15 minute read
On the Move: Young Alumni Stories
The Fast Track Young Alumni On The Move
by Debbie Carini Young alumni are making their mark on the world in diverse ways. They are rising stars in their fields, innovators, leaders, and changemakers. These young alumni are also enriching the communities where they live, building businesses, and working to have a meaningful and positive impact on the world. They embody Webb’s mission to think boldly, mindfully and creatively; act with honor and moral courage; lead with distinction; and serve with a generous spirit. And they are excited about Webb’s future and possibilities for growth.
“Webb has moved forward,” says Dr. Connie Cheng ’05. “We’ve had difficult but necessary conversations concerning the ways we’re acknowledging race and class and we know we have room to grow. I hope we keep talking about it.”
Connie Cheng, MD ’05 OB-GYN/The Gynmama
Dr. Connie Cheng ’05 graduated from Pomona College with a degree in molecular biology, followed by Yale Medical School; she completed her residency at UCLA in Obstetrics and Gynecology. Today, she is one of two founding physicians at UCLA’s new Pasadena branch, where her daily activities range from delivering babies to providing abortion care to operating in minimally invasive robotic surgery to conducting community outreach to educating women about best health practices. She is also a wife and mother to one-year-old Jordan Jack Lee. In addition, she serves on the physicians’ council for June, a digital maternity career startup and runs an evidence-based women’s health blog on Instagram, @TheGynMama.
Her informative and often poignant blog posts on @TheGynMama (such as one recently where she described her own experience with fertility struggles) reveal the human side of a highly educated and respected doctor. She attributes a lot of her fearlessness in communicating these important issues to her experience at Webb.
She cites her close relationships with former teacher Anne Graybeal, track coach Phil Hogarth, tennis coach and calculus teacher Daren Starnes and coach Dan Pride.
“Ms. Graybeal encouraged us to think and listen to our thoughts—you’re supposed to learn things to pass the test, but she wanted to hear our interpretations. These people weren’t just my teachers, they were my mentors,” she said of the faculty who encouraged her to try different things, like running track and playing basketball (despite her 5’2” stature).
“They taught me to be mentally resilient—even when I was playing sports where I wasn’t the best, and the coach was tough,” she says.
“The fact that VWS is a school for girls also made me attuned to the difficult challenges that women face in their health,” she adds. “It opened my eyes to the fact that we go through different things health-wise.”
Kane Willis ’11 Upper School Dean, Poly Prep Country Day School
Kane Willis ’11 took advantage of almost every extracurricular activity Webb had to offer when he was a day student—from playing basketball to ASB to orchestra. Today, he finds himself on the flip side in private school, as the Upper School Dean at Poly Prep Country Day School in Brooklyn, N.Y. “I had so many wonderful teachers at Webb—they were so influential in different ways,” he says.
Willis was the first person in his family to graduate from high school, college and graduate school. He earned his BA from Amherst College with a double major in English and political science with concentrations in psychoanalysis and international studies. He then earned his MS in education from Johns Hopkins University with concentrations in social policy, secondary education and science education.
“I think one of the most important things I learned to do at Webb was to create relationships,” says Willis. He also cites time management.
“Webb was a rigorous institution that demanded a lot,” he says. “In college, I wrote up to four papers a week and I knew how to do that. I knew how to utilize office hours, how to talk to a professor, how to ask for help. That was critical.”
Poly Prep Country Day School is one of the most diverse independent schools in New York City, and Willis says he applies a lot of what he learned at Webb, even in difficult times, to what he does in his job.
As a student of color at Webb, Willis faced challenges that today, Webb continually seeks to improve, and that is something that he brings to his work as an educator now.
“There were no black or brown teachers when I was there,” he says. At Poly Prep, Willis has installed measures that allow BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) to feel seen on campus.
For two years, Willis taught at a high school in Hawaii as part of Teach for America. It opened a window to the high school side of the admission process. He realized that as a teacher, “You are responsible for other people’s children. You help build their foundations for what success is and what it means to be a ‘good human.’”
“I think the work that Webb is doing today in terms of diversity, gender and sexuality has contributed to making the school a better place,” he says.
Valerie Cook ’09 Law Student, American University, and Filmmaker
Valerie Cook ’09 graduated from the University of Southern California with a BA in critical studies and is currently earning a law degree at American University, Washington College of Law, but she still considers a Webb teacher as one of the most influential she’s had.
“To this day, Sr. Valera is one of the most impactful teachers I have ever had. I knew when I signed up to take his AP Spanish Literature class that it would be difficult, and the truth is, it is one of the hardest classes I have ever taken,” explains Cook. “We read all of Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote in Spanish and wrote analytical papers in Spanish as well. Sr. Valera’s expectation that his students do well was extremely high, but what made him great was that he modelled his expectations to us through his teaching. He worked so hard to make sure we understood a dense amount of material, and he succeeded. Every student deserves a teacher like him.”
Cook’s circuitous route to law school started at USC where she majored in Spanish — “largely due to the success I had in my Spanish classes at Webb,” she explains. But during her time at USC, she transferred into the film school and eventually went to work for Amazon Studios where she rose to senior post production executive of International Original Series. She also founded her own company, Happy Wanderer Productions, which advocates for solutions through investigation and exposition of underrepresented stories. “Thinking back on the hours I spent studying in the library and the pages of papers I wrote in college, I know they were built on the foundation that I acquired at Webb,” she says. “Webb’s nightly study hours, advisory groups, small classes and accessibility to teachers all paved the way for collegiate success. Webb had so many available resources and staff, I learned how to seek help and identify tools that would be helpful to me when I needed support.”
The decision to go to law school was not one that she made lightly considering she had already begun to establish herself in Hollywood with numerous production jobs and freelance film credits, and she had just started production on a civil rights-era short film.
“I’m extremely interested in the intersectionality between creative content and human rights and am looking forward to understanding how my study of the law can contribute to these pursuits,” she says. “The way in which Webb is relevant to these experiences is that I am part of a community of incredibly intelligent, diverse, thoughtful and talented people. No matter where I go or what I pursue I know there are Webbies all over the world who I can connect with, and that is invaluable.”
Cook has returned to campus to be a speaker at Sophomore Career Evening and was impressed by the students. “They were so engaged and thoughtful, it inspired me. If they represent our next generation of leaders, we’re in good hands.”
Cook and her film crew, including Nick Nolan ’09 (second from left) making a teaser for her short film.
Mark Torres, PhD ’06 Assistant Professor, Rice University
In 2014, Mark Torres ’06 had a major milestone in the career of a young scientist: he published, along with geologists A. Joshua West and Gen Li, a paper in Nature magazine entitled: “Sulphide oxidation and carbonate dissolution as a source of CO 2 over geological timescales.”
This was before he had even completed his PhD.
“Being published in Nature is a significant feat, especially since Mark was still finishing his PhD,” said Director of the Alf Museum of Paleontology Don Lofgren at the time. “Having a first authorship in a journal of this esteem is the benchmark for any scientist.”
Torres, who completed his undergraduate degree at Pitzer College would go on to receive his PhD in geology at the University of Southern California. He joined Rice University in 2017, after working at the California Institute of Technology.
He was inspired by these endeavors, naturally, through his association with the Alf Museum, but he also credits his overall education at Webb with giving him the tools he still utilizes today in his career.
“At Webb, we were able to do a lot of outdoor stuff,” he says. “I did Outdoor Activities in the afternoon, instead of participating in a sport. We’d go hiking in the hills behind Webb. I remember walking with art teacher Blair Maffris and just talking about life, about what we were learning.” He also says that studying humanities was an impactful experience at Webb.
“In my freshman English class, there was such a focus on critical reading—and that’s had an enormous effect on my work today and my days in college,” he says. “We would read a few pages, and then Ms. Graybeal pushed us to understand what the writer meant, to analyze it critically.”
Of course, having a paleontology museum on campus was a plus for a student interested in nature and science.
“Dr. Lofgren once told me that when he was in graduate school, a researcher told him, ‘the only way you learn is by doing it,’” says Torres of the project meetings, conferences and hands-on science he was able to be a part of at the museum.
Today, Torres’ research concerns how concentrations of carbon dioxide and oxygen in the atmosphere are regulated over geologic time and what makes planets habitable.
Last year, he was selected as a 2019 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow in the field of ocean science for which he was awarded a 2-year $70,000 fellowship. The award seeks to stimulate fundamental research by early-career scientists and scholars while recognizing their distinguished performance and unique potential to make substantial contributions to their fields.
As a career scientist, Torres is taken with the equipment and experiences Webb students have access to today.
“Every time I go back to Webb, I’m impressed and even a little jealous. There’s more technology, more research … I saw a student looking at dinosaur teeth on an electron microscope,” he says. “That’s something I didn’t do until college!”
In a recent issue of Capitol Weekly, a publication covering California government and politics, Ariel Fan ’10 wrote about the passage of AB 841, a bill that directs state energy efficiency funding to upgrade HVAC systems in public schools. Fan wrote: “If there’s one thing that 2020 has taught us, it’s that we must create collaborative methods to solve mounting problems. If there is one thing my career as CEO of GreenWealth Energy Partners has taught me, it’s that strategic investments in energy efficiency can employ Californians, reduce energy bills, and create healthier buildings.”
In 2016, Fan founded GreenWealth Energy Partners, a designbuild energy transformation firm. It shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that she is forging a path in green energy solutions—she founded the Project Earth club at Webb when she was a student and spent many weekends working to clean up local watersheds and beaches.
In 2016, she won an Edison Award, which recognizes and honors innovation and excellence in the development, marketing and launch of new products and services. At the time, she said, “Winning the Edison Award was everything to me as a young entrepreneur. Before that, when I was working on these green projects that I thought were great to save energy, people didn’t really understand that sustainability and energy efficiency can actually save owners money.” Fan believes that her time at Webb taught her invaluable lessons that she brings to her company today.
As a boarder, she especially appreciated the warmth and generosity of her teachers and Webb staff who lived on campus and welcomed students into their homes.
“I was close to Peter and Colleen Bartlett—we still stay in touch—Colleen was my advisor and we bonded for life. I respected her as a mentor, but felt a kinship with her,” says Fan. “All of my teachers were exemplary in character and that has inspired me in how I treat people.”
Fan has been a dedicated Webb alumna helping out with Sophomore Career Night and the Networking Essentials seminar. Though she’s had a busy year, pivoting her company to concentrate more on EV charging and closing contracts with The Grove shopping center and Metropolis, a residential and retail complex composed of four towers in downtown Los Angeles, Fan recently joined the Webb Alumni Council and hopes to make an impact through the Webb15 and Women of Webb alumni programs.
Kevin Groh ’09 Senior Field and Media Advisor to Political Campaigns
Right now, Kevin Groh ’09 isn’t quite sure what his next move will be. He just finished working on the successful Biden for President campaign and is looking at possible jobs in the administration. But his biggest achievement this past year was working on the unprecedented presidential campaign of Mayor Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay man to run for the nation’s highest office.
Though Groh has worked in a number of high-profile positions, including as the GOTV (Get Out The Vote) Director on Stacey Abrams’ run for governor of Georgia in 2018, and as the senior media advisor for the Speaker of the New York City Council, his work for Mayor Buttigieg felt especially personal.
“It empowered and motivated me as a gay man to work for the first openly gay candidate in American history,” explains Groh. “I wanted to be on that cutting edge.”
Groh was the Iowa organizing director for Buttigieg—a state the groundbreaking candidate narrowly won, becoming the first openly gay candidate to win a presidential primary or caucus.
When Groh was at Webb, he was president of SMART— Students Maintaining and Reaching for Tolerance, a gaystraight student alliance. “That was meaningful for me because Webb is such a traditional school in so many ways, with chapel and formal dinners, but I was encouraged to be myself, and to start new initiatives to raise awareness of and organize around LGBTQ+ issues,” he says. “There was a place for me because there were leadership opportunities in progressive spaces— it helped me want to pursue the career I have today.”
Groh came out as gay during his sophomore year at Webb.
“I’m from Alaska,” which he describes as not very liberal, “but my friends at Webb were my family, I felt very accepted.”
In Anne Graybeal’s AP Literature class, Groh remembers reading Tony Kushner’s Pulitzer Prize winning Angels in America, a play about the early 1980s spread of the AIDS epidemic, and a rapidly changing social and political climate.
“It was so fascinating and motivating to learn about the activism and upheaval of the gay movement in the 1980s. To learn about how much progress was made and how quickly and reflect on how far we still have to go,” he says. “Reading that and discussing it with other smart kids made me want to do something in politics or activism.”
In Iowa, Groh managed 36 offices and a staff of hundreds for the Buttigieg campaign.
“The Iowa caucuses are a unique process,” he says. “You need to be able to stand and support your candidate individually. We trained people how to talk about Pete and my staff prepared hundreds of volunteers to knock on thousands of doors.”
His Webb experience as a boarder played a large part in this endeavor. Especially having to move frequently and work away from home.
