 2019: Governing California in the Twenty-First Century, as well as co-author (with Nazita Lajevardi and Professor Marianne Marar Yacobian) of a book chapter: “The Unbearable Whiteness of Being Middle Eastern: Causes and Effects of the Racialization of Middle Eastern Americans,” forthcoming in Muslim American Politics, published by Temple University Press.
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Director of Oral Communications Programs Marianne Neuwirth guided students in her classrooms to debate ideas while networking across cultures: Kimhong (Emmy) Le-Ewig, from Professor Neuwirth’s Business Communication class, started Menlo’s Culture Xchange Club; .. Derrick Higgins and Christopher Overkamping from her Public Speaking class (and Victor Garcia, a friend of theirs) started a Debate Club; and Robert (Maxwell) Barnes from her Business Communication class started the Pioneer Club. Building on the success of Menlo’s internship program, Director Zach Osborne was elected to serve as Vice President of the Board of the Cooperative Education & Internship Association, a national professional experiential learning program association. He also recently presented at two sessions of the Association’s annual conference: one intended for new practitioners in the field of experiential learning and a second on the practical considerations of running an experiential learning program. In June, he will serve as a facilitator at the Association’s Academy. Management Professor Leslie Sekerka recently published articles in Journal of Business Research, Business Horizons, Human Resource Management, and International Journal of Public Leadership. She also published a case study, wrote a chapter in Management Education for Corporate Social Performance, and completed a second book in her children’s ethics series, Being a Better Bear: Flying Higher with Ethics. Her research has also been selected for inclusion in venues around the world, including presentations at the Academy of Management, Eastern Academy of Management, Association for Psychological Science, Humanistic Management Conference, European Academy of Management, and the Equality, Diversity, & Inclusion Conference. The Ethics in Action Center was recently awarded a grant by the James Hervey Johnson Charitable Educational Trust to advance the practice of business ethics on campus and in the broader community. Women’s Volleyball Head Coach Denise Sheldon will be lending her passion to our country’s wounded servicemen and women this summer as the Competition Director for the Paralympic sitting volleyball tournament at the 2018 Department of Defense Warrior Games. Participating in the competition will be approximately 300 wounded, ill, and injured service members and veterans representing the United States Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, and Special Operations Command, along with teams from the U.K. Armed Forces, Australian Defence Force, and Canadian Armed Forces.
Menlo College welcomes Dr. Nicole Jackson to the management faculty as an assistant professor. She has already made an impact on campus by spearheading a partnership between the college and ImpactEd Learning that will allow select Menlo classrooms to become problem-solving centers, with students taking on challenges for real-world organizations through their courses.
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Using Simple Technology Solutions to Connect our Classrooms By Minh Huynh, Director of Internet Technology For the fifteen years before I joined Menlo, I was asked repeatedly to set up video conference systems to connect remote sites to Bay Area companies. The setup inevitably included beautiful sound panels, with sound-seeking cameras, ceiling mount microphones, and automated lighting, with costs often skyrocketing well into the six figures. What did I learn from it? Don’t do it. There are far more efficient solutions available. Menlo is embracing those more efficient solutions. In particular, simple site-to-site video conference systems like Hangout, ZoomUS, and Skype allow our faculty to beam into the classroom people from China, Germany, or even down in Los Angeles without the need for anyone to hop on a plane. And all with an iPad Pro running ZoomUS. Giving proof to the adage, sometimes keeping it simple is the best solution.
MOLE—Not Just a Cute Critter!
By Erik Bakke, Director of the Writing Center
Menlo’s Online Learning Environment (MOLE) is a classroom platform for students and faculty to easily interact online. It allows faculty to upload assignments, tests, and reading materials, and students can submit work there, view their grades and see comments from their professors. In February 2018, MOLE gained a new mascot—no, it isn’t a gecko; yes, it is a purple mole, wearing a mortarboard. Besides the new look, Francia Friendlich, Business Process Analyst and Project Manager, offers tips for using MOLE, which is Menlo’s branded version of Schoology’s learning management system. I’ve had great success with one of those tips—using the Schoology App on an iPad Pro. Incorporating the app with the Apple Pencil, I grade papers with the speed and efficiency of using a pen. If you are not in the business of marking papers, this may not sound very exciting. But being able to open essays without downloading them, being able to mimic the fluid process of marking on paper, and then not having to print, reupload, or resend those papers, has saved this instructor hours. Students benefit by getting detailed comments pointing out their specific strengths and areas that need work while instantly seeing their grade and re-calculated grade average.
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Friendlich also points out that students can streamline the creation and submission of assignments by linking their Google drive and their Schoology page. Using this link, students gain the unlimited storage, convenience and collaboration-friendly tools of Google Drive along with a quick method for transfering assignments that leaves files uncorrupted and easily opened. Look for the tutorials, tips and classes that Friendlich offers through the year. She’s uncovering more ways to make our purple MOLE even friendlier!
Technology Has Changed Our Daily Lives
By Yufan (Evan) Wu ‘19 Over the last decade, technology has been playing a vital role in our daily lives. We are gradually depending on it more and more. Each of us has a smartphone with a variety of applications, through which we learn about the weather, the stock market, and everyday news. We learn what is happening in the world without going outside. We connect with new people online and become friends without ever meeting. As students, we even submit homework through the internet. But as an international student who is just learning to speak English, technology has been essential in helping me communicate and improve my language skills. When I first came to America from China, I realized language was a barrier preventing me from participating in American life. Luckily, I have Google Translate, a mobile application on my smartphone which allows me to translate words that I don’t know into my native language, which is Mandarin. Also, if I’m having trouble communicating with someone, I can speak directly into my phone and Google Translate will record my voice and translate my words back to me in understandable English. I also use an app created by Baidu, an internet company and search engine in China (like Google), that allows me to take a picture of an object or image with the camera on my phone that I’d like translated. As an international student, I also benefit from a free video application called WeChat to communicate with my family in China. WeChat is the most popular and commonly used app in China. It allows me to send messages and have video calls with friends and family back home. Everyone in China knows how to use this app. Also, like Instagram, WeChat allows us to share our photos and recent thoughts with friends through something called “moments,” and it offers a variety of other functions as well: sending a traditional red envelope (pocket money) for the Chinese New Year, shopping, reading news articles, paying bills and buying tickets. With the benefit of technology, our lives as international students are becoming more and more convenient and our language skills are advancing. We can only imagine what the future will be like.
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What FOMO is Doing to Millennials By Michaela Courand ’17 FOMO, or Fear of Missing Out, is the fear that there is something happening on my social media that I need to know about, or feel validated by. At first, millennials like me joked about FOMO and took it very lightly; it was not a big deal. But now the fear that we could disappear if we are not a constant presence on social media is real. With current technology, such as Instagram and Snapchat, we have instant access to social media and an awareness of what others are doing at any time. In a New York Times1 article, ‘The Rise of a Visual Internet,” internet expert Farhad Manjoo reports that more than 800 million use Instagram and spend more than 30 minutes a day on average on the app; I believe my generation spends more. So now the problem is doubly large—we feel left out of social media if we are not constantly checking, and left out of real life events if we are. This can make us feel like we don’t belong and are not a part of something we are
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seeking to be a part of most, a community or friend group. And when we post, we judge our value based on how people are reacting, that is, liking or commenting, on what we are doing. I have seen and talked to many people my age who always have to be “tapped” in. It makes them truly anxious to stop checking their social media. For example, have you ever been at a social gathering or party and noticed that nine out of ten people are not engaged in conversation but are engrossed in their phone and socials? Others display physical agitation if they haven’t refreshed their feed. They fidget with their hands, squirm, or look around the room for some kind of stimulus. If that does not make them feel at ease, they will give in to the need to be physically doing something with their hands, like drawing in a classroom setting or holding a drink at a party.
The problem gets worse every year. People have real FOMO, but don’t know it—they repress their anxiety! The need to “be in the know” is subconscious. Sometimes, it looks like an addiction, and just like an addiction, it can be hard to know, or admit, you are addicted. Many millennials do not see that the value of an experience is the experience itself. We don’t have to capture and share the experience to prove to others we are worthy. Look at the girl in the photo. She is enjoying the ocean and all its beauty. She isn’t capturing the beauty with her phone and isn’t consumed with telling others she is looking at the ocean and they aren’t. She doesn’t need her followers to say she is okay.
media verifying it is. I think we need to choose to value our own experience, and trust in our worth. 1 Manjoo, Farhad. “The Rise of a Visual Internet.”
New York Times, 9 February 2018. https://www.nytimes. com/interactive/2018/02/09/technology/the-rise-of-a-visualinternet.html Photo: David LaFlamme ’17
What others are doing, and how they see us, matters too much these days! FOMO will not go away unless we consciously believe in our self worth and that it is enough without social
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INTERNSHIPS THROUGH MENLO
Q&A An Internship at the Cutting Edge By Cady Chessin ’18 with Angela Schmiede, Vice President for Student Success
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Since fall 2017, Cady Chessin, ’18, has been a social media intern with VMware, a Palo Alto-based corporation with more than 18,000 employees, which provides cloud computing and platform virtualization software. Cady’s technology-driven internship illustrates how internships have changed, even since the launch of the Menlo College Internship Program five years ago. Our business interns are increasingly finding success in the heart of Silicon Valley’s tech community.
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Tell us about a typical day in the life as a VMware intern.
I usually come into work and start monitoring and responding to various messages and posts made on VMware’s social media accounts. Then I find and highlight content created by people at VMware as well as outside developers and experts that use VMware products. I have a meeting in the morning and afternoon with my team to discuss what’s going on in our feeds that day. We’re always brainstorming new ways to promote various campaigns and events that VMware is running.
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What role does social media play in promoting VMware?
Social media at VMware plays a crucial role in supporting people who want to or already use their various products. It’s not only a way for people to simply see what they’re doing on Twitter or Facebook, but it’s also a vehicle for troubleshooting and product support. There are many forums and posts people write with questions, comments, and concerns on something they’re doing with VMware products. People write blogs about upcoming events and product updates, and produce their own material and programs that run with VMware’s products, so we even have pages for code samples, software development kits and application program interfaces. Social media has become a quick and easy way for people to reach us instead of the process of calling us on the phone or waiting for emails.
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You mentioned that sometimes you attend team meetings at VMware where some or all of the team members participate remotely using Beam,® a telepresence robot. What’s it like to be part of a team that’s often virtual?
The Beam devices are commonly used to pretty much be there without being there. Standing at least four and a half feet, at least one or two a day zoom off their charging stations to run to a meeting. It definitely surprised me the first time I saw one, let alone saw one move (they are fast!). The Beams are commonly used for people who can’t come into work or are even working in different parts of the world. They’ve even been utilized for taking various company visitors on tours around the campus.
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What do you think an internship in marketing at VMware would have looked like 15 years ago?
Fifteen years ago, marketing for VMware would have not been as involved in social media–probably more ads in trade journals, attending trade shows, writing marketing collateral, and giving speeches at conferences.
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What’s next for you after you complete your internship?
Seeking a new adventure could be exciting, but at the same time with the calm and serene campus atmosphere VMware, along with a battle-hardened and positive workforce, it may be a little hard to leave.
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2018/2019
Resident Assistants (RAs)
Savannah Rosales-Brand Elliy Gorelik Esther Funez Jenae Pennywell
Jordan Broughton Bell Stewart Haller Solin Piearcy Tamara Williams
FEI Awards 2018 Scholarship to Finance Major Adam Fenyvesi ’19 Financial Executives International (FEI) - Silicon Valley Chapter awarded their annual scholarship to Menlo student Adam Fenyvesi. Originally, from Hungary, Adam is a soccer player on the field, and a finance major in the classroom. He plans to obtain his MBA from Stanford University. “I would like to express how honored I am to be awarded Financial Executives International’s prestigious scholarship. I am very excited to join their Rising Star Advisory Board, where alongside some of my fellow students, I will have the opportunity to work with over 350 top financial executives from all over the San Francisco Bay Area. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity and I look forward to showing all of them what Menlo students are capable of,” Adam proudly noted. Menlo College Finance Professor Soumendra De is a member of FEI. 21 SUMMER 2018
Trey Lake Noa Kerr Alexa Christoforatos Larissa Martinez
John Paine Trey Taniguchi Niko Dugay Crystal Cebedo
Pioneer Club Links Entrepreneurs The Menlo College Pioneer Club was launched last year by founding director Robert Maxwell Barnes ’18. To foster the building of a network with successful Bay Area entrepreneurs, the club hosts events throughout the year to gather current students, Menlo College alumni, and other Bay Area entrepreneurs. One of the Pioneer Club’s key sponsors is GSV Asset Management, a venture capital firm in Woodside, CA.
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Menlo College Professor Michael Laufer:
“Biohacker”
In science fiction, a biohacker is someone who pushes the limits with implants to enhance sensory and brain power and can also be a person who makes do-it-yourself (DIY) therapeutic drugs. Menlo has one in Professor Michael Laufer and his special power is his scientific creativity. Laufer and his collaborators have branded themselves the “Four Thieves Vinegar” with the mission to reduce the cost of medications. They launched their initiative with the Apothecary Microlab, and released instructions to concoct medicinal drugs at home. More recently, Laufer used off-the-shelf parts to build a homemade version of the EpiPen—the device used by people to deliver an emergency shot of epinephrine during an anaphylactic allergic reaction. Laufer teaches mathematics at Menlo, but he studied particle physics as an undergraduate. His pursuit of DIY drug manufacturing is driven by the extent to which the cost of commercially-produced medications can be a barrier to access. Laufer, who is recognized as a fixture in the biohacker movement, has started publishing DIY manuals for those who have no other alternative but to make their own medications at home.
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Creating many medications should be no harder than assembling Ikea furniture. Michael Laufer
Photograph: Andrey Poliakov
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Let us all truly honor Dr. King’s legacy this 50th anniversary of his death by taking to the streets and to the voting booths to advance his moral vision of a true multiracial, economically just democracy.
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Menlo’s observation of Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2018 included a fireside chat with Dorian Warren, president of the Center for Community Change Action, and Vice-President of the Center for Community Change. Dr. Warren is also a Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute, and a host and executive producer of “Nerding Out” on MSNBC’s digital platform.
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Guest Speakers Caught in Action
Menlo faculty enrich the student experience by drawing from their connections in Silicon Valley and with colleagues in their fields around the world. This year these speakers included, top to bottom: Adriana Torres, Oracle’s Senior Vice President | Global Head of Customer Support for Hospitality; Pavel Ferreri, IBM North America’s Innovation Executive, Watson and Cloud Platform; Stas Khirman, Managing Partner of TEC Ventures; and Marc Berman, who serves as a member of the California State Assembly, representing California’s 24th District. MENLO COLLEGE
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The Stars Come Out at Menlo! For the first time, Apollo Night, a showcase for student talent sponsored by the Black Student Union, was at a venue off campus. On Saturday night, February 24 the audience cheered as students revealed their gifts for music, dance and more! It was a night to remember! Photographs: Amaryon Bates
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Join Menlo Adventures for an Off-Campus Experience! By Alyna Anderson ’18, Recreation Student Coordinator Menlo Adventures is a program under Club Sports and Recreation, a branch of the Athletics Department. It provides the Menlo College community a chance to get off campus and explore the natural beauty of the San Francisco Bay Area. We have taken trips to landmark parks, such as Big Basin Redwoods State Park and Yosemite and Pinnacles National Parks. Hikes are a staple of the program as we take advantage of the various hiking trails throughout the Bay Area. Some other past adventures include: white river rafting, skydiving, skiing and snowboarding, biking, and photography trips. We like to try urban adventures involving the natural world as well, such as our trips to the Academy of Sciences, Alcatraz, the San Francisco Zoo, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We’ve even gone paintballing and to a Giants game! Want to join the camaraderie and fun? Sign up for any of our trips this fall and be part of Menlo Adventures helping to build a strong campus community.
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All photos by David Laflamme ’17
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Readying Menlo Students for Post-Graduate Success By Dylan Houle, Associate Director of Internships & Career Services Menlo College hosted its annual spring Career Fair on March 15. Close to 200 students attended, shaking hands and networking with more than 50 employers and graduate schools. Billion-dollar companies like Enterprise Holdings, Khosla Ventures, and Morgan Stanley shared the floor with alumni-owned startups like Cider (Ilya Lipovich ‘99) and Coralba (Massimiliano Genta ‘16), and local non-profits like Coaching Corps, the Mathnasium, and Team Esface. Two weeks before the Career Fair, the Office of Internships and Career Services presented Career Connect Day, a new spin on a Menlo College classic.
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This year’s Connect Day featured a series of events focused on preparing students for the Career Fair, including a social media workshop with Professor Nicole Jackson; an off-campus student-alumni networking lunch; a panel discussion for international students featuring guest speakers hailing from five different countries; a business formal fashion show co-hosted by the Fashion Club; and a special guest appearance by Robbins Research International. To learn more about the Office of Internships & Career Services and how alumni can get involved, email Associate Director Dylan Houle at dylan.houle@menlo.edu.
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H oliday P arty a n d R etirement S
Menlo’s holiday party in December 2017 included celebrating two retirements: far left, Doug Carroll, Professor of Management (20 years) and, far right, Linda Smith, Dean of Library Services (12 years). Photographs: Andrey Poliakov 31 SUMMER 2018
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El Vestido Verde By Carolina Gonzalez ’18
I wear my mother’s story. I wear my father’s journey. I wear the history of my ancestors and the culture of my country. I was not born on its lands but I carry it in my veins. In my customs and traditions I honor its memory. I stand in my regional folklorico dress with confidence and pride as I dance to the triumphant sounds of violins, trumpets and guitars. With its beautiful colors bright like our flag and vibrant like our people, the colorful ribbons on my dress bounce with joy as I tap my feet to the rhythm of my beating heart in tune with the mariachi. Embellished by delicate white lace, my dress stuns as I twirl its edges like the pages of my unread story. I pound my white lace-up boots on the pavement like the hooves of horses galloping in the fields. My ribbon-braided hair is crowned with roses like the ones that Our Mother made appear in the desert while my ears are adorned with the heavenly gold artifacts inspired by Huitzilopochtli, Aztec god of sun and war. I dance to celebrate the culture that makes up who I am. I wear the dress to show my pride but also to show that I belong.
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Growing up I didn’t think that I was different. I looked like the majority of my family, light skinned with dark hair. However, I was born here… on the other side. As a kid, you don’t have a full understanding of what ethnicity is, everyone is just human. I didn’t identify myself as Mexican or American or Mexican-American. I spoke Spanish like the majority of my family spoke English, not perfectly but well enough so we could understand each other. I listened to songs in Spanish and in English. I knew the 50 states of the United States but not the 31 states of Mexico. I liked apple pie but I loved pan dulce. One day my brother made a comment to me about how I wasn’t “enough” and that he was “better.” He told me that he was Mexican because he was actually born in Mexico and that I wasn’t because I was born here. He told me I wasn’t Mexican; I was “white”. Throughout the rest of my childhood and adolescence my brother constantly reminded me that I was a güera, an outsider. Angry at first and convinced to prove him wrong, I dove deeper into learning about my culture and heritage. His remarks drove me to wear this dress, not a costume but a symbol. It wasn’t until later that I realized his comments derived from jealousy because he felt as if he didn’t have a country he belonged to. My parents brought my brother over here when he was only a toddler. He has no real memories of growing up in Mexico. According to both the media and the government, he didn’t belong here either without a signed piece of paper. It wasn’t until this year, more than twenty years later, that he was allowed to call himself American in the country that he grew up in. I keep the dress as a reminder that a signed piece of paper doesn’t define who we are, we do.
Menlo’s New Student Union By Dr. Andrea Peeters, Dean of Student Affairs
The development of Menlo’s New Student Union is underway! This effort, largely driven by the ideas of students, and generously supported by trustee giving, will bring to campus a new place for engagement, lounging, and play. Some of the elements being incorporated into the new space include a TV/gaming room where students can go head-to-head in video game competition or bring friends together to watch the big game. The Tavern will be back, along with a cafe serving a variety of hot and cold dishes and beverages throughout the day. The space has been created by students for students, and the design will allow for more collaboration for every kind of Menlo student. Commuter students will be able to call the place their home for the day. All students will have a late night hang out and a gathering place for dances, receptions, competitions, and multicultural experiences. The New Student Union will be a place for all to come together.
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Photo: Andrey Poliakov
Speaking Up as CalCPA Ambassador By Hunter Dupee ’18 I never thought that at 21 years old I’d have the opportunity to speak with state council members in Sacramento as an advocate for financial literacy and CPA friendly tax legislation. Attending Certified Public Accountants Day at the Capitol in January with CalCPA gave me just that opportunity. Being a student member of CalCPA as their Menlo College Campus Ambassador has enriched my professional life in countless ways. We’ve all heard the old adage about women in business, “You can’t be what you can’t see.” Within CalCPA I get to see many successful women and the career paths they’ve chosen. This has opened my eyes to all the possibilities I might have before me; I have learned about different career opportunities in both public and industry accounting. In turn, I’ve been able to come back to Menlo and share these experiences with my peers and help guide them in their career search. Whether you are in accounting, finance, or business law, being a member of CalCPA is essential to building your professional network. I couldn’t be more appreciative for the way CalCPA has supported me and others. This experience has already enriched my studies at Menlo College and 35 SUMMER 2018
A Place For Day Students By Maddeline Thomas ’18, Day Student Representative Menlo has over two-hundred day students on campus. Some live nearby in places like Menlo Park and Redwood City and others as far away as the East Bay. Menlo’s student government wants the new Student Union to feel like a home for day students. These students have to pack for the whole day; their dorm rooms are not steps away and it’s hard to carry all their things. Last fall the Day Student Committee heard from many students requesting lockers. They explained that their backpacks are too heavy to carry around, they don’t want to go back and forth to their cars, and they need somewhere to keep their things. The Student Union, a common place to meet and do things with other students, was the perfect venue for these lockers. One of the perks of being a day student is that student government provides free lunch every other Wednesday ordered from local restaurants. Now they also have lockers. Menlo always keeps day students in mind by promoting them to be involved and by having more events that welcome day students. Photo: Ian Morken
CalCPA Recognizes Menlo College Accounting Students Last November, the Peninsula Silicon Valley chapter of CalCPA recognized two Menlo College accounting students for outstanding academic performance in their majors. Hunter Dupee ’18 and Ariel Lipski ’18 were cited for high academic achievement and progress towards becoming Certified Public Accountants. Along with five other Menlo College students, Dupee and Lipski also received Book Awards, which help defray the cost of textbooks. These awards extend a 15-year unbroken record of the recognition of Menlo College accounting students by the Peninsula Silicon Valley chapter of CalCPA. As the CalCPA Ambassador to Menlo College, Dupee brings to campus a passion for becoming a CPA and also disseminates news from CalCPA, a professional organization of leading business and finance professionals, students and educators. Funding for the student awards, ambassadorships and other programs comes from the commitment members and sponsors make toward education. Accounting Professor Donna Little says, “I have been honored to work with CalCPA Peninsula/Silicon Valley over the past 15 years. Their generous scholarships, networking events, and educational forums have supported many of our students in becoming CPAs. They have been an integral resource in developing our strong accounting program at Menlo College.” MENLO COLLEGE
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COMMENCEMENT 2018
Commencement Advice to Graduates:
Allow Your Failures to be Your Next Teachers By Caroline Casper, Adjunct Professor of Literature The 90th commencement ceremony at Menlo College, held on May 5, 2018, kicked off on a sunny Saturday in Atherton, California with a spirited procession of the cheering and clapping graduating class. The audience was then treated to a rendition of the national anthem sung by graduating seniors Mariah Gale and Erika Vargas, and the ceremony was officially convened by Grand Marshal Charles “Chop” Keenan III ’66. In his first commencement as Menlo College President (his sixth commencement overall), Steven Weiner offered a warm welcome to the audience and to the families, partners and friends of the graduating class of 2018. He thanked the faculty, the Board of Trustees, and staff members for making this day
President Weiner then introduced the chair of the Menlo College Diversity Committee on Equity and Inclusion, Professor Melissa Michelson, to congratulate graduating military veterans Edwin Li, Leland Placheta, and Logan Winterton, and to recognize the rich contributions that the College gains from its diverse student body. Micah Kane ’91, Vice Chair of the Menlo College Board of Trustees, and Jordan Long, trustee and valedictorian of the Menlo class of 2009, spoke next about the importance of giving back. “Starting today you have the opportunity to make the value of your Menlo College diploma even greater,” said Kane, whose daughter, Ili ‘20, is a current student at Menlo. Long encouraged graduates, who are now among the 15,000 Menlo college alumni in the world today, to stay connected with
“Read twelve books a year, be curious, have confidence in your possible. Speaking to the students, he said, “I look at you and feel wonderfully optimistic about the future of our College...all of you, I hope, will consider this the first day of the next days of your lifetime of learning.” President Weiner offered the students his “takeaways” from his own life and career, which took a few unexpected turns after his graduation from the University of Chicago. “Graduation is the end of four years, I hope four very gratifying years, but the learning that has to occur in the next phase is never ending…from this place forward you will experience education in a fundamentally different way.” 37 SUMMER 2018
the College in order to make an impact. “Our experience and our time is needed,” he said. Dean of Student Affairs Andrea Peters introduced graduate Jaagriti Sharma, President of the Menlo College Student Government Associate. Sharma, a double-major in human resources and marketing, and the former president of the women’s business society, spoke eloquently about the importance of failure by telling the audience she had been rejected from 30 colleges and universities before arriving at Menlo College, an experience that changed her life in the most surprising and rewarding ways. “When life gives you thirty-something rejection letters, frame them so one day you can look back at how far you’ve come.”
Photos: Andrey Poliakov
Trustee and alumnus, David Irmer ’58, introduced this year’s valedictorian, Joseph Jauregui, and Provost Terri Givens recognized and introduced the year’s valedictorian from the Professional Studies Program, Brittany Santos, who pursued adult education at Menlo. Santos is also a familiar face on campus, as she works in the College’s Academic Affairs office. The day’s keynote speaker was Mar Hershenson, co-founder and managing partner at Pear VC, a seed-stage investment firm in Palo Alto. Hershenson, a native of Spain who emigrated to America as a young woman, works closely with founders to take companies from an idea to a defining business. She earned her PhD in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University in 2000, and started her first company, Barcelona Design, based on her research as a student to build “possibly the most sophisticated circuit design software at the time.” She began by likening the writing process for the day’s talk to
Today, as a successful venture capitalist sitting on the other side of the table, Hershenson is often surrounded by moments of failure—founders who can’t raise money, companies that shut down or cannot make payroll, customers who cancel contracts— but despite this, she said the best part of her job is the opportunity to be a close witness to many success stories, seeing people overcome failure despite dismal odds. “The companies that make it are not the best companies, but those whose founders refused to give up,” she said. Hershenson listens to 750 entrepreneurial pitches a year and only invests in about five of them, so she said the key to raising money is to exhibit character. “In that very first meeting, I’m only checking for one thing, the character of both the founder and the CEO. Even in a 30-minute meeting I can learn about that CEO’s character.” Hershenson closed her speech by offering the graduates a few
self, try new things, own your failures, be kind, and dream big.” packing a suitcase to come to America as a young woman. “I couldn’t fit everything in one suitcase so I had to carefully choose what was precious to me, and that’s what I did today. I packed my life into three key learnings and one great investment tip.” Hershenson shared those three keys, which included the importance of believing in yourself to overcome labels, the inevitability of failure, and the importance of cultivating character by investing in yourself. As a woman in a male-dominated industry, Hershenson said she has spent most of her adult life trying new things, such as sports, things she was often told as a child and young woman that she’d fail at accomplishing.
investment tips: Read twelve books a year, be curious, have confidence in yourself, try new things, own your failures, be kind, and dream big. “The world is changed by people like you—courageous, brave, somewhat foolish people that can dream beyond any of us. So dream, don’t wait. Go out there and peel off all of your labels… and keep your young spirit of the class of 2018 alive.” The members of the class of 2018 took to the stage to receive their diplomas and a handshake from President Weiner. A joyous cap toss and confetti concluded the ceremony, with Grand Marshal Charles “Chop” Keenan III leading the recessional. MENLO COLLEGE
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Go Find Your Something By Caroline Casper, Adjunct Professor of Literature
Menlo College trustee and alumnus, David Irmer ’58, introduced this year’s valedictorian at the graduation ceremony on Saturday, May 5 for a very special reason.
Menlo provided him with the chance to meet people from different countries and to sit with his favorite professor or coach in the cafeteria at lunch.
Several years ago, Irmer gave a scholarship to Menlo to support the education of a deserving student. He didn’t request that his scholarship be awarded to the brightest or the best student; he just asked the College to make sure it would make a difference. No one could have foretold that the recipient of Irmer’s generous scholarship would be this year’s valedictorian, Joseph Jauregui.
“Menlo is special,” he said. “You come in alone, anxious, excited, afraid…but you leave confident, knowledgeable and, although we may not feel like it, ready for the next chapter.”
“Joseph exemplifies the ideal of a student athlete: a wellrounded student whose talent integrates multiple forms of excellence—mind and body, intellect and character, individual and team. I am very proud and pleased to introduce Joseph,” Irmer said. Jauregui was charismatic and funny at the podium as he spoke to his fellow classmates: “ “Congratulations,” he said. “The ride has lowkey just begun.” He spoke about the unexpected benefits of attending a school like Menlo: “When we all came here to Menlo, we knew the school was small, but I don’t think we realized what going to a small school really meant.” He went on to say that because of its size,
He spoke about the importance of looking for and, eventually, finding your something. He said he arrived at Menlo thinking he was certain about his something; he had dreams of winning a national title in wrestling. But he was later injured, and when he realized he wouldn’t be able to accomplish this dream, he found he was able to accomplish something even greater, he could become the valedictorian of his class. He thanked his mother, father and brother for encouraging him, and he took an emotional moment to express gratitude to his deceased grandfather for teaching him how to wrestle and for showing him how to become a grownup at such a young age. He thanked his friends and teammates, and all the teachers at Menlo before turning to his classmates and saying, “Congratulations to the class of 2018. Now go find your something.” Photos both pages: Andrey Poliakov
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Faculty Closeups
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Menlo’s Lu’au Celebrates Tradition By Timothy Burke ’18
A Lūʻau is a Hawaiian feast named after the taro roots which are commonly offered at these Hawaiian gatherings. “Lūʻau” is not an ancient Hawaiian word but can be dated back to 1856, when it was first used as a way to advertise this event. Formerly, a feast was known as pāʻina or ʻahaʻaina. Here at Menlo College, The Pacific Islander Club, formerly known as The Hawaiʻi Club, welcomes and celebrates students from every background. We host a Lūʻau every year as a way to celebrate the Pacific Islander history and population on campus. Since 1991, The Pacific Islander Club has used the Lūʻau as a way to educate the com-
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munity about the culture and to further relationships with others, on and off campus. The Pacific Islander Club started the planning for this yearʻs Lūʻau and other educational and cultural events in June, with members fundraising over their summer break. The club started hula practice in August, averaging about 10 hours of practice a week. Two weeks prior to the Lūʻau, practice is increased to around 25 hours a week. The club has been honored to have Kumu Hula (Hula Teacher) Martini Eke choreographing and advising the club for over 20 years. Martini, who is also the lead dancer for Kumu Mark Keali’iho’omalu and made the music for the Disney film Lilo & Stitch, has taught generations of Menlo College students an art form that will live on as a Menlo tradition for years to come. Photos: Ian Morken and Amaryon Bates
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Alumna Reflection:
Taylor Morrow ’16 Carries her Menlo Values Forward By Dylan Houle, Associate Director of Internships & Career Services A recent conversation with Professor Leslie Sekerka led to some reflection; I began to think about my time at Menlo and how those years have affected and shaped my life. My four years at Menlo College were full of opportunities that I would not have experienced anywhere else. I devoted four years as a member of the women’s soccer team, three years working as a Writing Center tutor and Library Assistant, two years working as a Web Marketing Assistant, and almost two years creating the Journalism Club and the Menlo Oak Press. My college years were busy and I loved it! Every class I took helped prepare me for my career in business, but the ones that stand out were those that focused on teaching morals and examples of “real” work experiences. Professor Marar’s Diversity in the Workplace and Professor Sekerka’s Business Ethics courses are two such examples. Both of these women inspired me. Those courses provided scenarios and case studies that prepared me for what I experienced after graduation. I knew how to deal with an unethical work environment as well as the importance of analysis and writing skills. I would not be where I am today without Menlo College. The classes I took, mentors I gained, and life lessons I learned have provided opportunities that enable me to live the values I hold. Taylor Morrow ’16 is the Social Media Community Coordinator at 23andMe. She lives in Santa Clara, California, and her hobbies are reading and hiking.
Menlo Alumnus Makes Professional Mixed Martial Arts Debut At the age of 32, Josh Emmett ’10 is poised to make his professional mixed martial arts debut with the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC). A wrestler when he was an Oak, he says he got into fighting because he wants to be a world champion. Said Emmett, “I want to be the best fighter in the featherweight division on the planet. And I’m getting closer and closer to achieving that goal.” 4 5 SUMMER 2018
The Success of Plug and Play Founder & CEO Saeed Amidi ’81 By Caroline Casper, Adjunct Professor of Literature Menlo College alumnus Saeed Amidi ’81 often says that his experience in building relationships as a student at Menlo College still, after all these years, drives his success. Amidi is an active member of the Silicon Valley tech community and the founder and CEO of Plug and Play, an international network that has accelerated thousands of start-ups, and serves as a multinational corporate innovation platform for Fortune 1000 companies. Plug and Play has collectively raised more than $7 billion in venture capital and created thousands of job opportunities, making it one of the most dynamic innovation platforms and venture capital firms in the tech community. When international entrepreneurs want a shot at Silicon Valley stardom, they call on Amidi. Amidi said he learned to value and cultivate relationships while still a student at Menlo. “At Menlo, we created relationships with students from all over the world,” Amidi said. “I remember friends from Singapore, Hong Kong, India, Saudi Arabia, and Norway. Relationships, and trust, those are the bases of any transaction.” Amidi, who was called Silicon Valley’s Hottest Matchmaker by Inc. in 2013, credits his early success to the partnerships he created with Menlo classmates after graduating in the early 1980s. In one of his first ventures out of
college, he and a former classmate from Saudi Arabia helped launch Delta, now one of the largest bottled water companies in the Middle East. He then went on to launch a second company with a former Menlo classmate in Norway, and a third with a former classmate from Hong Kong. “Because of Menlo, I knew them and trusted them,” he said. Amidi went on to say that the prime location of Menlo College in Silicon Valley, and the high caliber of international students the school attracts, makes the College a great place for anyone looking to start a business or become an entrepreneur, whether interested in technology or not. “You can apply what you learn at Menlo in any industry,” he said. Amidi’s been involved with many new emerging growth companies, including three investments with over $1B valuation: Paypal (acquired by eBay), Lending Club (IPO in 2014) and Dropbox. He’s also a frequent contributor to numerous charitable foundations. He recently bestowed the College with a generous gift to accelerate the growth of our entrepreneurial program. This gift, along with the financial support of a trustee to build out the Innovation Center, our participation in the Stanford d.school University Innovation Fellows program, and the launch of the Menlo College student Pioneer Club, will propel the entrepreneurial studies program here at Menlo and, one day, likely send throngs of Menlo grads through the doors of Plug and Play. “Most of the joy I get out of my job now comes from seeing entrepreneurs be successful in their dreams,” he said.
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Photos: Amaryon Bates and Saybah Biawogi
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Cheers to Menlo! At Menlo’s annual OAKS-in-Industry event, held February 21 this year, current students met with alumni and College supporters for an evening to connect, network, and engage. Hosted by the “Bay Area’s Friendliest Beer Maker” and alumnus Chris Garrett ’94 at his Devil’s Canyon Brewing Company, the great food and drinks helped to make for a festive event.
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IN MEMORIAM Donald Drury, former head of Menlo College Library (1927-2018) Donald Drury, former head of the Menlo College library, passed away on March 3, 2018, at the age of 90. Drury was born in London, in an apartment adjacent to his family’s place of business, Glass House, a stained glass studio, founded in 1897 by his grandfather. After emigrating to the U.S., Drury completed a degree in library science at UC Berkeley. He served as librarian at Menlo College for more than 30 years, until he retired in 1995.
Joseph Greenbach, Jr. ’47 (1929-2017) Joe Greenbach attended Menlo College in the years shortly after World War II. He was a member of Menlo’s basketball team, and was honored with membership in the Menlo College Hall of Fame. Greenbach was a 1950 draft pick by the Washington Capitols, but he declined that opportunity to pursue a career in his family’s real estate business, Belle Haven Realty. As president and CEO of Belle Haven Realty, Greenbach helped build over 3,000 homes in San Mateo County. He oversaw hotel operations throughout California and in Washington State, and built the first high-rise hotel in Waikiki Beach, Hawaii, as well as the Royal Towers on Russian Hill in San Francisco. Greenbach received many honors over the course of his career, including a lifetime achievement award for starting the San Mateo County Convention and Visitor’s Bureau. He also won the Humanitarian of the Year award from the Easter Seal Society for Crippled Children and Adults of San Mateo County. His first wife Betty died before him. In 1997, Greenbach married Nancy, who survives him, as do his children—Dan Greenbach, Kim Jones, Mylie Greenbach, Tami Adam, Matt Mattix, and Jennifer Oines—and 11 grandchildren.
Lynham Wallace Jones (1938-2018) Lynham Wallace Jones died on March 13, 2018, at home in Twain Harte, California. A third-generation San Franciscan and the great-grandson of James Edman Plaskett, a pioneer settler in Sutter County, Jones received his business degree from Menlo College in 1964. He was the husband of the former Lois Ethington, and father of Shelley and Craig. He is survived by his second wife, Jan Jones.
Merritt Sher (1939-2018) A 1960 Menlo graduate, Bay Area real estate developer Merritt Sher passed away on March 4, 2018. Sher’s best-known projects include the rebirth of Oakland’s Jack London Square, and development of the h2hotel and Hotel Healdsburg, both icons of the town of Healdsburg, California. He was also an investor in The Gap, Pacific Sunwear, Tilly’s Surf Shop, Stacks and Stacks, and the former Rainbow Records. Sher was a New Jersey native who found his way to California after high school in order to enroll at Menlo College. He subsequently graduated from San Francisco State, and then earned a law degree at Hastings College of Law. “I’ve known Merritt for over 50 years. We spoke of Menlo College in kind terms. A very bright, wonderful man! He will be missed,” said David Irmer ’58, President of the Innisfree Companies. In addition to his achievements in real estate development, Sher also authored a book on business: 10 Birds with One Stone. He is survived by his wife Pam, his three children Justin, Circe, and Lacey, and two grandchildren.
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Daniel Sexton Gurney ’51 (1931-2018) After graduating from Menlo College and spending two years in the United States Army, Dan Gurney ’51 went on to achieve a stellar career as a race car driver, race car manufacturer and inventor, and racing team owner. He was the first race car driver with victories in each of the Formula One, IndyCar and NASCAR Cup series. He died on January 14, 2018, at the age of 86. Gurney’s racing career started in 1955 and spanned 15 years. By the time he retired from active driving in 1970, he had raced in 312 events in 20 countries, winning 51 races. He was a top road racing star, as well as one of the most popular F1 drivers of the era. Among his most notable accomplishments was winning the 1967 Formula 1 Belgian Grand Prix in the Eagle-Weslake, a car of his own creation. Hollywood fame was yet another of Gurney’s achievements: He appeared in motor racing films, including Winning, A Man and a Woman and Grand Prix. His win of the Cannonball Run across the United States in 1971 inspired his friend and co-pilot, Brock Yates, to write the screenplay for the Cannonball movies. Gurney is survived by his wife Evi, and his sons Alex, Justin, Jimmy, John, and Dan Jr., and daughter Lyndee Gurney-Prazak.
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Dorothy Skala Alumni Center Opens By Rosetta Clay, Executive Director of Alumni Engagement and Development On April 7, 2018, Menlo alumni joined family and friends of Dorothy Skala for the official opening of the Dorothy Skala Alumni Center. It was a beautiful sunny day, befitting the event to honor a woman who was revered by so many at Menlo College, for so many years. The naming of the Center and its central location overlooking the main campus quadrangle are symbolic reminders of the legacy of Dorothy Skala at Menlo College. Pat Skala, Dorothy’s daughter, spoke on behalf of the family to express their joy and appreciation for the ways in which Menlo recognized her mother during her more than 50 year tenure, and in all the years since. “Mom truly loved Menlo and Menlo has always returned the love,” said Pat.
Being a Better Bear Menlo students join in the Ethics in Action Center’s community outreach by working with neighborhood youth groups to help young people learn to pause, reflect, and share conversation about “how to be a better bear,” part of the Being a Better Bear Reading Initiative. Under the leadership of Center Director Leslie Sekerka, the initiative helps people develop their character strengths and fosters the habituation of ethics as a daily practice. These gatherings are conducted six times each year at boys and girls clubs, elementary schools, and special needs environments, bringing Menlo to the surrounding community.
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Art Exhibit Coming to Menlo in October 2018! Five years ago, artists from around the world were invited to create work for an exhibit called 85 Years 85 Artists celebrating the college’s anniversary. Artists were arbitrarily assigned a year from the college timeline and asked to respond with artwork. Chicago-based artist Rose Camastro-Pritchett drew 1940. During her research she became interested in the 200,000 “comfort women” who were forced to provide sex for the Japanese Military during WWII. Her Comfort Women Project grew from this first moving artwork. We are very pleased to announce that she will be bringing the entire collection to Menlo this fall. Stay tuned for more information!
Comfort Women Quilt Patch
Exquisite Corpse Returns! By Erik Bakke, Director of the Writing Center Unless you played Pokémon on campus a year or so ago, you may have never noticed a clay, sculptural artwork behind some plantings near the Academic Success Center entrance at the front of the Bowman Library building. The work was created by Judy Wasmann. Learning Services Manager, and her students in the summer of 2005. It was also, more recently, the site of a Pokéstop. Judy Wasmann and the other artists used the exquisite corpse method. The students were given general instructions (make an arm, for example), but they were not aware of what the other students’ contributions would be. Each of the 22 pieces of the sculpture was completed out of sight of the others before being assembled into a whole figure. The work was in storage for a while and now has been reinstalled. Make sure to stop by the Administration Building to see the sculpture in its new location and to take a close look at the exquisite corpse. The Art Committee will provide a plaque to commemorate the making of the work and the students’ involvement. MENLO COLLEGE
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Where Tech and Sport Meet By Aaron Gillespie, Assistant Athletic Director Communications and Marketing
Menlo College alumnus Adam Ochart ’15, was a leader on the baseball team as an Oak, and now is blazing his own trail in the golf world. Ochart is a Site Coordinator for The First Tee of San Francisco, where he teaches golf and life skills to youth. He is also the founder of Trackman Rentals, a company that provides access to the high-tech training tool Trackman Launch Monitors to golfers who are looking to learn more about their swing and the metrics behind it. Trackman Launch Monitors allow the golfer to see such key performance metrics as shot shape, spin rate, distance traveled, and swing speed. Insight into those factors contribute to a better understanding of the way a golfer’s swing works and how their balls travel. These tools can quickly provide the knowledge needed to drop strokes on the course and improve game enjoyment. As the monitors run anywhere from 20 to 30 thousand dollars apiece, they are beyond reach for most golfers. That realization is what sparked the light bulb for Ochart, and his entrepreneurial spirit kicked in. Ochart and a partner purchased two monitors, launched a website, and began marketing their business. One of his first clients happened to be the Menlo golf team, coached by Ochart’s former assistant baseball coach, Mike Givens. “It all aligned perfectly and it turned out that Menlo has a bunch of young, new golfers who are tech-driven and have either used Trackman or wanted to use it,” said Ochart. Perhaps not coincidentally, the Oaks are in the midst of their best season as a team in program history. The business continues to grow as does the skill set and entrepreneurial savvy of Ochart, who credits Menlo College for making him believe in his abilities. “Menlo plants that seed in you that if you want to start a business, you can and you should,” he noted. “I was lucky to have a class with the late Professor Ron Kovas, and he kept telling us that the ball is our court. He said that if we want to do something, it’s a matter of putting the rubber on the road and committing.”
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Reaching Fans Far and Wide by Streaming Games By Aaron Gillespie, Assistant Athletic Director Communications and Marketing Web streaming live sporting events is a major trend in the college athletics landscape, and Menlo College has been at it for nearly eight years. The College’s Athletics Communication group includes fulltime staff as well as student broadcasters, camera operators, and producers. The humble beginnings of the live web streaming Menlo Sports Network included a standard definition pay-per-view stream, which averaged 15-20 viewers per game. Fast forward to 2018, when we boast a fully HD production with top-quality on-air broadcasting talent, custom produced graphics and video content, and often times, a multi-camera production that averages nearly 300 viewers per stream, and is available free to viewers. The reach of these broadcasts is world-wide. Anyone with an internet connection can access the action on our Stretch Internet platform— the industry leader in the small college athletics streaming space. Home and visiting fans alike who are unable to make it to Atherton
are still able to enjoy the action of every home game, all season long. With student-athletes on the campus from 26 states and 34 countries, streaming has proved to be a valuable tool for friends and families to keep tabs on the action all year long. As all broadcasts are archived and available to view on-demand, the action can also be seen at any time. This year alone, the Menlo College Sports Network has broadcast over 100 regular season contests with Voice of the Oaks Brian Brownfield handling the majority of the play-by-play action. Brownfield ’17, broadcast his first-ever game as a freshman, and he has grown into his current role as a polished, memorable voice for the network and full-time staff member. His impressive on-air portfolio at Menlo includes calling 300+ Oaks contests spanning five different sports. Go Oaks!
Follow Menlo games live via portal.stretchinternet.com/menlo/.
Live Stream Menlo Athletics Announcer Brian Brownfield ‘17 “Kudos to your basketball announcer!!! I’m a parent of a Westmont women’s basketball player from Colorado. I watched the game last night via the live stream. The announcer was the BEST I’ve ever heard in the four years listening to NAIA basketball. He was so thorough and descriptive of both teams’ members. The game was much more exciting with him doing the play by play.” -Ross Ferrin, Denver, Colorado
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ATHLETICS
One for the Record Books By Aaron Gillespie, Assistant Athletic Director Communications and Marketing The spring semester proved to be one for breaking records. Setting the pace was Menlo’s women’s basketball team. The Oaks knocked off five top-25 ranked teams in the nation, including wins over the #1 and #3 ranked teams, and achieved the deepest run of any team in program history in the NAIA Division I National Championships. The Lady Oaks advanced all the way to the round of eight, finishing the season ranked in the top 25 with a 23-9 overall record. On the mats, both men’s and women’s wrestling had stellar seasons. Men’s wrestling finished 10th in the nation. The women were not to be outdone; they wrapped up in 5th place in the nation. Three men’s wrestlers and four women’s wrestlers earned All-American status. Head Coach Joey Martinez won both the Cascade Collegiate Conference and National Wrestling Coaches’ Association Coach of the Year Awards, and the team won the NAIA Champions of Character Team Award. Both women’s and men’s wrestling were honored as national scholar teams.
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On the softball diamond, the team rewrote the record book. They advanced to the GSAC tournament, and placed four members on the All-GSAC team. Brooke Shigematsu ‘18 hit over .447 on the season, with 38 runs, 15 doubles, five triples and eight home runs. Her 49 RBIs broke the single-season program record, and she also broke the program’s career RBI record. She is the team’s all-time leader in games played, runs scored and doubles. On the Track, the men’s team wrapped up the regular season with a 4th place finish at the GSAC Championship Meet, where the women finished 6th. Twelve Oaks achieved All-Conference status, and qualifying marks will send three Oaks to the National Tournament in Gulf Shores, Alabama in late May: Jonnythan Munkholm ’18 will compete in the triple jump; Tommy Wright ‘19 will compete in both the long and triple jumps; and Da’Schele Sauls ’19 will compete in the 200-meter race. The Oaks concluded the year with 141 wins across all teams, the most in department history. Six programs were among the top 25 of in the nation. Fifteen of 16 teams posted a 3.0 or better GPA, and student-athletes claimed 10 of 16 awards at the 2018 Menlo College Honors Convocation award ceremony. There’s never been a better year for Menlo College Athletics.
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Shelly Avelino ’21 Makes Philippines Menlo grappler Shelly Avelino competed successfully for a position on the Philippines National Women’s Wrestling team. She’ll be going for gold at next year’s 11-country Southeast Asian Games in Manila. Avelino had a great freshman season with the Oaks, qualifying
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National Women’s Wrestling Team for the National Tournament. The outstanding performances of Avelino and her teammates led the Oaks to a 5th place national finish. Menlo’s wrestling program is on the map.
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Banner Year Celebrated at Annual Athletics Banquet
Menlo College Athletics hosted its annual banquet on March 28 to celebrate a historic year for the department. The Oaks won a department-best 141 games in 201718, 18 more than the prior season. Recognition came in the form of 25 All-GSAC honorees, four All-Region, 15 All-Americans, 17 Academic All-Americans and 20 GSAC Player-of-the-Week Honors. Six department teams were ranked in the top 25 of their respective sports, and 15 of 16 programs posted a GPA of 3.0 or better. Top honors went to Don Baike Athletes of the Year recipients Anthony Orozco ’20 and Kaylin Swart ’18; and Bud Presley Coach of the Year recipient Joey Martinez.
Warrior Star Kevin Durant Provides Scholarship to Menlo College Student Hoops player Kevin Durant started playing basketball as a member of the Boys & Girls Club when he was growing up in Prince George’s County, Maryland, and he has supported Boys & Girls Clubs ever since. Along with Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative’s education chief Jim Shelton, Durant was among the judges for this year’s Youth of the Year award, organized by the Boys and Girls Clubs of the Peninsula. Durant surprised incoming Menlo freshman Dezmond “Dez” Frazier with the offer to pay his first year of college tuition. For Frazier, that support will help him launch his Menlo education when he joins next year as a member of the class of 2022.
Who is This? Atherton neighbor and former NFL star Jerry Rice, known for his work ethic, continues to stay in shape with regular runs on Menlo’s track. His former team, the San Francisco 49ers, held summer training camp at Menlo College in the 1950s.
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Menlo College’s Annual Vegas Night a Big Success Menlo College Athletics hosted its biggest and best Vegas Night Fundraiser yet on March 24th. Nearly 300 people filled Haynes-Prim Pavilion for an evening of fun in support of the Oaks. The event included a silent auction, mock gaming, Texas Hold ‘Em and a live DJ. A number of Oaks’ faithful walked away with great prizes. Follow @MenloAthletics on social media for updates on next year’s event!
Menlo Adds Three New Sports to the Lineup A trio of new club sport offerings are set to roll out at Menlo College for the 2018-19 academic year. eSports, Rowing and Weightlifting will join a club sports roster that already includes Cheer & Dance and Baseball. The fastest growing sport in the world is also one of the fastest growing club and varsity sports at the intercollegiate level: eSports. Alex Holler has been tapped as the Head Coach for Menlo’s program and the North Carolina native brings a great deal of experience to the table. He has already put Menlo on the map in the gaming landscape, joining forces with the National Association of Collegiate eSports and the High School eSports League. Our team will largely compete in League of Legends, Overwatch, CS:GO, PUBG, Hearthstone and Rocket League (names you’ll know if you’re a gamer!). Club Weightlifting will be coached by a familiar Menlo face: current Sports Performance Coach Karl Reyes. Karl has deep roots in the Bay Area and word of the new Menlo College Weightlifting program has spread like wildfire. He has partnered with USA Weightlifting to help promote this emerging sport. His tireless work ethic will prove vital as he builds a competitive men’s and women’s weightlifting team for the fall. The third club sport to roll out next year is Rowing, led by newly-recruited Head Coach Stefan Evano. Evano has been busy establishing local connections, including with the Bair Island Aquatic Center, where the Oaks will have local access to boats and dock. He currently holds his US Rowing Level 2 Certification. With 16 varsity teams and soon five club sports offerings, the breadth of Menlo Athletics exceeds that of most small colleges. Surveys repeatedly confirm that employers value the leadership, resilience, discipline, and teamwork that college sports promote. And every year, thousands of American students choose their college based on the opportunity to keep playing a sport that has become part of their identity. The new sports extend Menlo’s reach even more. At Menlo, the ideal of the scholar-athlete is alive and well. We recognize and prize the fact that quality athletics programs can add deep value to a learning environment. MENLO COLLEGE
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SAVE THE DATES!
October 26-27, 2018 Come back to the warmth of Menlo College for OAKtoberFest. You'll get to see our new student union and the Acorn Coffee Bar featuring your favorite chai or latte and, especially, your friends from your years at Menlo!