Blog Articles

On Board: 3 Distinguished Alumni Join the College’s Board of Trustees

January 9, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on On Board: 3 Distinguished Alumni Join the College’s Board of Trustees
John Gingrich

John Gingrich

John Gingrich ’91 is the office managing director for Accenture in Northern California, leading more than 5,000 people who work out of the company’s San Francisco Innovation Hub and San Jose offices. He is responsible for Accenture’s talent development and recruiting as well as growing the business and maintaining strong client relationships. He also works to deepen relationships with local community organizations, nonprofits, higher education institutions and government entities. Gingrich returned to Accenture in 2020 from Bay Area startup Humu, where he held the position of chief revenue officer. Earlier in his career he spent nearly three decades at Accenture. Gingrich is a board member and past board chair of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce. He also is a director for the Elizabeth V. Sanderson Foundation, which provides animal rescue resources and land preservation grants to help protect the environment. Born in Pomona and raised in Claremont, Gingrich majored in international relations at Pomona. His wife, Christine Currie ’91, is a Pomona alumna. Their son Gus Gingrich ’24 is a current student.

Wei Hopeman

Wei Hopeman

Wei Hopeman ’92 is a co-founder and managing partner of Arbor Ventures, a leading Asia-based fintech-focused venture capital firm founded in 2013. Arbor uses its global vantage point, extensive network and deep sector knowledge to identify key trends and partner closely with leading entrepreneurs to build transformational companies. Hopeman previously was managing director and head of Asia for Citi Ventures, chief China representative for Jefferies & Co. and a technology investment banker at Goldman Sachs in Silicon Valley. She currently serves on the board of directors of Booking Holdings and numerous private technology firms. After graduating from Pomona College with a major in international relations, Hopeman earned an MBA at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Jim Valone

Jim Valone

Jim Valone ’85 is a retired emerging markets investment professional who is actively involved in nonprofit work. From 1999 to 2021, he worked at Wellington Management, where he founded and led the firm’s emerging markets debt (EMD) effort. During his tenure, he built out a suite of EMD products, led a team of 35 professionals and grew assets under management to over $35 billion. Prior to joining Wellington, Valone was a portfolio manager at Baring Asset Management and an analyst and portfolio manager at Fidelity Management. In retirement he continues to invest in emerging markets through his private investment fund, 4747 LLC. Valone’s nonprofit work is concentrated in youth education and sustainability causes. He serves on the boards of the Wellington Foundation and Empower. Valone also is a board member of the Emerging Markets Investors Alliance, which promotes good governance and sustainable development in emerging markets. After majoring in economics at Pomona, he went on to earn an MBA from the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. He and his wife, Lisa Valone ’96, live in Wayland, Massachusetts, and have two grown children.

After 67 Years Pomona Claims Another SCIAC Football Championship

January 9, 2023  by Robyn Norwood Comments Off on After 67 Years Pomona Claims Another SCIAC Football Championship
Pomona-Pitzer Football team seen celebrating after winning 2022 Sixth st. Rivalry game

Pomona-Pitzer Football team seen celebrating after winning 2022 Sixth st. Rivalry game

When students rushed the field after Pomona-Pitzer’s Sixth Street Rivalry win over CMS for the first SCIAC title and first NCAA playoff berth in the program’s history, a few of them already had bottles of bubbly ready to spray in celebration.

Figuratively speaking, the champagne had been on ice for 67 years. Pomona had not won a SCIAC football title since 1955—so long ago that Pitzer College had not yet been founded and Pomona and Claremont played together on a combined team.

“It means the world. You imagine this, and now it’s a reality. Nothing beats it,” says defensive back Vaish Siddapureddy ’22, one of the Sagehens’ fifth-year seniors already taking classes at Claremont Graduate University while playing their final seasons after the COVID-19 pandemic canceled the 2020 season.

Quinten Wimmer PZ’24 on left, throwing a pass to Will Radice ’22 on right

Quinten Wimmer PZ’24 on left, Will Radice ’22 on right

Emotion was flowing along with champagne spray after a hard-fought 28-14 victory over CMS (7-2) on November 12. Officially, the two teams shared the SCIAC title with one conference loss each, but the Sagehens earned the automatic NCAA berth and bragging rights by virtue of their head-to-head win over the Stags.

Crowd of Pomona-Pitzer fans cheering

A week later, Pomona-Pitzer bowed out in the first round of the 32-team NCAA Division III football playoffs in a loss to undefeated Linfield University on November 19 in McMinnville, Oregon. But this Pomona-Pitzer team left its mark with an 8-3 record—the most wins in program history—with two of the losses in overtime.

“It’s a lot of hard work that coaches, players and staff have put into this, and we finally did it. We finally did it,” says John Walsh, head football coach and assistant professor of physical education.

It has been a long climb. When Walsh arrived at Pomona-Pitzer in 2013 as defensive coordinator and associate head coach, the Sagehens had won only two games over the past three years, making them one of the least successful programs in the country.

“It needed to be rebuilt,” Walsh says. “We took some time and solidified the infrastructure and then brought in the right coaches and the right players. That’s how you do it.”

Since Walsh took over as head coach before the 2017 season, the Sagehens have gone 27-20 and had only one losing record.

“When I first came into this program, Coach Walsh had only been here for a few years,” says offensive lineman Michael Collins ’22, who graduated with a degree in economics in May and will earn an MBA from Claremont Graduate University’s Drucker School of Management this spring. “He made a real point to change the culture here. This was a team that hadn’t won games in a long time. It had been 60 years at that point since Pomona had won a league championship. I really was inspired by the people he recruited to come in.”

The game was played in front of an overflow crowd at Merritt Field, with spectators leaning on the fences outside the stadium after the stands filled.

“When I came in, I had no clue how big a rivalry this really was,” says Collins. “It means a lot because this rivalry between the two teams has been a huge part of my time here. As much as you want to beat the other guys, the reality is, it makes both teams better. Both these teams, CMS and ourselves, have pushed each other in these tight rivalry games.

“I think it’s a real testament to not only what Pomona and Pitzer have going on, but all the 5Cs.”

A Grant for Inclusive Excellence

January 9, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on A Grant for Inclusive Excellence

Pomona’s newly created Institute for Inclusive Excellence will benefit from an $800,000 grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). The six-year grant is part of the HHMI Inclusive Excellence initiative, which incentivizes four-year colleges and universities to build capacity for inclusion on their own campuses, especially in the sciences. Pomona is one of 108 schools across the country that were invited to take part in HHMI’s current Inclusive Excellence 3 initiative. Most of the grant will go directly toward supporting programming through the College’s new institute, which is co-directed by Travis Brown and Professor of Biology Sharon Stranford. Pomona’s initial focus is on faculty and staff professional development in inclusive teaching and mentorship.

Travis Brown (left), Sharon Stranford (right)

Travis Brown (left), Sharon Stranford (right)

 

New COO and Treasurer Jeff Roth

January 9, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on New COO and Treasurer Jeff Roth

Jeff Roth, an innovative finance leader with experience at top higher education institutions and the nation’s largest public library system, joined the College as vice president, chief operating officer and treasurer in September.

Jeff RothHe previously was an associate vice president for academic planning and budgeting at UCLA, where he worked to increase transparency in allocation decisions for the $10 billion annual operating budget and developed a multi-year budget approach to strengthen the university’s finances for the future. Before joining UCLA in 2016, Roth served in a series of key leadership roles over 15 years at the New York Public Library, directing finance and strategic planning for the 92-location system, largest in the U.S. He earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and an MBA from Rutgers Graduate School of Management.

4+7 Cool Things About the New Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness

January 9, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on 4+7 Cool Things About the New Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness
Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness Aerial

Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness Aerial

When the glass doors of the Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness swung open in October, we heard words like “beautiful,” “gorgeous” and “When can alumni use it?” Another question is what to call the nearly 100,000-square-foot building in day-to-day use. Generous gifts by Ranney Draper ’60 and Priscilla Draper as well as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (facilitated by Libby Gates MacPhee ’86) allowed Pomona to begin construction on the $57 million project in 2021. Yet when the principal donors selected two special interior spaces—the fitness center and the upstairs gym—to name in commemoration, it left the building without a nickname. The acronym—CARW—wasn’t doing it for Jasper Davidoff ’23, who suggested in an opinion piece for The Student Life it might be better to rearrange the letters for the new home of Sagehen Athletics to a more ornithologically correct CRAW. Other efforts to invoke the sage grouse have landed on the Nest and the Roost. Still another attempt by students to make the acronym roll off the tongue was WARC, as in a place to WARC out. For now, we’ll go with that big, gorgeous, light-filled building at the end of Marston Quad between Big Bridges and Sixth Street. Hope to see you there on Alumni Weekend.

1) Oak Trees

Several large older oaks offer their shade near the building’s entrance, and new wooden tables and chairs entice people to linger in Rains Courtyard. Along Draper Walk on the south side of the building, a row of existing mature oaks has been enhanced with two newly planted young oaks and new benches. A larger oak has been planted between the new building and Smiley Hall, creating a small seating area outside the residence hall and a pleasant, leafy view from the fitness center. A subtle architectural reminder of Pomona’s lovely old oaks are the dappled shadows that fall on the concrete beneath the perforated shade panels that line the top part of the entry portico, and at night the light from the building lends a lantern-like effect.

2) Skyspace Tribute

Rains Courtyard, A tribute to Skyspace

Pomona’s familiar campus Skyspace by artist James Turrell ’65 welcomes sunrise and sunset with varied hues of light on the other side of Sixth Street. Architect Tim M. Stevens of the firm SCB added a nod to Turrell’s work in designing the Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness: Look up as you pass through Rains Courtyard just before the main entrance and you’ll see a rectangle of open sky, often a brilliant shade of blue.

3) Repurposed Wood

The basketball court from the earlier Memorial Gym that existed before the Rains Center opened in 1989 had been in storage for decades. The old maple court has been repurposed to gorgeous effect in the Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness, adding a midcentury vibe to an otherwise contemporary space. A feisty painted Sagehen on one piece of the court welcomes visitors to the front desk. Wood from center court, marked with the PP logo in the jump circle, can be found above the hallway leading to refurbished Voelkel Gym. And not to be overlooked, an expanse of blond refinished wood from the court provides a seating area along the large central stairway.

4) Ahmanson Studio and Studio 147

Studio 147 Door

With double the studio space of the previous building, there can be two classes in session at once, whether they are P.E. classes, general fitness sessions or faculty/staff fitness and wellness activities. Spin cycling is a new offering, along with standbys like yoga, Pilates and high-intensity interval training.

Each studio features a student-designed mural: Nico Cid Delgado ’25 is the artist of the one in Studio 147 downstairs, and Kaylin Ong ’25 created the one in the Ahmanson Studio on the second floor. And yes, the first-floor studio is literally room number 147.

Studio 147 Interior

5) Locker Rooms

With 12 locker rooms—including day-use lockers for students, faculty and staff—the building provides enough spaces for each of Pomona-Pitzer’s 21 Division III NCAA teams to have its own locker room during the season. Large, colorful banners with the sport’s name and one of the team’s Sagehen athletes of the past make the rooms feel special in-season—and the banners can be exchanged for a different sport’s when another team takes over later in the year. Instead of rooms that were too small or too large for a team’s personnel, they are right-sized—and players love that their names are posted on their stalls.

6) Draper Public Fitness Area

Spanning nearly 6,000 square feet just inside the main entrance and surrounded by windows on three sides, the Draper fitness center is the heart of the building. A space to nurture the health and well-being of students, faculty and staff, it also has become a new place to see and be seen. Indoor joggers, cyclists and stair-climbers can log miles on machines with a view of the passersby on busy campus walks—and perhaps those passersby will be inspired to come inside and work out too when they glimpse others doing cardio and lifting weights.

Draper Public Fitness Area

7) N&N Practice Gymnasium

That view. The San Gabriel Mountains are striking from many points on campus, but the sight of their snow-capped peaks in winter from the second-floor recreational and practice gym is stunning. The nearly floor-to-ceiling windows frame the scene spectacularly. Insider’s tip on the N&N Gym name: It’s a tribute to former head women’s basketball coach Nancy Breitenstein (1969-92) and her longtime assistant Nettie Morrison by former player Libby Gates MacPhee ’86. The teams coached by “N&N” included the 1981-82 team that reached the Final Four of the first NCAA Division III women’s basketball tournament ever held, along with the string of teams that dominated the SCIAC for much of the 1980s.

N&N Practice Gymnasium PE Class

8) Olson Family Terrace

Pass through the Athletics Department conference room at the back of the building on the second floor and you’re suddenly in an unexpected space: The Elizabeth Graham Olson and Steve Olson Family Terrace is a spacious shaded balcony with views of Merritt Field and Alumni Field. It’s a lovely spot for a small special event, a prime stop for visiting recruits and a very sweet perch to take in a football game, which comes in handy: Liz and Steve Olson are the parents of Sagehen football players Graham Olson ’23 and Matthias Olson ’26.

9) Hall of Fame

A silver platter won by Darlene Hard ’61, a Wimbledon singles finalist who won the U.S. Open and French Open championships, is among the memorabilia in the new Pomona-Pitzer Athletics Hall of Fame display, centrally located on the first floor. Other items include the historic drum from the old Pomona-Occidental football rivalry, an 1893 silver teapot trophy and the 2019 and 2021 NCAA Division III national championship trophies won by the men’s cross country team. A large mural features recent Sagehen athletes, among them Pomona’s Conor Rooney ’19, Sophia Hui ’19, James Baker ’17, Caroline Casper ’19, Sam Gearou ’19, Danny Rosen ’20, Vicky Marie Addo-Ashong ’20, Jessica Finn ’18, Andy Reischling ’19, Genevieve DiBari ’23, Ally McLaughlin ’16, Tanner Nishioka ’17, Nadia Alaiyan ’17, Aseal Birir ’18 and Liam O’Shea ’20.

10) Sixth Street Courtyard

What was largely neglected space along Sixth Street is now a gathering place, perfect for Sixth Street Rivalry games against Claremont-Mudd-Scripps or just a spot to pause during the day. An orderly arrangement of sycamore trees, benches made of wood and concrete, and a central planter create a sense of place. Plus, the metal wall sculpture Four Players by Bret Price ’72 has a new home on an exterior wall after being moved from inside the now-demolished Memorial Gym. Another new gathering place, Rains Courtyard outside the front entrance, provides more welcoming surroundings for another large-scale metal sculpture by an alumnus, In the Spirit of Excellence by Norman Hines ’61, which remains in its earlier location but is more prominent in the new landscape.

Sixth Street Courtyard

11) Athletic Performance Center

On the first floor with a wide view of Merritt Field, the nearly 5,000-square-foot strength and conditioning center is a cavernous space where varsity athletes train, along with other users. The equipment includes a dozen new Olympic lifting platforms painted in Sagehen blue and orange, plentiful free weights and a three-lane indoor turf strip. It’s as impressive as some NCAA Division I facilities and an enticing stop on the tour for athletic recruits. “I’m obviously biased but it’s probably a top-five Division III facility,” says Athletic Performance Coach Greg Hook PZ ’14.

CARW Athletic Performance Center workout equipment

 

New Eckstein Scholarship for Refugees

January 8, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on New Eckstein Scholarship for Refugees

Whether displaced by war, political upheaval or natural disaster, students fleeing crisis could soon find refuge at Pomona College through the new Dr. Albert Eckstein and Liese Bendheim Eckstein Scholarship.

Eckstein Family

Liese and Albert Eckstein in a family photo at son Paul’s 1962 graduation from Pomona, along with images of their U.S. citizenship papers.

Established by Pomona College Trustee Paul Eckstein ’62 P’92 GP’26 and his wife Florence P’92 GP’26 in memory of Paul’s parents with a gift of $1.2 million, the permanently endowed scholarship will provide students with refugee status and financial need a chance to continue their education.

Paul’s father, Albert, born in 1908 in what is now Romania, immigrated to America with his family as a teenager to escape the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe. Encountering quotas on Jewish students in U.S. medical schools, Albert returned to Europe to attend medical school in Germany, where he met Liese Lotte Bendheim. With Hitler in power by the time Albert earned his degree in 1936, the couple left Germany for the U.S. ahead of the horrors of the Holocaust.

Paul said his father often spoke about the extraordinary waste of human talent caused by the Holocaust, other wars and political upheaval. Both Flo and Paul know his parents would be proud the endowed scholarship carries their names. Thinking of future recipients, Paul says, “Who knows if they will be Nobel Prize winners, great senators, or wonderful writers or musicians? I like to dream and think this gift will in some way help facilitate that.”

Alumni Voice: Alfredo Romero ’91

January 7, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on Alumni Voice: Alfredo Romero ’91

Romero, the new president of the Alumni Association Board, arrived at Pomona in 1987 as an undocumented student. After working in international business, he now owns a marketing consulting firm for small businesses and is a part-time lecturer at Loyola Marymount. His conversation with PCM’s Robyn Norwood has been edited for length and clarity.

Alfredo Romero

PCM: How was it that you first came to Pomona?

Romero: In high school, I visited the Harvey Mudd campus through the Upward Bound program, where we got to stay overnight. I was very interested in—and still am—engineering and mathematics. During the tour, somebody pointed out, oh yeah, down the street there are other colleges. Pitzer, Claremont McKenna, Pomona. Only one of my teachers at Pioneer High School in Whittier had actually heard of Pomona, and the only reason he remembered was because Pomona had won the College Bowl back in the ’60s. So that added a little bit more mystique. Sure enough, I fell in love once I got to visit the campus, meet people and read about the student-faculty ratio. I thought, absolutely, I’m going to apply.

PCM: Tell me about your family and higher education.

Romero: We’re all immigrants. I was 8 years old when we came here. I didn’t speak a lot of English. One of the reasons that we came to this country, my dad has said many times, is for the opportunities, including educational opportunities. We were a border family. I was born in Hermosillo, the capital of the state of Sonora, just south of Arizona. This was before the borders were so impenetrable. There was a lot of back and forth.

We finally came here, and I was pretty good at school and ended up skipping eighth grade. In high school, they put me in the track of the honors program. It was really interesting, the encouragement I got from my parents. It wasn’t even explicitly said, but I understood that whatever I chose to do, they were going to support it. It never really dawned on me to think about the price. We’d figure out how to pay for it. I’d take loans if I had to, which I did. There are a lot of things I wish I would have known. But I also had probably the best support I could have gotten.

PCM: How did you get involved on campus once you were here?

Romero: I spent my first two years in Oldenborg, and that was a lot of fun. I was very involved in high school and I just continued that here. I decided to run for ASPC, so I was a senator and then I was the external affairs commissioner my junior year. I played intramurals. I’ve always been very sociable, so I’d just go meet people. A lot of the people on the Alumni Board are people who were very involved. In fact, we have former ASPC presidents on the board, including Andrea Venezia [’91], who was ASPC president when I was here. My personal journey after graduating was that I volunteered with the CDO [Career Development Office] quite a bit. And I served on panels about business, international business, graduate school, anything they needed speakers for that I have experience in.

What it’s always been about is Pomona did a lot for me. Coming in, I was actually undocumented. I didn’t get my green card until I was a sophomore at Pomona. Thinking back, that was probably one of the reasons I chose Pomona over UCLA—a state school versus a private school. I never got to the conversation with UCLA as to what they would have expected of me as an undocumented student, but with Pomona there was no issue. Some of the loans I got were different from federal loans, but they found them for me.

That’s probably one of the biggest debts of gratitude I have to Pomona: They didn’t let my immigrant status get in the way. But the other one is really just the exposure to the world that I got at Pomona. Students from all over the world, all over the country. The access to different socioeconomic groups. I think one of the best advantages Pomona has, especially with the diversity of the student body, is that as a young immigrant kid from Whittier, you get to speak with people whose parents are professors or they’re lawyers or they’re successful business people. There are also instances where you realize that you’re in a better situation than they are, which for a 17-or 18-year-old is eye-opening when you’ve been told your whole life that people in the upper part of the socioeconomic strata have it better: They have a better life; they have a better chance of success.

The story I love to tell is the friend of mine who needed to buy a dress for a formal party. We went down to Montclair Plaza. I had a car, and that was one of the biggest things right? I’m local, so I have a car and I drive people around. There are different kinds of privilege. We get to the mall, she picks the dress she wants and we go up to the counter. Her father had given her a checkbook and said, “Go ahead. Write checks for anything you need.” Which immediately I’m thinking, oh, that’s cool. She opens up the checkbook and goes, “I don’t know how to write a check.” It was a big reveal to me, because I had a checking account since I got a job at 16. So I helped her. Privilege isn’t necessarily a binary thing. It’s not one extreme or the other.

PCM: Given the timing, were you part of the Reagan amnesty era?

Romero: Yes, absolutely. We came here in 1978, and my dad actually had attended high school in Arizona, in Tucson. He joined the U.S. Air Force but ended up moving back to Mexico, met my mom and had a family there. When we came, my dad said, “I’m a veteran. We should have no problem immigrating.” So we started applying for residency. And nothing. It was issues with my dad’s paperwork; there were just all kinds of hurdles. It was seven, eight years of trying. My mom was completely concerned when I was in high school. “Be careful where you go, you don’t want to get caught by Immigration.” At that point, I think I’d already lost any accent I had, so I wasn’t that worried. But my mom was.

At one point, the lawyer we had hired to help us looked at my parents and said, “You know, the best thing you could do right now is to apply for this new amnesty program that is coming through.” So when I hear people talking about, like, why don’t people just come here legally, I remember it took us almost a decade to do it the right way. That is how finally, in 1987, I was in Oldenborg and I got my date to go down to the city of Pomona and have my interview to get my temporary residence card.

PCM: With the Alumni Board, do you come in with anything specific you’re trying to do?

Romero: The Alumni Board to me is a reflection of the alumni community as a whole. So what I immediately recognized is that no matter what my personal feelings may be towards something, the only way to get things done is to make sure the energy is there to get them done. Yes, I have a particular passion for DACA students or anybody undocumented. I have a very, very strong desire to help first-generation and low-income students as they come in. We do have a very diverse group on the board, including other former first-generation students.

But we also have—I guess I’m part of this now—older alumni who are very interested in continuing the traditions of the College. In conversations with some of the younger alums, there seems to be a disconnect between their experience at Pomona and what they see as the traditions of the College. Some of that was done on purpose because there are some traditions that Pomona had—the freshman weigh-in was definitely one we don’t want to continue. It stopped. But there are a lot of traditions that we do want to continue. (For more on traditions, see Pomoniana Blog)

In Memoriam: Julian Nava ’51

January 7, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on In Memoriam: Julian Nava ’51

Educator and Ambassador to Mexico, 1927—2022

Julian NavaJulian Nava ’51, a professor and trailblazing advocate for public education who later became the first Mexican American to serve as U.S. ambassador to Mexico, died July 29, 2022. He was 95.

Two Los Angeles Unified School District campuses bear Nava’s name—the Dr. Julian Nava Learning Academy and the Nava College Preparatory Academy—in recognition of his contributions as the first Latino elected to the Los Angeles Board of Education in 1967.

Nava, a professor of history at Cal State Northridge for more than 40 years, served on the LAUSD board for 12 years, including two stints as board president. A proponent of bilingual education, a multicultural curriculum and school integration, he emerged as a pivotal figure in the first year after he was elected during the volatile protests remembered as the East L.A. high school walkouts or Chicano “blowouts,” when thousands of students walked out of classrooms demanding more equitable education. Nava, a graduate of Roosevelt High in Boyle Heights, immediately found himself in the middle.

“Having grown up in East Los Angeles and having experienced the same unfair treatment that these students were experiencing, he understood it like no other member on the board,” remembers his daughter Carmen Nava, a professor of history at Cal State San Marcos.

“It was a trial by fire and on a certain level, everybody criticized him. People on the right felt like, ‘Who is this person who’s sympathetic and soft on crime?’ People on the left were like, ‘Why are you wearing a suit? You’ve just become one of them and you’re a sellout.’”

Nava—at times under such criticism he was advised to wear a bullet-proof vest—persuaded the board to move a pivotal meeting to East L.A.’s Lincoln High, and the board eventually implemented reforms that met most of the students’ demands.

“He had to find a way to speak with his brand-new colleagues on the board—to talk with them, to learn from them, to educate them, to convince them that this was an opportunity to listen to these students—and to do what he could, for example, to try to prevent an overreaction, a police reaction, to what the students were doing,” his daughter says.

Though Nava hadn’t planned to go into politics or diplomacy, he was appointed U.S. ambassador to Mexico in 1980 by President Jimmy Carter, serving until 1981 after Ronald Reagan had taken office. In 1992, not long after he taught at Pomona as a visiting professor, Nava announced a run for mayor of Los Angeles, but his candidacy never took hold.

Nava arrived at Pomona after serving in the U.S. Navy Air Corps near the end of World War II. The GI Bill provided a pathway to higher education, and he became the first of eight siblings to attend college. He enrolled at East Los Angeles College, where he was the first Mexican American elected student body president. One of his teachers, a Pomona alumna, pointed him toward her alma mater, suggesting that he could be accepted despite a B+ average. “She explained that grades were not everything that Pomona would take into account. My well-rounded background, military service and election as student body president could help gain acceptance,” he wrote in his autobiography, Julian Nava: My Mexican-American Journey.

At Pomona, Nava recalled, he was one of only a handful of students with Spanish surnames. He reveled in eating in Frary Dining Hall under the Prometheus mural by José Clemente Orozco, one of Mexico’s greatest artists. Professor Hubert Herring, a specialist in Latin American history, urged Nava to apply to graduate school at Harvard. He was accepted and became one of the first Mexican Americans to earn a doctorate from Harvard.

As a young man Nava worked as a community organizer with the Community Service Organization. There he met labor leader Cesar Chavez. He served as a pallbearer at Chavez’s funeral in 1993.

Pomona presented Nava with an honorary doctor of laws in 1980, when he was a Commencement speaker. His time as a Pomona student was a watershed, his daughter says. “Up to that point, nothing in his life had been like that. But the beautiful Pomona campus, the richness of the experience that he had in his classes with his teachers and fellow students, I remember stories he would tell me about how small the classes were, almost like a seminar. I’m so grateful for that and I know that he was able to pass it forward to other students.”

Nava is survived by his wife of 60 years, Patricia, children Carmen Nava, Katie Stokes and Julian Paul Nava, sister Rose Marie Herzig and six grandchildren.

Notice Board

January 7, 2023  by Staff Comments Off on Notice Board

Alfredo RomeroMessage from Alumni Board President
Alfredo Romero ’91

Greetings, my fellow Sagehens,

Happy New Year! How are we here in 2023 already? I’d like to begin by thanking Don Swan ’15 for his leadership of the Alumni Association Board these past two years. The board and I deeply appreciate his time and commitment, especially as it stretched across the pandemic and the return to in-person life.

I am excited to be leading this dynamic group of dedicated and energetic Sagehen volunteers and can’t believe it’s already been six months since the Alumni Board members kicked off their work this academic year. We have had fantastic planning and discussions taking place in our meetings and are working toward many opportunities for alumni engagement and philanthropy—so stay tuned for more details! And I am also pleased to share some highlights of board work already in motion:

Partnering with the Career Development Office to offer Alumni Futures, virtual career exploration and planning presentations from Alumni Board members for young alumni and students. Chirps to Jeff Levere ’12 for kicking off this effort with his workshop this past fall!

Connecting with members of the campus community to share information and support Pomona traditions.

Working to grow alumni registrations as well as alumni-to-alumni and alumni-to-student mentoring on Sagehen Connect. (Did you know you can access the official Pomona College Alumni Directory and the Pomona College Magazine class notes pages on Sagehen Connect?)

Supporting activities of our Sagehen Regional Alumni Chapters, including working with chapter volunteers and planning the launch of two new chapters by Summer 2023!

As we get closer to spring, I want to remind you that all alumni are welcome to attend Alumni Weekend—April 27-30—and hope to see you there. The Alumni Board also looks forward to welcoming our newest Alumni Association members (the Class of 2023) in May!

Until next time—CHIRP!

Alfredo

Alfredo Romero ’91
Alumni Association Board President

To learn more about the Alumni Association Board, see the board roster or read meeting minutes online—or to nominate a fellow Sagehen (or yourself) for the board—please visit pomona.edu/alumni-board.

For questions, please contact
Director of Alumni and Family Engagement Alisa Fishbach at alumni@pomona.edu.

Family Weekend Fun

We happily welcomed hundreds of families to campus for Family Weekend in October to enjoy a special weekend of programs and activities with their students. Families toured the new Center for Athletics, Recreation and Wellness and Benton Museum of Art, attended faculty and staff presentations like Hen Talks and History of Pomona, and were welcomed to many open house receptions hosted by academic departments and Student Affairs offices. We also appreciated the opportunity to thank our generous family donors in person at a special luncheon held in their honor on Saturday.

three photos of smiling families

Blue Badge: Alumni Weekend & Reunion Celebrations: April 27-30, 2023

Alumni Weekend

Who’s Coming to Alumni Weekend 2023?

Alumni Weekend registration opens in February, and we can’t wait to welcome our Sagehens back to campus for a fantastic weekend of reconnecting and making new memories. We’ll visit familiar and new Pomona spaces and celebrate reunions with class years ending in 3 or 8 as well as the 47th reunion of the Class of 1976 and our Diamond Classes of 1962 and earlier. As always, therewill be an abundance of curated programs and events for our alumni community to enjoy. All alumni are invited, so don’t wait for your next reunion to come and say hello to classmates, faculty, staff and Cecil!

Watch your email and the Alumni Weekend and Reunion Celebrations website at pomona.edu/alumniweekend for details, updates and information on how to register. Questions? Please call (888) SAGEHEN or email Director of Alumni and Family Engagement Alisa Fishbach at alumni@pomona.edu.

Sage Coaches Needed on Sagehen Connect!

Who knows the ins and outs of graduating from Pomona and experiencing life beyond the Gates better than a Sagehen? Alumni and students would love to connect with you and hear your advice about career experiences, graduate school and other post-Pomona life wisdom as a Sage Coach on Sagehen Connect. Provide resume feedback, offer advice on career roles and paths, make recommendations on graduate school programs or assist with other types of support—you choose how you would like to help and how much. Additionally, Sage Coaches may be invited to participate in panel discussions or individual presentations hosted by the Career Development Office or Alumni and Family Engagement.ipad with screen shot of sagehenconnect.pomona.edu

Signing up is easy:

  1. Log in to Sagehen Connect at sagehenconnect.pomona.edu.
  2. Select “Edit profile” next to your profile image.
  3. Scroll to “Offer Sage Coaching” and select what you would like to do as a Sage Coach.
  4. Don’t forget to save your changes!

Not on Sagehen Connect yet? Learn more about our Pomona College online alumni community and register today at pomona.edu/sagehen-connect.

A Message from Nathan Dean ’15, National Chair of Annual Giving

Hello and Happy New Year, Sagehens!

I hope your holiday season was full of joy and relaxation and gave you time to reconnect with family, friends and your favorite Sagehens. During these past months of giving, I have been in awe, once again, at the generosity of our Sagehen community. It is inspiring to begin 2023 as a proud member of our philanthropic community, noting the impact that’s been made in support of our students so far this academic year.

With January here, it occurs to me that I am heading into the last six months of my term as the national chair of annual giving. In July, I’ll be honored to pass the torch to our newly named national chair, Christina Tong ’17. It’s been a rewarding role indeed, and I look forward to working on several special giving opportunities coming our way this spring that will strive to raise funds for key areas in need at Pomona.

Thank you to everyone who has made a gift in 2022. Rest assured that your support goes directly to the immediate needs of current students and faculty, including financial aid, academic programs and resources, experiential learning and student activities. If you haven’t given yet, I hope you’ll consider donating to the area of Pomona that’s most meaningful to you before June 30 reaches us. Gifts of all sizes make a great impact.

Nathan Dean ’10

Gratefully,

Nathan

Nathan Dean ’10
National Chair of Annual Giving

Stray Thoughts: Echos from A Different Era

January 7, 2023  by Robyn Norwood Comments Off on Stray Thoughts: Echos from A Different Era

Teddy Roosevelt speaking at Pomona College

Almost everyone who comes to Pomona College learns that Theodore Roosevelt gave a speech in front of Pearsons Hall in 1903, the only visit by a sitting president in Pomona history.

In one of the stories in this issue of Pomona College Magazine, there’s an allusion to a theme in some of Roosevelt’s more famous addresses. Though the exact phrase “dare mighty things” comes from his 1899 speech “The Strenuous Life,” the better-known speech is “The Man in the Arena,” itself part of a longer address called “Citizenship in a Republic” that Roosevelt delivered in Paris in 1910.

A popular figure at the time, Roosevelt is more controversial today for certain imperialist and racist views. And the famous speech is mostly spoiled for me anyway by Richard Nixon’s use of it as he resigned the presidency in disgrace in 1974, still believing he was being persecuted.

What draws me in isn’t the “It is not the critic who counts,” part, though granted, that might have something to do with my background in journalism. Instead, it’s the words at the end about being willing to fail in striving for a worthy cause. Like poet Robert Browning’s idea that one’s reach should exceed one’s grasp, it encourages aiming for more than we might be able to achieve, along with accepting that we may be judged for it.

That willingness to try, not blindly but with a clear understanding that they might not be able to do the thing they set out to do, is at the heart of several of the stories in this issue. Jessie Berman Boatright ’98 and Laila Bernstein ’04 work intently in Boston with their teams in the Mayor’s Office of Housing to try to end homelessness, even though it often seems like every time 100 people find homes, another 100 appear in the streets. Laura Kerber ’06 works at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where virtually every shot is a long shot. And Zach Landman ’08 and his wife Geri, both physicians, are bringing to bear all their training, talents and connections to try to find a cure for their daughter Lucy’s rare genetic disorder. Even if they can’t, they’ve launched a foundation to try to discover therapies that might help cure other children with single-gene disorders.

There’s another story in this issue that reflects a different type of persistence and conviction. It’s an essay by physician Atsuko Koyama ’96 about why she has chosen to be an abortion provider. I ask you to hear her out to better understand why her professional and personal experiences have led to her decision, and to respect her readiness to explain it.

These Pomona alumni exhibit a boldness some educators believe is diminishing among high-achieving students: the willingness to fail. When getting a B feels like failure for students trying to gain admission to highly selective colleges or graduate schools, it can lead to not attempting courses or projects beyond ones they’re confident they’ll master. When a student at another college once told me she had failed an engineering course in statics, I remember being surprised she didn’t change her major. She took the course again, passed it, won a six-figure federal grant for her technology startup and completed her degree.

So here’s to trying, and to trying again.