Brandeis Magazine

Lewis Brooks, P’16, reports that Max Perlitsh ’52 celebrated his 95th birthday in June 2024. Three months earlier, on March 9, Lewis and wife Denise Silber Brooks ’84, P’16, helped Max and his wife, Hilda, celebrate his 34,567 days alive — what Lewis calls “a sequentially astonishing achievement.”

In July 2024, Betsy Diamant-Cohen presented a webinar for the World Literacy Summit/Sun Books on the topic “The Importance of Family Engagement in Early Childhood Literacy.”

Lisa Hirsch has retired from a 28-year career in technical writing that included nine years at Documentum and nearly 18 at Google. At the latter, she documented the Google Search Appliance, data center hardware and software, and various Google Cloud networking products. She has also retired from Danzan-ryu jujitsu, in which she is a second-degree black belt. Her 20-year side career as a classical music and opera writer now includes writing regularly for San Francisco Classical Voice and the San Francisco Chronicle.

In 2021, Hank Kopel retired from the U.S. Department of Justice after 30 years as a federal prosecutor and also celebrated the publication of his first book, “War on Hate: How To Stop Genocide, Fight Terrorism, and Defend Freedom.” Hank now writes on the Middle East and geopolitics for several publications; serves on the board of the Abraham Global Peace Initiative; and is writing his next book, “The Great Forgetting: How Prosperity Corrodes Wisdom and Breeds Intellectual Folly.”

Andrew Moore has retired after more than 26 years at the Wayland (Massachusetts) Public Library, starting as a part-time reference librarian and finishing as assistant director. He writes that he’s “excited, apprehensive, and determined not to squander a second of retirement.”

Richard Rosen, P’10, got together with classmates at the Legacy Club in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. “Huge fun, lots of laughs, and plenty of catch-ups and memories,” he reports.

Shari Roth hopes to connect with Brandeis alumni in the Atlanta area, where she and her husband live after moving from South Florida during the pandemic. A consultant and executive coach for 20 years, she has started a new business, Oral Surgery Staffing Partners, with her son. It focuses on connecting oral surgeons with oral surgery and dental specialty practices. Shari has four granddaughters and a grandson.

Sol W. Bernstein, P’15, has joined Chiesa Shahinian & Giantomasi, a law firm with offices in New Jersey and New York, as of counsel in the corporate and securities group and the banking and finance team. He has a special focus in commercial lending, including leveraged, structured, and acquisition finance; asset-based finance; and cross-border and multicurrency lending.

Now that she’s left her career as a chief communications and development officer at hospitals, Dianne Cutillo golfs; takes French lessons; travels; works as a freelance editor; and enjoys doing community service, including teaching English to an immigrant from Ecuador. She and husband Bernie Pinsonnault welcomed their first grandchild, Theodore James, in December 2023.

Laura Dow celebrated the publication of her first book, “Mind Your Movement: Six Essential Physical and Mental Tools To Stay Active As You Age,” in fall 2024. Edited by Seth Arenstein, the book explains how to start a daily movement practice. Laura is the founder and creator of Stiff to Fit, a boutique fitness, yoga, and wellness business that helps older adults maximize their physical abilities so they may age in place.

Sara Monoson is a professor of political science, classics, and philosophy at Northwestern University. She and Michael Berns celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary in May 2024.

Randy Calvo shares information about Scott Suchin, his roommate for three years at Brandeis. According to Randy, Scott “has set up a scholarship to pay the medical school tuition of nurses who wish to become doctors, which was his path toward becoming a gastroenterologist in NYC. Ever see the ‘md’ and ‘rn’ in Scott’s email address (suchinmdrn@aol.com)? It’s quite a story.”

In June 2024, Micah Krohn and husband Mark Ishaug attended a Buddhist meditation retreat with Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche at Tergar Osel Ling Monastery, in Kathmandu, Nepal.

Joel Lutterman, Heller MBA’20, is medical director of public health at the Wake County Department of Health and Human Services, in North Carolina. Previously, he worked as a doctor in pediatric interventional cardiology. In his new role, he leads teams of doctors, nurses, epidemiologists, chronic and communicable disease specialists, and experts in occupational and environmental health and safety as they treat patients and try to stay a step ahead of the next public health crisis.

Malka Margolies, who has worked in book publishing for decades, is a freelance developmental editor and publicist specializing in nonfiction Judaica. She recently joined PEN America’s communications team as a consultant focused on issues related to digital safety, legislative gag orders in education, campus free-speech issues, and banned books.

Alexa Shabecoff has retired after running a program that helped connect low-income residents of Chelsea, Revere, and Everett, Massachusetts, with benefits and workforce development. Before that, she was an assistant dean for public service at Harvard Law School and a legal aid lawyer. After she retired, she and her husband took a three-week trip to Turkey. Her daughter is a public defender in Philadelphia, and her son works at Trader Joe’s.

Beth Chance is an oncology nurse in Southern California. “Grateful for the liberal arts education I experienced at Brandeis,” she writes.

Irene Frielich’s memoir, “Shattered Stars, Healing Hearts: Unraveling My Father’s Holocaust Survival Story,” earned an award from the National Federation of Press Women.

David Lewis is vice president at Manchester Trade Ltd., a trade policy and investment advisory firm in Washington, D.C., and co-founder/co-chair of the Caribbean Policy Consortium. He is also a member of the American Jewish International Relations Institute advisory board.

Loren Reisner Weisman and Stephen Weisman ’82 are the proud grandparents of Charlotte Joelle (born December 2021) and Eliana Mackenzie (born May 2023). Loren is the director of resource development at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Annapolis & Anne Arundel County, in Maryland. Stephen is in his 25th year as rabbi at Temple Solel in Bowie.

Last summer, Beth Ross wrote to say her son Jeremy and his wife, who live in Chicago, were expecting their first child in November. Beth, who has lived in her Stoughton, Massachusetts, home since 1990, works full time in her therapeutic coaching and counseling practice, Mending Fences Institute, and enjoys hiking, biking, kayaking, and gardening.

No Class Notes submissions this issue.

Samuel G. Kaufman retired from AT&T’s Office of the President in April 2024.

Adam Pack recently completed nine years as psychology department chair at the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo. He served as an associate editor for the scientific journal Marine Mammal Science; published papers and gave conference presentations on the behavior, biology, and communication systems of humpback whales and the cognitive abilities of dolphins; and appeared in the “Mystery of the Humpback Whale Song,” “Vanishing Whales,” and “Humpback Health” episodes of the PBS series “Changing Seas.”

Now that she’s retired, Laurie Solomon is spending time in the pottery studio and traveling with her husband, Zach. So far, they have visited Italy, Croatia, Montenegro, Greece, and Colombia; circumnavigated Iceland; and explored the Galapagos.

After 30 years, Cary Zel left the management-services outsourcing company he started and became the president of Darwin CX, a subscription software platform and services provider for magazine publishers and media companies. He works remotely in Miami Beach and often visits his three grown sons in Brooklyn.

Bonnie Brensilber and husband David ’86 celebrated the wedding of their daughter, Jamie, in January 2024 at Oheka Castle, on Long Island, New York. Michelle Cornick Frank, Lisa Silverstein Weiner, Karen Weinberg Drogin, Ariane Economon Mastrototaro, and Shari Gersten Rosenblatt ’86 joined in the festivities.

Gary Golden writes, “I may be way ahead of the curve in the grandkid department compared to my classmates. My stepdaughter just remarried, bringing three more grandchildren into the family, so I am now up to eight.” Gary, who became a marine insurance broker the year he graduated from Brandeis, now heads his own brokerage firm, Manifest Marine.

For the fifth year in a row, work by Daniel Lockwood has been published by Writers Without Margins. In addition, one of his poems, “Bathing in the sunlight,” was published in the literary magazine Portrait of New England.

Ari Sky is assistant city manager for finance for the city of Watertown, Massachusetts. He previously served as town administrator for the town of Lakeville. He writes, “My wife and I moved to the Boston area from southeastern Massachusetts in April 2024, trading house size for location and convenience. We’re very much enjoying our latest adventure.”

Stuart Spencer, who lives in Hong Kong with wife Mieko, is group chief marketing officer at insurance company AIA.

Mimi Lind, a resident of Oahu, Hawaii, runs a small nonprofit for the Jewish community and organizes gatherings for Brandeisians.

Alise Panitch and husband Ken welcomed the arrival of a grandson in Jerusalem.

Jeffrey Gordon serves as state senator for Connecticut’s 35th District. He’s also the medical director of hematology and oncology services at UMass Memorial Health-Harrington.

Dvora Weinreb owns a solo law practice focusing on transactional real estate, and business purchases and sales. She lives with husband Herschel and children Sarit, Yosef, Akiva, and Matan in Boca Raton, Florida.

Jaclyn (Kugell) Yezerski, partner at Boston employment law firm Morgan, Brown & Joy, has been ranked as a leading practitioner by Chambers and Partners, an independent professional legal-research company.