Alumni Profiles

In the ClassroomAlumni Spotlight

Lessons Learned as a Tatnall “Theater Kid”

Lauren Lovet ’89 Lauren Lovett’s favorite time of day on the Tatnall campus was actually night, when the world was tucked in all quiet and still.

“Like every kid, there were times during the day when I didn’t feel in harmony with the school, but there was room for me there at night,” recalls the 1989 grad. “I remember it feeling so safe and magical.”

Lovett got to experience that magic because she was a self-described “theatre kid” who spent countless hours rehearsing in the old theater building after school. She came to Tatnall in fifth grade with an already-established passion for acting.

“I visited other schools but at Tatnall there was a stronger sense of humanity… it felt like a community to me,” she says. “And even though Tatnall leaned conservative like a lot of private schools, it also fostered and encouraged my creative side, especially when I got to high school.”

Beginning in ninth grade, Lovett began landing lead roles in Tatnall’s spring musicals and fall plays. The plays were part of the school’s advanced theater class called Showcase (“With a capital S,” Lovett says with a laugh). “The Matchmaker”, “The Good Doctor”, “The Miracle Worker”, and the female version of “The Odd Couple” are ingrained in her memory.

Dr. Bruce Chipman, then Head of English and Director of Showcase, and Assistant Director Rosemary Crawford left an indelible impression on Lovett.

“Dr. Chipman was both exacting and loving, a big personality and a powerful presence…he was like your theater uncle,” she says. “Rosemary, who passed away in 2013, was gentle and would pull you aside to make suggestions. They weren’t a couple, but they made a great couple. They had a team approach and a shared vision; you never saw them argue. It was a great model for us as kids.”

They were also very good directors.

“This wasn’t a high school hobby for them, they had talent and they nurtured the talent of their actors and crew,” Lovett says. “It was clear they knew more than you, but they always treated you like an artist and like someone who had something to give and something to say. I was a professional actor for years, and I can tell you that’s really unique.”

After graduation, Lovett would go on to earn a BFA at the Juilliard School and then spend the next two decades working as an actor in regional theater around the country. Life eventually carried her to Los Angeles and today she owns Speak Well, a thriving consultancy that has her helping actors and business professionals refine and revitalize their overall presence, including the way they speak, what they’re saying, and their intended outcome.

In 2019, Lovett was one of nine former students invited to return to Tatnall to honor Dr. Chipman upon his retirement from Showcase Director after 47-years (he maintains his position as Emeritus Head of English). While she has never tried to follow his lead as a director, the lessons Lovett learned as a “theatre kid” at Tatnall still echo in her head.

“My experience in Showcase wasn’t just, ‘You’re going to do what I say.’ It was more like, ‘How are we going to tell this story together,’” she explains. “That’s the philosophy I have with all of my clients. I know what I’m doing and I’m going to help you, but you are a very important partner in this relationship. The trust and respect Dr. Chipman and Rosemary had in us as students and artists is the same approach I use when I teach today.” I visited other schools but at Tatnall there was a stronger sense of humanity… it felt like a community to me.

Alumni Spotlight

Designer Still Drawing on Tatnall Experiences Years Later

Jackie Ivy ’88 Jackie Ivy has worked as a designer for some of the nation’s most iconic brands, including Urban Outfitters, Rag & Bone, and Nike. At every stop, she’s helped shape the look and feel of their stores and influenced how they sell products. She says the seeds of her career were planted at Tatnall.

“I took art history in tenth grade and loved it,” she says. “It was the coolest thing I could have imagined. In my senior year, Mrs. Mason let me do an advanced independent art study with her in lieu of physics. She was – and still is – one of my idols.”

Although Jackie started at Tatnall in fifth grade, the school had long been a part of her life. Her mother, Alice Mearns Ivy, taught there alongside Mrs. Tatnall in the early 1950s. Mrs. Ivy left and started a family but returned in 1978 to work at Tatnall’s preschool. Jackie’s brother, Herb (class of ’81), started at Tatnall during this time, and a few years later Jackie and her sister Carroll (class of ’84) attended as well.

After graduating in 1988, Jackie was off to the University of Virginia where she took an Intro to Architecture/Intro to Design class and fell in love with how it blended the intellectual with the artistic. She would graduate with a degree in Architecture and American Studies and proceed to build a successful career—starting at the Peggy Guggenheim Museum in Venice, Italy, and working her way up to Senior Director of Global Retail Design for Nike. Along the way she earned a master’s degree in Environmental and Exhibition Design from Yale’s School of Architecture. Today, Jackie and her daughters live in Portland, Oregon. She is currently one year into a two-year fellowship at the Garrison Institute, which is based in upstate New York. In that role, she is developing collaborative transformative justice practices, using her skill as an experiential designer and her extensive knowledge of mindfulness and meditation. Her aim is to help people develop ways of seeing events, points of view, and behaviors that are widely hidden within today’s contemporary culture. These practices give everyone the ability to develop a greater awareness of anti-oppressive – and oppressive – behaviors.

“I have worked for many brands and companies during my career, and would become acutely aware of the incongruent cultural elements,” she says. “Sometimes a company would publicly espouse certain values yet contradict them when it came time to make leadership decisions or to keep Wall Street happy. It was not always malicious or intentional—simply easily overlooked or by-passed when inconvenient. What if there are ways to address these issues in a more transparent, mindful manner? I have been studying cultural trends for my entire career—probably my entire life. They come from a combination of ‘Bottom Up/Top Down’ decisions. There is never a straight line, or a simple answer to big questions.”

More than 30 years after graduating from Tatnall, the names of Jackie’s teachers and mentors still roll easily off her tongue.

“I loved Gail Flynn, she was an epic Middle School English teacher. Mr. White was an iconic social studies teacher— everyone dreaded that darn sixth grade salmon migration film. Rosemary Crawford was especially influential…she took a group of us to Richmond one spring break to experience a completely different perspective of life—volunteering at a homeless shelter.

“My teachers at Tatnall weren’t just superior educators,” she concludes, “they were superior human beings.”

My teachers at Tatnall weren’t just superior educators, they were superior human beings.

In the ClassroomAlumni Spotlight

Tatnall Alum Reflects Upon the Art of Pursuing Your Passion

Enjoy the process, don’t be hard on yourself. Everything happens in steps. Calida Rawles’ advice to today’s students is drawn from her own experience, “Enjoy the process, don’t be hard on yourself. Everything happens in steps.”

Rawles is a writer and acclaimed artist whose largeformat ethereal paintings of black men and women floating calmly in water have appeared in galleries around the world. But well before she landed on the global stage, Rawles was a student at Tatnall.

“I loved my Bible Myth and Epic class,” she remembers. “And of course Ms. Baylin, Dr. Chipman, and Ms. Ripley. English literature and art were my passions and Tatnall gave me the chance to expand upon those.”

It wasn’t until she was a student at Spelman College, however, that she developed her fondness for painting. “It was what I really loved to do, and I could do it for hours,” she shares. “Though I didn’t believe it could be a career at the time. It wasn’t until much later, after being in the art world, that I saw this was possible.”

From Spelman, Rawles traveled north for graduate school at New York University. The experience, while beneficial, left her questioning her future as an artist.

“I wasn’t sure I should be painting and so I stopped for a bit,” she says. The next several years were spent working as a graphic artist, getting married and raising her children. Rawles also expanded her creative portfolio to include writing and in 2011 she published a children’s book, “Same Difference.” She never fully abandoned her palette and brushes, however.

“I finally came to a point in 2015 where I needed to decide where I wanted to focus my energies—painting or writing,” she explains. “In the end, I realized that I really just want to paint.”

With her mind made up, Rawles set to work creating a strong body of work and selling paintings out of her 700-square-foot space in Inglewood California’s Beacon Arts Building. She also began hosting studio visits with collectors and galleries, talking about her work. Her first solo exhibit, at Various Small Fires in Los Angeles, sold out before its opening night. Rawles now has representation at the global gallery Lehmann Maupin with locations in New York, Hong Kong, Seoul, and London.

English and American literature strongly influence Rawles, and she draws upon many of the themes discussed in her classes at Tatnall — and later at Spelman College — in her paintings.

“Tatnall didn’t make me an artist, but it definitely gave me many of the tools I needed to become the artist I am today,” she says. “It was like a second home to me.”

In September, Rawles will have her first-ever solo exhibition in New York at Lehmann Maupin. This will coincide with the debut of a permanent installation at the new Hollywood Park/SoFi Stadium campus in Inglewood. To learn more about Rawles and her work visit calidagarciarawles.com.

Alumni Spotlight

The Many Loves of a Tatnall Grad

Heather Robb ‘01 with her mother, former Tatnall teacher Karen Barker Heather Robb had many loves at Tattnall.

The daughter of Upper School science teacher Karen Barker (who retired in 2018), Robb entered Tatnall at age three and stayed until her graduation in 2001.

The school was a natural fit for Robb and played to her creative nature—affording her with limitless opportunities to pursue her adoration of the arts.

“Theater was my first love and I participated in this both at Tatnall and in the community,” she explains. “I took part in school plays in elementary school, but it was my first big theater production in eighth grade that truly sparked my passion. I remember the sense of community and collaboration around a creative pursuit and the feeling that I really, really love this.”

Showcase—the school’s advanced theater class for students in the Upper and High School—its Director Dr. Bruce Chipman, Assistant Director Rosemary Crawford, and Technical Director Rick Neidig further fanned the flame for Robb. The regular stream of successful Tatnall alumni who visited the school helped too.

“Hearing someone who once walked in your shoes say you can have a successful career in the arts really makes an impact,” she shares. “They never presented it as easy, but it was nonetheless a path and a valid one at that. That was a big deal for me.”

But theater wasn’t Robb’s only love at Tatnall. She also had a deep affection for music and writing. Fortunately, she didn’t have to pick just one to pursue and today she has built a life that includes them all.

Following graduation from Syracuse University where she majored in drama, Robb connected with fellow Tatnall alum and friend James Cleare (’01) and Kennett Square native James Smith to launch the folk/rock trio, The Spring Standards (thespringstandards.net). The group, which draws its influences from bands such as Fleetwood Mac, toured full time from 2008 through 2015 and produced four albums and a feature-length concert film. It has also performed on Conan O’Brien and at the South by Southwest music festival among others.

Exhausted from being on-the-go, Robb took a break from performing and moved to Los Angeles to accept her first staffing as a TV writer for CBS. Her knack for story telling — honed largely through writing music — made it a natural move for Robb and she flourished in the creative environment. Though the transition was far from easy.

“I got a lot of Hollywood ‘baptism by fire’ early on,” Robb admits. “Fortunately, I had a good community and came into this with humility and determination. I had plenty to learn, but threw myself into it, joining the Writer’s Guild Union, taking classes, and doing my fair share of odd jobs and freelancing.”

Her second staffing came in 2019 with NBC. Then, just as the COVID-19 pandemic began, she was asked to be the writer-on-set for an original Freeform show called Cruel Summer, which was filming in Dallas. With the first season now under her belt, Robb is focused on her next challenge, a film with Rocket Pictures and Jersey Pictures based on the life of AIDS activist Ryan White. She is also developing the script for a stop-motion feature with Sean Pecknold and the music of Fleet Foxes.

“I’ve learned that you have to be prepared to take risks, more so when you’re doing something that is outside the box,” Robb shares. “Tatnall taught me to have an appetite for new challenges and empowered me with the raw materials I needed. Now it’s my job to refine and sharpen them.”

Learn more about Heather Robb’s work by visiting HeatherRobb.com.

Tatnall taught me to have an appetite for new challenges and empowered me with the raw materials I needed.