Class Notes

1950s

Roy Grundy

Roy Grundy
(IE ’52), Seattle, and his wife, Priscilla, met with United States Navy Lieutenant Junior Grade Juan Pablo Vielma (CIS ’14) for lunch in the wardroom of the USS John C. Stennis aircraft carrier at Bremerton, Washington. Vielma also gave the couple a tour of the ship.

Alfred Pilz
(IE ’53), Ligonier, Penn., after serving as president and chief executive officer of several medium-sized companies, founded and continues to head the retirement hobby business Greenway Products.

Oliver Saffir
(EE ’58), Palo Alto, Calif., worked in the aerospace industry while earning a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering. He then entered the commercial industry, working on integrated circuit design. Saffir started a Silicon Valley company in high-speed digital and analog-to-digital conversion. He consulted professionally before retiring and now enjoys life as a grandfather and great-grandfather.


1960s

Michael Retsky
(PHYS ’61), Trumbull, Conn., earned a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Chicago in 1974 under Albert Crewe. While working at HP in Colorado Springs, Retsky made a career change into cancer research and took a position as professor of biology at the University of Colorado. With colleagues he devised an inexpensive nontoxic method to prevent relapses in breast cancer; he is editing a book on this subject to be published by Nature. Retsky has been married for 55 years to the person he dated while a student at Illinois Tech.

Roger Cooper
(M.S. MATH ’63, Ph.D. ’69), Menlo Park, Calif., has a graduate-level background in experimental psychology in addition to mathematics.

Robert Gordon
(ARCH ’63, M.S. CRP ’67), Chicago, is an architect, designer, and adjunct faculty member at Columbia College Chicago. He presented a paper and slides at the historic first conference held on the resurgence of hand drawing in design. Gordon’s paper demonstrated ways that systematic sketching through SketchBook are intrinsic to the design process. He also shared architectural and urban design case studies that compared preliminary sketches to the completed design.

Bhakta Rath
(Ph.D. MET ’63), Washington, D.C., associate director of research at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, was awarded the Medal for the Advancement of Research by the Board of Trustees of the American Society for Metals [International].

George Bradburn
(ARCH ’65), Nîmes, France, worked for many years in Berlin and now lives in the south of France. He hopes to see old friends at the Illinois Tech Global Alumni Gathering in Paris this summer.

Ernest Bitten
(ME ’66), Richland, Wash., U.S. Navy Captain (Ret.), obtained graduate degrees in ocean engineering and business administration. Bitten, also retired from the Hanford Site, where he served as a nuclear project manager, is an adjunct professor in the mathematics and business departments at Washington State University. He flies and maintains his own aircraft, and is a licensed commercial pilot, certified flight instructor, and certified light sport aircraft mechanic. Bitten is married and has seven grandchildren.

Kenneth Bobbe
(ME ’66, M.B.A. ’76), Inverness, Ill., was recruited out of school by Uarco Inc. and worked his way up until the company was bought out 32 years later. He then worked at the new company until 2000, when he retired. Bobbe and his wife celebrated their 50th anniversary, and have two children and four grandchildren. The couple has continued to learn over the years, taking part in the Institute for Continued Learning at Roosevelt University, of which Bobbe was president for two years.

Theodore Bohigian
(Ph.D. CHEM ’66), Lincolnwood, Ill., spent his career doing industrial chemical research at corporations such as Amoco Chemicals Corporation and Bell Labs. He and his wife, Diane, recently celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. Bohigian has two daughters and is very active in his church.

Bernard Brady
(CHE ’66, M.S. CHE ’69), Tumwater, Wash., taught at Oregon State University and has worked in various areas of engineering, such as chemical research, freeze-dried food research and production, fruit juice production, water treatment, and air quality. He has a daughter, a son, and five grandchildren. Brady enjoys hiking and beekeeping.

James Brown
(EE ’66), Long Grove, Ill., retired from Honeywell after 34 years. He helped develop and promote life safety products in fire and security, and was responsible for setting up Honeywell’s Life Safety Division throughout Asia. Brown and his wife, Donna, have been married for 50 years and have two children and four grandchildren. They enjoy traveling the world, playing golf, and most of all, babysitting the grandkids.

Margaret Cekis (née Sheridan)
(SW ’66), Johns Creek, Ga., spent her career as a technical writer working at various laboratories. She enjoys sewing, crafting, reading, and studying how technology is changing.

Thomas Chilis
(EE ’66), Lincolnshire, Ill., received a medical degree from the University of Illinois College of Medicine and spent his career as a pathologist. After acquiring a new family by marriage only three years ago, he is happy to have become a grandfather for the first time.

Phyllis Chillingworth
(DSGN ’66), New York, received degrees in fine arts from Yale University and spent a career in design, including founding three different firms and designing the logo for Ellis Island. In 2009 Chillingworth left design for painting. She has had three solo shows in New York City and is painting for a fourth. She is active in nonprofit work, including the support of female veterans.

David Christof
(ME ’66), Sabula, Iowa, served in Vietnam and spent his career traveling the country building above-ground storage tanks; he also owned his own company in Vietnam and had four offices and 150 employees. He and his wife, Bernadette, have been married for 47 years and have three children. Christof still owns his first car, a 1951 Ford Coupe, and loves restoring old automobiles.

James Foley
(ME ’66), Harrison, N.Y., was employed at the same company since graduation, spending 46 years at Ingersoll-Rand/Dresser-Rand in New York, working in sales and marketing in the oil and gas, petrochemical, and utility markets. He is a two-time cancer survivor, having overcome both prostate and pancreatic cancers, and is involved in various advocacy efforts, including marching on Capitol Hill on National Pancreatic Cancer Advocacy Day. He says his greatest accomplishment is his family, including his wife, Susan, of 49 years, whom he dated as a student at Illinois Tech. The couple has three daughters and seven grandchildren.

James Freiband
(PSYC ’66), Highland Mills, N.Y., completed two tours with the U.S. Navy in Vietnam, went on to graduate school at New York University, and spent his career as a municipal engineer and planner before becoming president of PPBS Inc. Engineering and Planning Consultants. He and his wife celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2016 and have two children. Freiband works over the winter as a professional snowboard instructor and has completed 85 marathons.

Gerald Gruenbaum
(EE ’66, M.S. ’71), Sunrise, Fla., enjoyed a long career as an engineer, during which he received the first-ever Purchasing Manager Excellence Award from Motorola. Now retired, he is a certified instructor in computer skills for adults and enjoys music and ham radio. Gruenbaum is married and has three children, four grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.

John Haley
(ARCH ’66), Chicago, worked for Ludwig Mies van der Rohe after graduation. When Mies died in 1969, Haley worked at Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill, and then joined the former Stanley Tigerman and Associates Ltd. In 1975 he started his own practice. Haley is married and had three children and six grandchildren.

Naoyasu Iino
(M.S. EE ’66), Flanders, N.J., spent his career as a consumer electronics design engineer and quality assurance engineer in the field of home electronics. He and his wife, Mitsy, raised two children in the Chicago area before moving to New Jersey more than 30 years ago. The couple has six grandchildren and is enjoying the retired life.

Michael King
(CHEM ’66), Washington, D.C., received a Ph.D. from Harvard University and was mentored by Nobel Laureate R. B. Woodward. He became an assistant professor of chemistry at New York University before transferring to George Washington University in 1973, where he has served as chair of the chemistry department for years. King has won numerous awards for his service at George Washington University, including the George Washington Prize in 2011, the university’s highest honor.

Robert Lyczkowski
(M.S. GE ’66, Ph.D. GT ’70), Darien, Ill., worked for Goodyear Atomic Corporation, the Aerojet Nuclear Company, Energy Incorporated, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the Institute of Gas Technology, and Argonne National Laboratory. He is an avid collector of classical music records, CDs, and videos, and enjoys gardening. Lyczkowski established the Dimitri Gidaspow Endowed Fellowship Fund at Illinois Tech.

James Muraski
(MET ’66), Chicago, earned his M.B.A. from Loyola University and worked as a metallurgist and in management for several organizations; he also was instrumental in expanding companies into China. He and his wife, Kay, whom he met at Illinois Tech, have three children, eight grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. Muraski enjoyes reading about history, spirituality, and business, and is active in his church.

Robert Nussbaum
(IE ’66), Chicago, earned an M.B.A. and became a management consultant on the way to his position as a chief financial officer. He has also written materials published by the federal government. Nussbaum enjoys playing bridge, fishing, and shooting.

Lewis Piggott
(IE ’66), Franklin, N.C., was employed as an industrial engineer specializing in supply-chain management for a variety of firms, including Johnson & Johnson and KPMG, and led supply chain redesign projects for companies such as Michelin and Unilever. He then ran his own firm for three years before he retired in 2000 at age 56. He and Sue, his wife of 43 years, enjoy traveling, attending antique auctions, and collecting silver and original art. He also enjoys golf but says he is not very good at it.

Conrad Rendina
(EE ’66), Woodridge, Ill., worked as an engineering manager at Motorola, Technitron Industries, and several other electrical engineering companies. He is married and has five children. Rendina likes to ski and golf, and stays busy by being active in his church.

James Rohrbacher
(ME ’66), Downers Grove, Ill., started his career working on farm tractors at the International Harvester Company, later worked for the food industry, and then was self-employed in the liquefied and industrial gases industry. He has been retired for 16 years. Rohrbacher enjoys ballroom dancing and even volunteered to be a ballroom dance teacher at Illinois Tech. He held patents on a pizza sauce applicator for mass producing pizzas and on a machine to mass produce crepes.

Donald Rowe
(DSGN ’66), Olivet, Mich., received an M.F.A. from the University of Hartford and was an art professor at Olivet College for 45 years. Rowe continues to produce art, paintings, prints, and drawings, working daily in his studio. His wife, Susan Rowe (née Sobczak) (DSGN ’66), has enjoyed a career in graphic design and now volunteers in their small community. Their daughter, Jessica, graduated with an M.F.A.

Patrick Schrickel
(CHE ’66), Green Bay, Wis., was employed for 40 years by Wisconsin Public Service, from which he retired as president and chief operating officer. He has been a longtime volunteer, contributor, and disaster response leader with Habitat for Humanity. Schrickel is also a supporter of Trees for Tomorrow, a natural resource education center in Eagle River, and has served as a math and reading tutor in schools.

Michael Slifka
(FPE ’66), Middleton, Wis., has been a government official with the U.S. General Services Administration, the National Bureau of Standards, and the veterans administration. He has spent most of his career in fire protection engineering, including forensic consulting on large loss of life fires. Slifka consulted on the fire protection design for the second McCormick Place and Water Tower Place in Chicago, and the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

Francis Wodarczyk
(CHEM ’66), Springfield, Va., retired from the National Science Foundation three years ago. He enjoys hiking, biking, traveling, and volunteering for environmental groups.

Victor Yipp
(MATH ’66), Oak Park, Ill., early in his career, was a computer programmer and worked at NASA on Project Apollo. He earned a law degree and was an Illinois assistant attorney general for a few years, defending state prison wardens when they were sued for violations of civil rights. Late in life Yipp received an M.F.A. in creative writing, and his passion for fiction writing led him to win a local short-fiction contest. He and his wife, Iris, have one child and four grandchildren. Yipp says that his claim to fame was winning a car, trip, and cash on Wheel of Fortune in 1996.

Ronald Yoshino
(ME ’66), Indian Head Park, Ill., worked for 39 years at General Motors Electro-Motive Division designing locomotives. He now enjoys playing tennis and golf, traveling, and reading.

Frank Dougherty
(CHEM ’67), Clovis, Calif., retired from ABB’s Ventyx Enterprise Software subsidiary. He is enjoying retirement by participating in the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Fresno State University.

Jerome Zis
(M.S. EE ’67), Saratoga, Calif., retired from a successful career in the semiconductor industry, where his last postion was as director of precision amplifiers at Analog Devices, Inc. He now plays in several bands and repairs musical instruments.

Deepak Bammi
(M.S. IE ’68, Ph.D. ’72), Barrington, Ill., won a leadership award for 35 years of exemplary application of management science from the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences. His dissertation on optimal police patrol beats was implemented by the Netherlands Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations in all 23 major cities in that country. Bammi merged the fields of multiple objective mathematical programming and urban planning to develop a long-range land use plan for DuPage County, Illinois. At Inter North, Inc. his team developed risk-analysis models for top management. Bammi retired from FedEx, where he developed innovative facility location models. He is now the president of Research, Optimization and Logistics, Inc. In his spare time, Bammi is writing a series of children’s books and a travel book.

Laurence Kozlicki
(LAW ’69), Inverness, Ill., was inducted into the Chicago Area Entrepreneurship Hall of Fame. One of his current companies was awarded the Blue Chip Enterprise Award, co-sponsored by Mass Mutual, Business Week magazine, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.


1970s

Richard Burd
(M.S. DSGN ’70), Bridgman, Mich., visited the Bauhaus Museum in Germany in January 2016 and the Moholy-Nagy: Future Present exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago, and found both to be inspirational.

Manu Vora
(M.S. CHE ’70, Ph.D. ’75), Naperville, Ill., was appointed as a Fulbright Specialist by the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. He and a team he led from the Quality Council of India received the D. L. Shah Silver Quality Award for the ASQ India Leadership Excellence Series. Vora also taught the course Project Management for Organizational Excellence at the Indian Institute of Technology, Varanasi, India.

William Schiemann
(PSYC ’71, M.B.A. ’73), Lebanon, N.J., is chief executive officer of Metrus Group and is a thought leader, author, and keynote speaker in the human resources field. His latest book, Fulfilled! Critical Choices: Work, Home, Life, teaches individuals to think about life fulfillment in a holistic fashion, using principles and tools that have been proven to work in business and organizational psychology.

Kenneth Carlozzi
(MATH ’72), Hilton Head, S.C., had a longtime career at Boeing, serving as lead database designer for technical and management information systems for NASA’s Space Station Program and as manager of information systems development at Naval Air Warfare Center China Lake. Carlozzi was employed as a systems engineer and an enterprise architect the last 14 years of his career before retiring in 2014.

Paul Clements
(M.S. PSYC ’72, Ph.D. ’78), Belleair Beach, Fla., recently retired from many years of full-time practice as a medical psychologist and psychiatric nurse practitioner. He continues to have a consultation practice serving nursing homes.

Frederica Darema (née Rogers)
(M.S. PHYS ’72), Bethesda, Md., was appointed as director of the Mathematics, Information and Life Sciences Directorate of the Air Force Office of Scientific Research. [Read more about Darema in the spring 2014 issue of IIT Magazine at http://bit.ly/2hf1rJf.] 

Dana Broach
(PSYC ’74), Norman, Okla., was named to the editorial board of the International Journal of Aviation Psychology.

Ronald Painter
(ARCH ’74), Santa Maria, Calif., has had extensive global architecture opportunities, working on projects in Bolivia, Honduras, Italy, Mexico, and Romania. His domestic work has extended from California to Maine. The varied projects included an airport, many office buildings, temples, hospitals, and more than 11,000 residences, mostly privatized military housing. Painter also had his own firm for 10 years.

Daniel Vukelich
(ENGL ’76), Albuquerque, N.M., is the founding editor of ABQ Free Press, an alternative weekly serving Albuquerque and Santa Fe, which began publishing in 2014. Most recently he was editor of Sun Country Golf. A career journalist, Vukelich previously worked for 10 news organizations. His first newspaper was Illinois Tech’s TechNews.

Brian Devit

Brian Devitt

(BIOL ’77), Philadelphia, and his wife, Dale Buddine, attended the commissioning of the USS John P. Murtha (LPD-26)  at Penn’s Landing in Philadelphia in 2016. After serving for seven years on active duty and 13 years as a reservist, Devitt retired in 1997.

Anthony Metoyer
(ME ’77), Sammamish, Wash., director of operations and strategic development at Boeing, received the Black Engineer of the Year Award (2017) for Professional Achievement from the Career Communications Group. He is a member of the IIT Alumni Association Board of Directors.

Pinakin Patel
(M.S. CHE ’77), Danbury, Conn., is director of advanced technology at FuelCell Energy, a company started by Illinois Tech alumni that has now grown to more than 600 employees with operations in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. Patel has worked in his field for 40 years, and has more than 30 patents and 200 publications and invited talks. He received a special recognition award from the U.S. Department of Energy for a demonstration of the world’s first tri-generation system for fuel cell cars. Patel serves on the board of directors of the California Hydrogen Business Council. His latest innovation is the co-production of syn-gas plus power for stranded shale gas and for the petrochemical industry.

Jeffery Perl
(CHE ’77, M.S. ’79, Ph.D. ’84), Lincolnwood, Ill., authored the book Sustainability Engineering: A Design Guide for the Chemical Process Industry (Springer Publishing, July 2016).

Russell Sinkler
(M.P.A. ’77), Rosemount, Minn., provides executive sponsor support and client relationship management services to select large health care delivery systems in Illinois, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana.

Alan Druschitz
(MET ’78, Ph.D. ’82), Blacksburg, Va., was presented with the FEF/AFS Distinguished Professor Award at the 2016 Foundry Educational Foundation College-Industry Conference in Chicago.

Edward Generazio

Edward Generazio
(M.S. PHYS ’79), Yorktown, Va., program manager for NASA’s Office of Safety and Mission Assurance Nondestructive Evaluation, was awarded the NASA Distinguished Service Medal for his exemplary work in nondestructive evaluation. He also developed and patented a new electric-field imaging technology. Generazio’s sensor made imaging these fields possible for the first time.

Kazimer Ignarski
(CS ’79), Orland Park, Ill., is co-author of the second edition of the book Cubs By the Numbers, which features a complete list of every Chicago Cubs player (except one) who has worn a uniform number since the team began issuing them in 1932 as well as stories about players and managers.


1980s

Thomas Brisbin
(Ph.D. ENVE ’80), Anaheim, Calif., is chief executive officer and chairman of the board of Willdan Group, Inc. He has served as Willdan’s president and CEO since 2007.

Patrick Charbonneau
(M.B.A ’80), South Barrington, Ill., retired from Navistar after 38 years. He held many executive roles and led the development of Green Diesel Technology, used in all modern low-emissions car and truck diesel engines in the U.S. and Europe today. Charbonneau now enjoys consulting, and traveling with his wife, Rosanna.

David Erhart
(CHE ’80), Menlo Park, Calif., is senior director of reliability and testing at Tesla Motors.

Danuta Solecka-Urbikas
(M.S. ENVE ’80), Chicago, wrote the book My Sister’s Mother. A memoir of war, trauma, and survival, the book focuses on her mother and half-sister who were taken from their farm in Poland in 1940 and sent to Siberia to be slave laborers. Solecka-Urbikas also works as a real estate broker. She and her husband have three adult children.

Daniel Chow
(M.S. ENVE ’82), Cupertino, Calif., is chief operating officer of Willdan Group, Inc. Prior to accepting the newly created position he was president and chief executive officer of Willdan Engineering since 2008.

Karen Hubbard
(Ph.D. BIOL ’82), West Orange, N.J., received the City College of New York’s Presidential Award for Faculty Service.

Robert Theel
(ARCH ’83), Chicago, chief architect and director of the Design & Construction Division for the Great Lakes Region of the U.S. General Services Administration, was a keynote speaker at the Construction Industry Conference held at Illinois Tech in November 2016. [Read more about Theel in the fall 2016 issue of IIT Magazine at http://bit.ly/2hc5aql.]

Prasad Kodukula
(Ph.D. ENVE ’84), Chicago, an adjunct faculty member at Illinois Tech’s Armour College of Engineering, received the 2016 Eric Jenett Project Management Excellence Award from the Project Management Institute.

John Swierk
(ARCH ’84), Winnetka, Ill., is celebrating his 28th anniversary as founder and president of DDCA Architects, a Direct Design Ltd. company. He is licensed to practice architecture in 28 states and has a client base that includes national retail, restaurant, industrial, and manufacturing companies.

Ejaz Elahi
(M.S. CS ’88), Naperville, Ill., is a managing director at BDO Consulting in the Healthcare Advisory Practice. For more than 17 years, he has advised health care organizations and gained comprehensive experience in growth strategy, mergers and acquisitions, capital markets, and restructuring.

Candace Wark
(Ph.D. ME ’88), Chicago, professor at Illinois Tech’s Armour College of Engineering, was a member of the panel that selected the winners of the 2016 Blue Man Group Art Competition, Daring to Live in Full Color, as the group celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2016. Wark and Shirley Nannini of Wind Flow Photography were winners of the 2013 competition. [Read more about Wark in the summer 2015 issue of IIT Magazine at http://bit.ly/2hW07i0.]


1990s

Robert Klaszky
(AE ’92), Chesapeake, Va., U.S. Navy captain, recently commanded the forward-deployed Afloat Forward Staging Base USS Ponce (AFSB(I)-15). Klaszky serves on the staff at Military Sealift Command in Norfolk, Virginia, supervising fleet exercises and war gaming. He was selected for Major Command for his next assignment at Coastal Riverine Group TWO.

Shelly Scinto
(LAW ’92), Chicago Ridge, Ill., has joined Ice Miller’s as Of Counsel in the Municipal Finance Group. She has more than 15 years of experience in the municipal finance arena, having served as lead counsel on more than 250 underwritten and privately placed municipal bond transactions throughout the State of Illinois.

Timothy McJilton
(M.B.A. ’93), Glenview, Ill., joined Chicago Real Estate Resources as an investment broker specializing in industrial, office, and multi-family real estate investments.

Christopher Monroe
(PS ’93), Whitefield, Maine, is an associate at Verrill Dana LLP.

Michael Lee
(LAW ’94), Vernon Hills, Ill., is an attorney at Howard & Howard, concentrating his practice in civil litigation, financial services, and labor and employment.

Rishi Bharadwaj
(EE ’96, M.A.S. ECE ’99, CER WIRE ’99), Schaumburg, Ill., was promoted to senior vice president and general manager of PCTEL’s Connected Solutions group. The role recognizes Bharadwaj’s contributions and leadership of the company’s antenna business, the development of its Beijing Design Center, its Tianjin manufacturing operation, and its sales growth in China.

Amanda Howland
(LAW ’96), Lake Zurich, Ill., was elected to the Diversity Committee of the Association of Community College Trustees for a two-year term. Howland has had an extensive career as a teacher of behavior-disordered students, an elementary school administrator, and now as an attorney and mediator practicing in the areas of civil rights and constitutional law.

Sherry Knutson Vaughan

Sherry Knutson Vaughan
(LAW ’96), Chicago, was elected a fellow of the International Society of Barristers. She has 20 years of experience in product liability and toxic tort cases, with an emphasis on defending pharmaceutical and medical device companies.

Lara Dreznick Shayne
(LAW ’96), Chicago, was appointed by Governor Bruce Rauner to the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board.

John Katsoudas
(PHYS ’97, M.S. ’04), Chicago, Illinois Tech senior research associate, co-founded AquaGrow Technologies with Elena Timofeeva, adjunct associate professor of chemistry. AquaGrow is a fully containerized aquaponics farm that uses local food waste as the energy source instead of electricity. It provides grid independence at a lower cost than typical indoor farms and mobility for use in food-poor areas.

Michael Hreczkosij
(PHYS ’98), Bagdad, Fla., was deployed to Kabul, Afghanistan, to serve as the commander of the 538th Air Expeditionary Advisory Squadron. He is leading a team of air advisors tasked with training and advising the Afghan Air Force on mobility operations, and will hold this position until July 2017.

Jennifer Ashley
(LAW ’99), Libertyville, Ill., received a 2016 Women of Distinction Award from the Lake County Journal. She joined Salvi, Schostok & Pritchard P.C. in 2012 and was named partner two years later. Ashley concentrates her practice in the area of personal injury. In addition, she is involved in many legal associations, including the Lake County Bar Association, Illinois State Bar Association, Illinois Trial Lawyers Association, and American Association for Justice.

Mark Frame
(M.S. PSYC ’99, Ph.D. ’03), Murfreesboro, Tenn., was promoted to full professor in the Department of Psychology at Middle Tennessee State University.


2000s

Brian Gahan
(M.A.S. CHE ’02), Cary, Ill., U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel, assumed command of the recently activated 182d Medical Group Detachment 1 in Peoria. He previously served as the bioenvironmental engineering officer at the 126th Air Refueling Wing, Scott Air Force Base. Gahan and his wife, Cindy, have three children.

Cynthia Leos (née Goldberg)
(LAW ’02), Albuquerque, N.M., won a contested primary election and a contested general election in 2016 for 2nd Judicial District Court Judge in Albuquerque. She assumed the criminal bench in January 2017. 

Mark Haraburda
(M.S. FM ’04), Chicago, is chief executive officer of Barchart.com Inc., a Chicago-based leading provider of financial market data and technology. Previously, he was Barchart’s managing director of business development and sales. Haraburda also has worked for Bank One, the Chicago Board of Trade, and the Chicago Board of Options Exchange.

Amy Beribak
(PSYC ’06), Watersmeet, Mich., earned a clinical doctorate in occupational therapy and passed the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy. She is a travel therapist with Delta Health Care and works in home health care in rural Michigan. Beribak is a regular presenter at various national occupational therapy conferences.

Erin Conway (née Woelker)
(LAW ’07), Chicago, is a partner at Amin Talati Upadhye, LLP.

Benjamin Edlavitch
(LAW ’07), Wilmette, Ill., has joined Westman, Champlin & Koehler, an intellectual property law firm in Minneapolis. Edlavitch is a member of the Illinois and Minnesota bars, and is registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.


2010s

LaShon Anthony
(CER IT ’10), Chicago, is celebrating her first anniversary as the community leader of her chapter, ABI Chicago, a women in tech group associated with the Anita Borg Institute. ABI’s global mission is to advance women in technology through professional and leadership development, mentoring, and training.

Patrick Olechno

Patrick Olechno
(CE ’10, M.S. ’12), Mt. Prospect, Ill., is an engineer at Raths, Raths & Johnson, Inc., a national engineering, architecture, and forensics consulting firm.

Omaditya Khanna
(CHE ’11), Philadelphia, is a resident at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.

Margaret Master
(LAW ’12), Chicago, serves on the KIPP Colorado Advisory Board. She promotes the work of KIPP Colorado Schools students and teachers, coordinates mentorship programs for current students and alumni, participates in fundraising efforts, and hosts networking events to raise public awareness of the nonprofit organization. Master is an associate at the Denver office of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, LLP.

Nik Rokop
(M.D.M. ’12), Chicago, was installed as the Coleman Foundation Clinical Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship at Illinois Tech. He supports student entrepreneurs and faculty who enhance experiential entrepreneurship education.

Michael Ward
(LAW ’12), Chicago, is an associate at Bryan Cave LLP in the real estate and lending client service groups.

Wen Yao
(M.S. MCOM ’12), Chicago, co-founded Powwful, a sports bra company inspired by well-known Chicago architecture and public art. Previously, Yao launched a fashion startup called Style Check-in, a curated personal styling service for petite women.

Daniel Craven

Daniel Craven

(ARCH ’13), Maquoketa, Iowa, and his team at Urban Architecture Studio, in Chicago, won first prize in a competition to conceive the world’s first freeform 3-D printed house. Planning phases will take place in Chattanooga, Tennessee, with printing set to begin sometime this year.

Elyse Doll
(PSYC ’13), Chicago, is a graduate student at Northern Illinois University. She is studying school psychology and received a federal grant to address and prevent school-age bullying.

Bhavna Hosakere
(EE ’13), London, moved from New York City to London with her husband for a professional opportunity with the strategy and business transformation team at The Hackett Group, Inc.

Samantha Lloyd
(LAW ’13), Chicago, was made partner at RC Immigration Group LLC in 2016. She practices in a range of areas relating solely to immigration.

Christopher Riley
(LAW ’13), Chicago, joined McDonald Hopkins LLC, a business advisory and advocacy law firm, as an associate in the business department. Prior to joining McDonald Hopkins, Riley was an associate attorney at Lowis & Gellen LLP.

Joanna Weir
(PSYC ’13, CER PSYR ’15, M.S. REHA ’15), Chicago, is a vocational specialist with Helping Hand Center and works for the nationwide program Project SEARCH at Brookfield Zoo. She supervises 10 adults with various disabilities who are learning new job skills during their zoo internships. Weir also assists with the transition of the adults to their jobs in the community.

James Pierog-Sheehan
(CHE ’14), St. Charles, Ill., was awarded third place at the sixth annual Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Division Graduate Award Symposium for his talk “Product Formation and Kinetics from the Fast Hydrothermal Liquefaction of Soy Protein Isolate.” The symposium was held during the 252nd American Chemical Society National Meeting in Philadelphia.

Pu Chen
(M.S. FIN ’15), Chicago, is founder of the lunch delivery startup Chowbus, located in the Merchandise Mart.

Kun Li
(Ph.D. MSC ’15), Hammond, Ind., assistant professor of finance at Beijing Normal University, received the Outstanding Young Faculty Research Grant. The grant supports promising and outstanding scholars and professionals under 35 with funding from the Government of Beijing and Organization Department of the Communist Party of China. Li is the first IIlinois Tech alumnus to receive this award.  

Brian Farci
(ARCH ’16), West Linn, Ore., moved to Portland, Oregon, and joined a collaborative team designing retail environments for Nike’s pinnacle North American retail locations. Notable projects include retail executions for the Olympics 2016 and Tech Pack, and the opening of new Nike stores in New York City’s Soho neighborhood and Miami.

Shyamoli Gramopadhye
(M.A.S. FST ’16), Springfield, Mo., is enjoying her first job as a food technologist and also her latest adventure as a food blogger for FoodGrads.com.