So here is the latest update from the proud cohort with a 100% retention rate – ACE 11!
Here we go, in ABC order by last name (maiden name if married since ACE)…
Sofia "yes, I'm still at Notre Dame" Barbato is at Notre Dame (surprise!) in her first year of the Masters of Divinity Program. If you're wondering, she has not yet mastered the divine...
Jillian Bernas, Tony Groseta, and Caty Hughes: ¡Hola desde Santiago! Hemos estado aquí por casi un mes ya y seguimos aprendiendo nuevas cosas cada día. Nuestro departamento es increíble y aquí en el colegio nos sentimos como en casa. En marzo, Tony va a ensenar clases de noveno grado, Caty de segundo grado, y Jillian de quinto grado. Kat, Padre Scully, y Padre Warner nos visitaron hace dos semanas y tuvimos una Linda visita con ellos. En enero vamos a acompañar a un grupo de jovenes en misiones a una isla en la costa de Chiloé. Estamos anticipando este viaje mucho. Después tenemos vacaciones hasta marzo. En algún momento ustedes tienen ganas de viajar están invitados a quedarse con nosotros. ¡Chao!
Translation: Santiago has been great! You should come! Bye!
Leah Bertke: Leah "the luckiest woman in the world" Bertke gets to spend much of her time in the presence of the two most beautiful and charming men ever conceived…and she also teaches high school in her spare time. P.S. Nathan Patla helped me write this!
Amy Bozzo: After a grueling 24-hour drive from Kansas to New York this summer, Amy Bozzo moved down to Fairfax, Virginia and is teaching 5th grade Language Arts, History, and Drama at Alexandria Country Day School in a suburb of Washington, DC. She is also planning her 7/7/07 wedding to her fiancé, Matthew, (whom she met during her first ACE year in Kansas City!). She is excited to be back on the East Coast, closer to family and friends.
Chris Broughton: Chris “it’s already been” Broughton splits his work between the ACE Badin Office and the IEI Building. He has spent a good portion of the fall visiting our ACE teachers in LA and ACE graduates around the country. His weekends have been kept busy hosting family, friends, and the occasional stranger for ND home football games. Currently, Chris spends much of his time planning for the Inaugural ACE Fellows Winter Board Meeting that will take place in January 2007. He has high hopes of becoming a bat boy for the World Champion St. Louis Cardinals next year.
Ruston Broussard: For Ruston, the move to Chicago was tough after being in many National Parks for most of the summer. Ruston and fellow ACEr, Katie Mitchell, were able to do a retreat with the Trappists in KY on the way up to Chicago. Ruston teaches at Loyola Academy in the village of Wilmette, just north of the city. He has been able to participate in a couple of faith sharing groups, which have been really good. He was welcoming freshman parents at open house night and one asked, "How did they get a cajun north of I 10?" There aren't too many Broussards in Chicago! He has been able to go on one retreat and one service day with his students and is still hoping to do some coaching, but that has not worked out yet. He also ran the Chicago half marathon with a couple of friends. One final thought, Thomas Bambrick is almost as cool as his brother, my roommate, John Bambrick!
Shannon Byrne (now Batal): Shannon “formerly Byrne” Batal is enjoying married life. She’s teaching third grade at Cora Spencer Elementary School in Mansfield, TX. She is loving teaching, although she felt sort of grouchy one day at school because she stayed up too late the night before reading Charlie Weis' new book. It's entertaining and interesting. I would recommend it.
Peter Corrigan: Peter is currently serving in the exciting capacity of assistant principal and teacher at Saint Augustine Catholic High School in Tucson. St. Augustine is a four-year high school that has endured tremendous tragedy in its first three years (first two principals died). Despite these challenges, the school has tremendous potential. They are poised to graduate their first senior class this spring, with Greg Boyle, SJ founder of Homeboys Industries, as the commencement speaker. In addition to teaching, recruiting, and discipline, Peter also served as the girls volleyball coach. The girls enjoyed a wonderful season, including qualifying for the regional tournament for the first time.
Michael Crean: Please see Sarah Finch’s update!
T.J. D’Agostino: T.J. has ACE coming out of his eyeballs right now. He’s back at Notre Dame working for ACE and looking into connections with ACE and Haiti. He’s also recently engaged to his ACE sweetheart, Emmeline, and they will be married in September of '07.
Betsy Dawson Drake: Betsy and her husband Paul are expecting two additions to their family! They recently began the process of adopting an infant and a toddler from Ethiopia and are hoping to have their children home within the next year. Please keep them in your prayers as they take this big step! Meanwhile, she is enjoying her third year at St. Adalbert in South Bend and is completing the post-ACE ENL program (just when she thought she was done writing papers and formal lesson plans!).
Katie Diller: Katie "Science makes me dreamy" Diller has snapped on the latex gloves again as a graduate student of the Molecular, Cell, Genetics and Development (MCGD) Track of the Biological and Biomedical Sciences (BBS) program at Yale University. When she is not up to her elbows in biohazardous bacteria or equally biohazardous reading assignments, she enjoys serving on the St. Thomas More student chapel Graduate Student Council where a Holy Cross
associate pastor keeps her updated on ND football.
Michelle Eppich: Michelle “the Super Dancing All-star Roommate” is enjoying teaching ballroom dancing full time at Pensacola Ballroom. She also spends three of her mornings each week teaching music at St. John the Evangelist grade school - a position she is most unqualified to hold, but nevertheless challenges her creativity and keeps her connected with the younger generation. She is loving not having to constantly grade papers and lesson plan and spends every moment she can drinking a differently variety of tea on her front porch and concocting epicurean delights in the kitchen.
Sarah Finch: Sarah Finch is teaching on the west side of Chicago at an all boys’ middle school. The school, Chicago Jesuit Academy, was recently named one of the top 25 elementary schools in the city of Chicago. Don't let the ranking fool you...the kids still ask, "Can I use it?" and "What you said?" Nothing too terribly interesting about herself to add, however, does have news about Mike Crean, who recently moved from Birmingham back to Connecticut for a dream teaching job. Figuring he wouldn't write in, she decided to spread the word herself.
Colleen Gannon: Colleen Gannon is back home in Washington, DC and as you all could probably have predicted, she couldn't be happier to be back in a city after her 2 years of country living in ACE. She is teaching 6th & 7th graders at the Washington Jesuit Academy, an all boys’ Nativity school in DC.
Laura Giannuzzi: Laura “never a dull moment” Giannuzzi is back in Pensacola at her ACE school, St. John’s, to teach for a third year. As predicted, she sometimes doesn’t know what to do with herself having no ACE coursework to complete and having no other ACE responsibilities on the side. But she continues to keep herself busy leading the school choir, coaching, and training. She successfully completed her first triathlon in October and thinks this might be a new passion for her. Sadly, she won’t make it to the ACE marathon this year, but is training for the Pensacola marathon instead, which is also in February. Oh, and her dancing all-star ACE roommate, Michelle Eppich, has finally gotten her out dancing a few nights a week!
Karen Hammen: Karen Hammen recently moved to San Jose, in a bold move, following David Yeager to the Bay Area. She was unable to stomach the thought of a life void of the Yeagermeister, so she has decided to become his Secretary for his movement to change the face of Catholic education. Karen also teaches 25 sixth grade girls at Our Lady of Grace Nativity Schools.
Karl Hendrickson: KFFH still lives and works in Mobile at McGill-Toolen Catholic High School. Never content with keeping the same job each year, he now holds the position of Director of Campus Ministry and moonlights as an Algebra 1 teacher. During his free time, he likes to visit the Brotherhood of Hope in Tallahassee, ride his bicycle, or simply sit back and sip a cold glass of southern sweet tea. Next summer he will move in with the Brotherhood of Hope (most likely in Boston) to begin formation as a brother.
Bryant Henry: Bryant has her VISA to work for a year in Europe. She is currently living and working in Galway, Ireland until December. She’ll head home for Christmas and then will be moving to live and work in Edinburgh, Scotland for 6 months. Her future plans are to move back to Mobile, Alabama and teach in the fall of 2007.
Tony Hollowell: Brother Peter, formerly known to the material world as Tony Hollowell, is in his first year of his novitiate program with the Dominicans. Though this year gives one copious amounts of time to "pray and reflect", Br. Peter is using his time for more useful activities, like sleeping 9 hours a day, reading spiritual classics such as "Harry Potter", and learning Eric Clapton songs on his guitar. Though Br. Peter truly misses the feeling of waking up stressed out over a pile of ungraded papers and unplanned classes, he considers the year to be a great success, if for no other reason than the fact that they have yet to kick him out of the program.
Michael Lang: Mike "Chocolate Teacher in the Cat City" Lang is teaching English to 1,758 of the brightest children in Miaoli (Cat) City, Taiwan. He holds the distinction of being the only African American in the city limits, the first African American to teach in Cat City, being constantly bombarded with questions of "Can you play basketball?" or "Can you rap?" and generally being stared at by all who pass by. Two traffic accidents were caused by drivers staring at him!
Liz Larkin: Liz "Dr. Liz" Larkin is well on her way to actually earning the doctor title and degree. Medical school in Ireland often seems way too fun to really be medical school, but the information is being thrown hard and fast. Then again, Liz loves to learn random facts and can often be found discussing inane physiological abnormalities that gross out most non-medical students. As the first Graduate Entry Program in Ireland, the small class of 53 is just a large guinea pig for RCSI, but Liz and her classmates will be out working the clinical wards in July.
Mike Macaluso: Returning back to his high school alma mater, Mike Macaluso still cannot call his high school teachers by their first name. Though some refuse to talk to him until he does so, he enjoys spending time with them now as fellow colleagues. Mike loves being back home, teaching history and English. His students are much more concerned with him being the leprechaun than any of the material they discuss in class. Despite this, he loves teaching and couldn't imagine being anywhere else!
Sarah Miller & Ryan O’Connor: Sarah and Ryan are thoroughly enjoying their amazing weekend adventures in Central America. Teaching in Guatemala, they are learning a lot, but really miss being at a Catholic school. For pictures, videos, and a blog, see their website at www.beyellow.org.
Katie Mitchell: Katie is living in Chicago now, teaching Science at Cristo Rey Jesuit High School.
Christy Moore: Christy "Senorita" Moore ya esta ensenando el espanol to wonderful public school kids. She finished a successful volleyball season and is now coaching basketball, enjoying it much more. She is back at home in Texas and recently received a new drivers license…she is now a Certified School Bus Driver! Pray for her!
Mandy Mouton: She is busy in Fort Worth teaching at her ACE school, living upstairs from Andrew Villanueva, and hanging out with the new ACErs! Mostly, though, she is getting ready for her wedding on December 2nd down in Houston. Wedding preparation is keeping her busy!
Mary O’Leary: She says that “Alls is well,” and is back on Irish soil teaching away. Mary teaches 4th class in the CBS Primary, New Ross, co. Wexford. She hopes all is well for everyone.
Nathan Patla: Nathan "What am I doing today again?" Patla is succeeding in surviving another year in Baton Rouge, his old ACE site, and is trying hard to look beyond the next bell to what will happen next year...so far he has no idea
what he is doing either tomorrow or today!
Katie Perry: She is in her first year (of six!) of graduate school for Spanish Literature at Wisconsin-Madison, which means that her life is dedicated to reading every book ever written in Spanish, along with teaching Spanish 102 and trying to convince 21 college students that they're taking her class because it's awesome and not because it's a requirement.
Sam Procopio: Living in the best city on Mother Earth, Seattle, former 3rd Team All-ACE 11, Sam Procopio is math teaching his brain off at Interlake High School in the cozy confines of the affluent suburb of Bellevue. His current projects include coaching a Freshman girls soccer team (record 0-14-2) and pumpkin carving.
Sisco Ramirez: Sisco "Loves the Backer" Ramirez is teaching 4th grade at All Saints in Kansas City, KS. Other than going back for ND games this fall, he just enjoys chilling in the KC. His school might close next year, so if anybody has any job offers, please let him know!
Annette Romans: Annette is still at Our Lady of Hungary in South Bend teaching 3rd grade and 8th Grade Algebra. Her kids are great this year…she only has 10…and they are excited about penpaling with Miss Giannuzzi’s class again down in Pensacola.
Paul Sepe: Paul "I'm not sensitive" Sepe is in South Bend working in the First Year of Studies at Notre Dame. He's enjoying working with the freshmen as they get adjusted to life at ND and the large amounts of free time that he has for once. Still unsure of what the future will bring, he's open to, and in fact soliciting, suggestions.
Kevin Somok: Kevin "Doesn't” Somok "Weed Everyday" is back for Round Three at St. Ignatius in Austin. He still enjoys the nightly Bill Trandon mini-concert series. Kevin rides his 1977 model ten-speed bicycle to work most days, although he sometimes starts his morning with a brisk walk instead.
Brandon Till: Brandon is still livin' large in Austin, Texas. Teaching for a 3rd year has, thus far, been a good experience for him, but his roommate, Kevin Somok, continues to be a pain in the a**. He’s trying to build up his coaching resume to be the next Charlie Weis and managed to increase his wins by 100% from last year with a total of 2 wins this year. You must take in to account that this is not just 5th/6th grade flag football, but TEXAS 5th/6th grade flag football so, needless to say, people are talking!
Jack Turner: Jack Turner teaches Junior and Senior Religion at St. Francis High School in Athol Springs, NY. He is also the Assistant Wrestling Coach and the Assistant Director of Franciscan Youth Ministry.
Laura Waite: Laura Waite is teaching kindergarten at Holy Spirit Catholic School in Great Falls, Montana. She married Tommy Demko on August 5, 2006. They are looking forward to relocating in June, although their destination is currently unknown.
Aaron Wall: Awall is chilling out in the IEI working on the Magnificat project and running a hostel on football weekends. He is loving the Bend, but thinks gray is overrated. Awall is still heading home early from the Backer and making sure that the cagey Chris Broughton is not settling for too many townies!
Laura Wolohan: Laura is living in the Post-ACE sorority house, as Chris Broughton dubbed it during a visit in October, in Nashville with Jenny Reed and Liz O'Connor. She teaches with Jared Dees at John Paul II High School, along with Eric Nitz and Al Mila (ACE 12). They spend most of their time with Meghan Robinson and Danny Linton (ACE 10) and Greg Celio (ACE 11) as well as their other friends.
Lauren Wons: Lauren "you're white?" Wons feels somewhat like a new ACEr. She started a job at Epic, a computer healthcare company, in August with 135 other recent grads knowing pretty much nothing about computers or healthcare. No big deal though for Lauren! Although she misses the B-ham weather, she is loving her new job and loving the city of Madison. She is keeping her fingers crossed that she will get assigned to work with a children's hospital in a fun city.
Well, that’s all folks! Thanks to all those who contributed and thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed it all. Can’t wait to hear some more updates in May when Brandon pulls this all together again. God bless!!!
Laura Giannuzzi