Brandeis Magazine

Paul Sullivan is a professor of economics at the National Defense University, an adjunct professor of security studies at Georgetown, and a columnist for Türkiye Gazetesi of Istanbul and the UB Post of Ulan Bator, Mongolia. He has been in the press and interviewed on TV and radio many times since the start of the Arab Spring. He has also taken part in high-level meetings at the Council on Foreign Relations and other organizations on issues related to energy, water, land, Africa, the Middle East and China. Last year, he testified before the 
U.S. Congress. Richard Blau, an attorney 
at GrayRobinson in Tampa, Fla., was named a Super Lawyer by Florida Super Lawyers Magazine. Attorneys selected as Super Lawyers are among the top 5 percent of Florida’s licensed attorneys. Joel Rosen was named managing partner at his law firm, High Swartz. He has been with the 98-year-old firm in Norristown, Pa., for five years. Prior to joining High Swartz, Joel had his own firm and served as vice president/general counsel of Nutrisystem and senior corporate counsel at AAMCO. He is considered an expert in the practice of franchise and business law. In 2010, he was named a “Legal Eagle” by Franchise Times magazine. The latest project of David Crane is “Episodes,” a comedy that airs on Showtime. David, 
co-creator of “Friends” with Marta Kauffman ’78, is working with partner Jeffrey Klarik, who was a writer and producer for “Mad About You.” In “Episodes,” a British husband-and-wife writing team are lured to the United States to adapt for American television their show about an elderly, overweight and sympathetic instructor at an exclusive British school. Mark Horowitz and Dorrine Veca, P’12, are proud parents of a second-generation Brandeis graduate. Daughter Jane Horowitz ’12 is devoting a year to mentoring young people as part of the City Year program in Brooklyn before starting graduate school in 2013. Their son, Steffan, just completed a master’s degree in African studies at Indiana University after conducting field research in South Africa. Karen Levenson took a five-week trip to Tanzania to research wildlife management, wildlife protection and conservation. She was surprised to learn how much more advanced Tanzania is in wildlife protection and conservation than either the United States or Canada (she lives in Guelph, Ontario). Karen visited Tarangire, Ngorongoro Crater, Serengeti and Arusha National Parks. She stayed at Gombe National Park, where Jane Goodall began her research into chimpanzee family groups in the 1960s. The 11th book by Newbery Medal-winning children’s and adolescent author Gennifer (Johnson) Choldenko is due out in May 2013. “Al Capone Does My Homework” is the final book in her Al Capone trilogy. The first novel, “Al Capone Does My Shirts,” won the Newbery honor along with more than 30 other awards and has been translated into 10 languages. “Al Capone Does My Shirts” and “Al Capone Shines My Shoes” have sold more than 1 million copies. 
Gennifer remembers her years at Brandeis fondly. In fact, the idea for her most recent picture book, “A Giant Crush,” came from a crush she had while living in Reitman Residence Hall. After many years of helping her husband battle cancer, even moving to Israel for a year and a half for radical treatments, Jill Friedlander Robinson returned to school to become a licensed massage therapist and is now working at Bliss in New York. Her daughter Leah graduated from the Abraham Joshua Heschel High School in Manhattan and is a freshman at Colgate University. Naomi Bromberg Bar-Yam, Heller PhD’97, P’07, P’12, is the executive director of the Mothers’ Milk Bank of New England. The organization was established in 2006 and two years later began dispensing pasteurized donor milk from the Mothers’ Milk Bank of Ohio to hospitals and families in New England. In 2011, Naomi’s group opened its own donor-milk processing lab and has been receiving, pasteurizing and dispensing donor milk to hospitals and families throughout New England. Her son Maayan Bar-Yam ’12, a third-generation Brandeisian, graduated with a BA in fine arts, sculpture. Ellen Holt recently started a new position as assistant manager for ticketing, concerts and lectures at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Cindy Saltzman Pinkus checks in with an update. She is co-publisher of Jewish Lifestyles magazines, which produces Arizona Jewish Life and Oregon Jewish Life. She has a 13-year-old son and two daughters, one in college in California and the other serving in the Israel Defense Forces. Linda Alpert works for Loeb & Loeb as a freelance contract writer, and has been enjoying researching and writing about intellectual property, advanced media and technology issues. One of her children just graduated from Indiana University, and another is a junior at Ohio State. During the fall and spring, she sings in an a cappella group, the Soundettes, which performs at local senior centers and the occasional public venue. Her favorite hobby is Israeli dancing (which she has been doing on a regular basis since her Brandeis days). Farley Frydman is president and co-owner of Midwest Iron & Metal, an industrial byproduct recycling company servicing industry across the United States. He and his wife, Linda, are now empty nesters, enjoying travel (they recently visited Barcelona and Paris) and visiting the kids. Their oldest daughter, Gail, is married; lives in Columbus, Ohio; and is pregnant with their first grandchild. Daughter Carey lives in Los Angeles and was married on Sept. 2. Son Benji is a sophomore at Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business. Dan Goldfield lives in Occidental, Calif., and owns the Dutton-Goldfield Winery in the Russian River Valley. His 19-year-old son, Jamie, is a sophomore at Stanford, and his 17-year-old daughter, Emily, is a high-school senior. His wife, Loie, is a vascular surgeon at Kaiser in Santa Rosa, the largest nearby town. Dan writes, “We love the beauty and agriculture of west Sonoma County.” Seth Moldoff was promoted to Western Division manager for Wells Fargo Bank’s Credit Resolution Group. He manages commercial loan workout officers in Los Angeles and San Francisco. He also joined the board of directors for the Special Assets Management Association, a nonprofit professional trade association dedicated to educating lenders in the workout area. Seth and his wife, Donna, live in Lafayette, Calif. Roberta Weinstein-Cohen, P’09, P’17, reports that her older daughter, Hanna Cohen Winkler ’09, completed a master’s degree in occupational consulting and development at Michlala Le Minhal in Rishon LeZion, Israel, and works as a recruiter for the high-tech industry in Israel. Her son, Yaakov Cohen, will graduate in December from the University of Maryland with a double major in criminal justice and psychology. He took time off during his studies to serve in the Israel Defense Forces as part of an infantry unit. Finally, her youngest, Rivka Cohen ’17, just left for a year of study in Israel at Migdal Oz, a girls’ seminary, after which she will matriculate at Brandeis. Roberta works at Jewish Association Serving the Aging, where she runs a social adult day-care program for those with mild to moderate cognitive impairment. She adds, “Of course, I am still doing Israeli dance, and I also teach it at a local yeshiva one day per week during the school year.” Michael Castro recently started a new medical practice, Personalized Cancer Medicine. He writes, “Sophie and I finally realized our dream to live and work in Hawaii. I opened a private practice in medical oncology in downtown Honolulu and am affiliated with the Queens Medical Center, a fantastic place for cancer care.”

Andre Tran ’14, Ingrid Schulte ’13, Brandon Sousa ’16, Sam Daler ’16 and Nicholas Medina ’14 were among the current and incoming students who attended the Boston-area New Student Send-off, hosted by Trustee Dan Jick ’79 and his wife, Elizabeth Etra Jick ’81, P’09, P’12.