Class Correspondent

Things are busy, as usual, in Avon. Besides the normal hectic life of raising two active boys, Zachary, 14, and Joshua, 9, I spend my time volunteering on various local boards — most recently the Avon Education Foundation, which funds innovative and creative educational projects for public school students. My husband, Steve Zweibel, has served as director of cardiac electrophysiology at Hartford Hospital since we moved here in 2008. In August, we were delighted to host a send-off event for members of the Brandeis Class of 2014 from the area. Steve and I look forward to keeping in touch with everyone.

Mitchell Bard and Ronna Horwitz-Bard ’90 of Madison, Wis., are proud to announce the birth of Isaac Henry Bard on Sept. 8, 2010. Mitchell is teaching and pursuing a graduate degree at the University of Wisconsin School of Journalism and Mass Communications after spending the previous 17 years working in publishing and film. Ronna is an attorney practicing workers’ compensation insurance defense and heading the settlement negotiations unit of New York–based Weiss, Wexler & Wornow.

Under the leadership of Jay Ruderman, the Ruderman Family Foundation has emerged as a major funder in the world of special needs and disabilities within the international Jewish community. In October 2010, the foundation hosted Advance: The Ruderman Jewish Special Needs Funding Conference, the first-ever gathering within the Jewish community aimed to promote collaboration among some 100 funders, as well as a score of professionals working in the field.

Mitch Gross is community manager for NASA’s Moonbase Alpha, a multiplayer exploration game set on a hypothetical lunar outpost. It is the first in a series of games being developed as part of a collaboration between NASA and game developers.

Beth Gates-Rivera was recently promoted to vice president, senior program director at Precept Medical Communications, a subsidiary of Young & Rubicam, where she has worked for more than six years. Beth is working on the launch of a new lupus drug co-branded with Human Genome Sciences and GlaxoSmithKline. The company recently moved to a new facility in Warren, N.J.

Peter Carmen was promoted to chief operating officer of the Oneida Nation, including Oneida Nation Enterprises and Turning Stone Resort Casino. He had been senior vice president and general manager of Oneida Nation Enterprises and its businesses. He first joined Oneida Nation as general counsel and chief legal officer.

Robert Rikeman accepted a position as operations coordinator at an oil and gas drilling company. Robert had been the baseball coach at Newberry College. “After 22 years of coaching baseball, I am now working for one of my former All-Americans and his family,” he reports.

Rachel Feingold was featured in a Boston Globe story about the college move-in season in the Boston area. Rachel’s daughter Gabriella ’13 lives in the same residence hall Rachel occupied as a freshman. “I had some of the happiest days of my life here, and I talked it up with so much fondness that, by 12, Gabriella wanted to go (to Brandeis),” Rachel told the newspaper.

Stephanie Fine Maroun, M.A.’90
, is the recruitment and marketing events planner at Solomon Schechter Day School of Greater Boston in Newton, Mass. She also runs PALS (Preschoolers and Little Siblings), a series of activities such as Jewish story hours, concerts and educational programs for young families held every month at Schechter. Stephanie and her husband, Alfred, have four children — high school sophomore Tirzah, eighth grader Judah, seventh grader Hillel and fifth grader Hadas.
Submit a Class Note