Alumni News

STUART AASE (B.A. ’80) joined the Wisconsin State Journal in Madison as a copy editor in May 2017. Prior to that, he was with the Florida TimesUnion in Jacksonville for 23 years as an assistant city editor and copy editor.

HAILEY ALMSTED (B.A. ’19) was promoted to editor of Woodbury Magazine and associate editor of eight other publications at Tiger Oak Media. Previously, she worked as assistant to the managing editor, which started before her graduation in March 2019.

REED ANFINSON (B.A. ’77) was featured in the TIME magazine article, “COVID-19 is Killing Newspapers, Creating an Information Crisis.”

BETH AULWES (B.A. ’07) spent a decade in nonprofit fundraising in Washington, D.C., before recently joining the TPT team to support their mission that uses the power of media to advance the arts, spur learning, help young people succeed and help adults age vitally.

GRACE BECKER (B.A. ’20) was hired as a communications specialist with Osseo Area Schools, Minnesota's fifth-largest school district.

DAVID BERKUS (B.A. ’64), after a 45-year career in advertising and marketing, has used his journalism background to become a certified grant proposal writer for charities in Los Angeles.

CHRISTIAN BETANCOURT (B.A. ’06) was promoted to the director of Demand Generation. He now oversees national paid media strategy and social media programs for all four brands at Self Esteem Brands (Anytime Fitness, Waxing the City, The Bar Method and Basecamp Fitness).

KATELYN BLOOMQUIST (B.A. ’19) was named the editor of Midwest Home Magazine.

SAMANTHA BORING (B.A. ’20) started as a reporter at ABC 6 News in Rochester, Minn. She was recently promoted to a morning reporter.

TIM BROWNE (B.A. ’72) and Colleen Browne's (B.A. ’78) Browne+Browne Marketing’s publishing division, Browne+Browne Books, recently won the 2020 Moonbeam Children's Book Award for Best Book by Youth Author (under 18).

JON COLLINS (B.A. ’08) and Riham Feshir (B.A. ’08) and their team at MPR won a national Edward R. Murrow Award for their reporting on the Mohamed Noor trial.

ANGELA DELMEDICO (B.A. ’04), Elev8 Consulting Group CEO, was accepted into the Forbes Business Council, an invitation-only community of successful business owners and leaders.

CHRISTY DESMITH (B.A. ’98) joined the Boston Globe in August 2019. As an assistant arts editor, she oversees coverage of visual arts and classical music. She previously worked as an arts editor at the Star Tribune.

SAMIR FERDOWSI (B.A. ’19) landed the news residency at VICE, one of four chosen out of 700 applicants. He was part of VICE Media’s 2030 Project, which was released last year. JAKE GROVUM (B.A. ’09) was promoted to deputy off-platform editor at The New York Times.

JENNIFER HASS (M.A. ’04) started a part-time, six-month position with Maine Regional School District 21 in Kennebunk, Maine, whose focus is delivering the latest developments in the district related to COVID-19, connecting schools and the community, and working on the district website.

BETSY HELFAND (B.A. ’15), who covers the Minnesota Twins for the Pioneer Press, was voted the Twin Cities chapter Baseball Writers’ Association of America Chairperson for 2021. She becomes just the second female chairperson in chapter history.

JAIME HUNT (B.A. ’99) was named Miami University’s vice president and chief marketing and communications officer. Prior to that, she was the vice chancellor for strategic communications and chief communications and marketing officer at Winston-Salem State University.

MUKHTAR IBRAHIM (B.A. ’11), editor and executive director of the Sahan Journal, announced that the organization was selected to join Facebook Journalism Project’s Sustainability Accelerator Program, in a cohort of 20 news operations that are owned and led by people of color. The six-month Facebook program offers participating newsrooms training and grant support to explore new revenue and audience development strategies.

JULIA KRIEGER (B.A. ’09) was the regional communications director for Biden for President, and in December 2020 became the senior spokesperson at the Biden Inaugural Committee.

team celebrated the first anniversary of their new consultancy, humanworks, in October. Along with three others, Marshall works with businesses to elevate corporate communications and internal engagement practices, among several other leadership and HR-related efforts.

CHRISTINA MILANOWSKI (B.A. ’06) joined the team at Life Time in January 2021 as associate director of social media.

KEVIN MORALES (B.A. ’05) has been appointed as editor-in-chief of the Cayman Compass newspaper, in the Cayman Islands. He spent the previous 10 years at local television station Cayman 27, where he served as news director and operations manager.

EMMA NELSON (B.A. ’14) was promoted to an editor at the Star Tribune, after more than six years as a reporter. She leads the suburban team.

TYREL NELSON (B.A. ’03) published his new memoir, Travels and Tribulations, in December 2020.

HOANG UYEN NGUYEN (B.A. ’06), after working at KSTP/KSTC and FOX Sports North/FOX Sports Wisconsin, went back to school to become a certified ophthalmic medical technologist. She works at Northwest Eye/ Unifeye Vision Partners.

MICHAEL NORTON (B.A. ’85) won the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance 2020 John N. Cole Award for his nonfiction book, Chasing Maine's Second.

SAM RICHTER (B.A. ’88) was inducted into the National Speakers Association (NSA) Speaker Hall of Fame in August 2020. New York for The Associated Press. He had previously reported for the Bismarck Tribune and the Rapid City Journal. At AP, he covered the awarding of the Nobel Prizes in medicine, physics and chemistry, and upon his retirement the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which bestows those prizes, sent him a letter of thanks for his efforts in promoting scientific knowledge and understanding.

JACK RODGERS (B.A. ’20) took home first place for breaking news photography at the Associated Collegiate Press awards in October 2020.

BABATUNDE SANTOS (B.A. ’19) was hired as a reporter at FOX 9 in Minneapolis.

BEN SAUKKO (B.A. ’97) is the director of communications at Adolfson & Peterson Construction. He previously worked at AmeriPride and Weber Shandwick Worldwide.

WILLIAM SOUDER’s (B.A. ’77) fourth book and third biography, Mad at the World: A Life of John Steinbeck, was published by W. W. Norton in October 2020.

JENNIFER (TRACY) STOLTENOW

(B.A. ’03, M.A. ’09) was promoted to global brand & marketing communications leader at 3M in the Transportation & Electronics Business Group. In this role, she’s focused on building brand foundation and global communications capabilities across six divisions.

ERIC SWANSON (B.A. ’04) was recently promoted to VP Product Management, Practice & Instruction at Renaissance Learning and is working to deliver literacy and math products that will improve academic outcomes for students.

NEW MEMBERS JOIN ALUMNI BOARD

The Alumni Society Board welcomed two more members to the team in the fall. MUKHTAR IBRAHIM (B.A. ’11) is the founder of the Sahan Journal, a news organization that reports for and about immigrants and refugees in Minnesota. He’s won recognition as an innovative journalist addressing issues of diversity and equity in media. He received the prestigious leadership fellowship from the St. Paul-based Bush Foundation; a “Great Immigrant” award from the Carnegie Corporation of New York; Islamic Resource Group's “Building Bridges Award in Media”; and an Above the Fold award, which honors Hubbard School alumni under the age of 40, who have made exceptional contributions to their fields. He's an adjunct fellow at the Hubbard School, where he supports the journalism school's inclusion, equity, and diversity initiative while co-teaching an intermediate reporting course. EMME STRAUSS (B.A. ’05) is Head of Production + Creative Operations at Google Brand Studio and has been responsible for helping bring to life some of Google’s biggest brand moments over the past few years, including the Helpfulness brand campaign, Racial Equity, Year in Search, Covid-19 efforts, Google One, Olympics, google. com/about and the Google Store (2015 Webby Award). Prior to Google, Emme worked on the agency side on clients such as Toyota, Nike, Visa, Intel, Bank of America and Merck in roles across account management, production and operations in San Francisco, New York and Minneapolis. She currently lives in the Bay Area with her husband and two young daughters.