Class Year: 2000

Jeffrey Howard ’01 earned a Master of Science degree with distinction in transport planning and management in November 2017 at the University of Westminster in London, England. His dissertation, titled Zoned Out: Implementing a Flat Fare Structure on the London Underground, was awarded the dissertation prize by the Chartered Institute of Highways & Transport Foundation.… Continue Reading →

Josiah Dykstra ’02

Josiah Dykstra ’02 is the senior warden, senior lay leader at St. Anne’s Episcopal Church in Annapolis, Maryland. He reports that St. Anne’s has Hope graduates at three levels of leadership, with Timothy Mulder ’76 becoming the interim rector at the church on Feb. 14, and Eugene Sutton ’76 serving as the Episcopal Bishop of… Continue Reading →

Katie Budris ’04

Katie Budris ’04 is a full-time lecturer in the department of writing arts at Rowan University in Glassboro, New Jersey. She teaches courses in first-year writing as well as creative writing for undergraduate and graduate students. She also serves as editor-in-chief of Glassworks, the literary magazine housed in Rowan’s Master of Arts in Writing program. Continue Reading →

Sarah Gonzales ’04 Triplett

  Sarah Gonzales ’04 Triplett of East Lansing, Michigan, received the 2018 Alene Valkanas State Arts Advocacy Award from Americans for the Arts on June 16 during the organization’s convention in Denver, Colorado. The award honors an individual at the state level whose arts advocacy efforts have dramatically affected the political landscape. Sarah is the director of public policy… Continue Reading →

Shirley Smith ’06 Lopez

Shirley Smith ’06 Lopez has published many books and is now retired and opened a bookstore, Shirley’s Bookshelf, in Lansing, Michigan. She also teaches others how to become writers, helping young authors get published, students to earn income while in college, stay-at-home moms and retirees like herself. She notes that she is hoping to repay… Continue Reading →

Jess Schmidt ’06

Jess Schmidt ’06 in November became the custom content manager at Great America Publishing, which publishes 12 trade publications in horticulture, agriculture, retail and sports. She is a project manager and writes content for all 12. Continue Reading →

Tyler Boonstra ’07

Tyler Boonstra ’07 received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Detroit Mercy in August 2017. As part of his degree he finished a year-long APA-accredited internship at the Hampton VA Medical Center in Virginia, and he is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center. Continue Reading →

Kristin Olson ’07 Brace

Kristin Olson ’07 Brace had her first book, a chapbook of poetry called Fence, Patio Blessed Virgin, published on July 13. The chapbook weaves together memories of Brace’s grandmother with narrative from the last two years of her life. Her second chapbook, Each Darkness Inside, will be published later in 2018. Continue Reading →

Luke Wendt ’07

Luke Wendt ’07 received his Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering control theory and robotics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. As a member of the Language Acquisition and Robotics Group/ Beckman Institute/ECE, he researched embodied cognition on the iCub, a humanoid robotics platform from the Italian Institute of Technology/Genoa. He is employed at… Continue Reading →

Matthew Baker ’08

Matthew Baker ’08 of New York City has had three short stories optioned for film: “The Transition” (Amazon), “The Appearance” (Makeready) and “Life Sentence” (Netflix). February saw the publication of his debut collection, Hybrid Creatures (LSU Press), a unique book composed of four stories that are each narrated partly in an artificial language: HTML, music… Continue Reading →

Tyler Racey ’08

Tyler Racey ’08 returned to the Ludington, Michigan, office of Western Land Services Inc. in December 2017. He runs and also performs in-office review on abstracts of title for clients’ projects and has worked closely with his supervisors in training new hires. Continue Reading →