Alumni News

Casey Battaglino (Math & CS, '09) will be doing a summer internship at the MIT Lincoln Laboratory, and then applying to graduate schools in the fall.

Jacob Bond (Math, '09) will be taking graduate school classes in number theory at the University of Michigan.

Peter Calhoun (Math, '09) will be pursuing graduate school in statistics at the University of Florida.

Sean Cooke (Math & CS, '09) will build African drums and do graphic design.

Caroline Ettinger (Math, '09) will be an assistant math teacher at a charter school in East Harlem, NY.

Jeffrey Gustafson (Math, '09) will most likely be teaching with the Job Corps in Los Angeles (while also applying for grad school).

Henrik Hakonsen (Math, '09) will be doing a MSc in Finance at the Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration (NHH).

Carleton Hanson (Math, '09) will be working in Minneapolis for SPS Commerce as an EDI Developer.

Colin Hottman (Math & Economics, '09) will start a Ph.D. program in economics at Columbia University in New York City.

Andrew Johnson (Math, '09) will be heading to the University of Minnesota for an MS in a statistics program.

Annika Johnson (Math, '09) will be a 'St Paul Teaching Fellow.' In this program she will be teaching either Middle or High school math at one of St Paul's public schools, and will be working toward a Masters degree in education at Hamline University.

Jung-Yul Kim (Math, '09) will be joining Korea's military.

Sherry Kurisinkal (Math, '09) is working for Goldman Sachs, in the Private Wealth Management Group, in Salt Lake City, Utah.

David Lewin (Math, '09) will be working for the Cleveland Cavaliers of the National Basketball Association starting in September as Basketball Operations Assistant. His duties will include statistical analysis of trades, free agency, the collegiate draft, contracts, the salary cap and luxury tax, as well as general administrative duties.

Conrad Lichty (Math & Economics, '09) is a Data Analyst at CarVal Investors, Cargill's hedge fund located in Minnetonka, MN.

Tom Mahle (Math & Chemistry, '09) will start a Ph. D. in inorganic chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Ephraim Musokwa (Math, '09) will be moving to New York to work for UBS Investment Bank in their Capital Markets Group. He worked there for 10 weeks last summer.

Joe Novak (Math, '09) will study applied math at University of Colorado, Boulder next year.

Stiliyana Stamenova (Math & CS, '09) will be a software engineer at Microsoft in Seattle and begin a Master's degree program in computer science at the University of Washington.

Bernd Verst (Math & CS, '09) will work at Mandli Communications in Madison WI next year doing GIS Analysis and Computer Support.

Meng Wang (Math, '09) will be working as an actuarial analyst at EMB America, a property & casualty actuarial consulting firm in Chicago.

Matt Webster (Math & Physics, '09) will be starting a Ph.D. program in physics at UCSD.

Owen Anderson (Math & CS, '08) is in a doctoral program in Computer Science at the University of Washington in the fall, after working for Apple over the summer.

Reed Andrews (Math & Physics, '08) works at HydroGeoLogic, a geophysics firm.

Innocent Dlamini (Math & Physics, '08) will start this fall in an M.S. program in biomedical engineering at Duke University.

Ozkan Erguden (Math, '08) is in a Masters in Finance program at the London School of Economics and Political Science, London.

Emily Gras (Math, '08) is in the Mechanical Engineering PHD program at the University of Minnesota.

Katherine Lim (Math major & Statistics Minor, '08) is a Research Assistant at the Tax Policy Center, The Urban Institute in Washington DC.

Alex Whitworth (Statistics & Math minors, '08) is in Minneapolis, working for Collins INC as a Catastrophe Risk Analyst.

Jeff Barnes (Math & CS, '07) participated in a UCLA-administered program at Microsoft Research Asia in Beijing. He is studying for his doctorate in software engineering at Carnegie Mellon University.

Elizabeth Gillaspy (Math, '07) spent the 2007-08 school year in Granada, Spain, taking some math classes and teaching English. In Sept. 2008 she entered the math PhD program at Dartmouth College.

Kyle Goerschler (Math, '07) plans to attend chiropractic school.

Kassahun Haileyesus (Math & Physics, '07) is pursuing a Ph.D. in theoretical particle physics at Stanford University.

Lars Johnson (Math & CS, '07) has joined Guy Carpenter, a reinsurance company, as an Actuarial Analyst. He is located in Edina, MN.

Andi Luka (Math, '07) works at Analysis Group, an economic, financial and strategy consulting firm in Boston.

Naveen Sablani (Math, '07) is completing a Master's program in physiology from Georgetown University.

Dan Schroeder (Math, '07) is teaching calculus at the American School of Dubai.

Adam Wedwick (CS major, Math minor, '07) is pursuing a Masters of Software Systems at University of Saint Thomas, St. Paul.

Michael Decker (math, '06) is pursuing a PhD in mathematics at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Nicky Dinev (Math & Economics, '06) is working for the Capital Markets Strategies group at Bank of America in New York, NY. The group is involved in structured finance transactions. In his spare time Nicky goes to ethnic restaurants, Broadway shows, and the occasional art gallery. He also enjoys hanging out with other recent Mac grads, watching the shows on Comedy Central and playing around with the Problems of the Week.

Heather Lendway (Math & CS, '06) is currently working as a programmer analyst at Securian Financial Group in downtown St Paul. She was an All-American swimmer at Macalester, and works as a lifeguard part- time at the YMCA so that she can workout over lunch.

Rustem Onkal (Math & Neuroscience, '06) is in graduate school at Imperial College London working in the Neuroscience Solutions to Cancer Research Group on a project related to breast cancer. He is working on a masters degree and hopes to move on the PhD in this program.

Vivek Sablani ('06) is working as a Catastrophe Risk Analyst at John B. Collins & Associates.

Eric Chan-Tin ('06) is attending graduate school at the University of Minnesota in Computer Science.

Derrick Fernando ('06) is working at LarsonAllen, a CPA firm out of MPLS. He will be sitting for the CPA exam soon.

Denitza Batchvarova ('06) is a Financial Analyst for Citigroup Inc. in their Corporate and Investment Banking Division in New York City.

Lubos Bosak ('06) is a Software Development Engineer at Amazon.com in Seattle.

Ben Johnson ('06) is an Analyst for Prudential Capital Group in San Francisco.

Sheila Nabanja ('06) is working on a PhD in Electrical engineering at MIT.

Margarit Ivanov ('06) is an investment banker for TD Securities in the Media & Telecommunications Division in New York City.

Dina (Heng) Zhou ('06) is a Consulting Analyst at Accenture in Minneapolis.

Deniz Nizam('06) is an Associate Analyst at Progressive Insurance in Cleveland.

Aimee Joualo ('06) is an Application Developer at eEmpACT, a small software company across the street from the Mall Of America.

Emil Staykov ('06) will return to Eastern Europe to work as a consultant with McKinsey & Company. He is formally hired by the company's office in Budapest, Hungary, but thinks he will be working mainly in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Kate Herbig ('06) is pursuing a PhD in Mathematics at Duke.

Megan Thieme ('06) is a Data Analyst at Hardwick-Day, a consulting firm which works with private colleges on enrollment management and financial aid planning.

Biniyam Taddese ('06) is in the PhD program in electrical engineering at the University of Maryland.

Allan Hill (math, '05) has taken a position as a technical services engineer at Epic Systems, a medical software company based in Wisconsin.

Erin Peterson (math & chemistry, '05) has completed a masters program in applied math from the University of Washington and is living in Seattle.

Azamat Sagatov (CS & economics, '05) is working for Renaissance Capital, in their department of Investment Banking and Finance, Central Asia and Caucasus, in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Christopher Oien (math, '04) visited Professor Joan Hutchinson recently. She reports that he is the Americorps Volunteer Coordinator for the elementary schools in "Frogtown", St. Paul.

Khiem DoBa (math & physics, '04) finished his Master of Science in math in 2006 at Wayne State University, Detroit, MI. He now teaches math at Northfield Mount Hermon (NMH) School, Mount Hermon, MA (Western Massachusettes) and is also the coach/advisor of the NMH Math Team. He writes, "I run the math club and the "Problem of the Week" at NMH. Outside the classroom, I also coach the boys tennis team in spring and enjoy playing soccer all year round."

Professor Tom Halverson and Mac Alum Tim Lewandowski ('03)
published a paper, "RSK Insertion for Set Partitions and Diagram Algebras," in /The Electronic Journal of Combinatorics, /Volume 11 (2) R24 (see it by linking to: http://www.combinatorics.org). This is a special volume dedicated to Professor Richard Stanley (MIT). This research grew out of Tim's Honors Project, and it uses some results from the Senior Capstone Project of Brian Miller (Mac Math Major from 2002). Tim earned a Masters Degree in Mathematics in May 2005 from Washington University in Saint Louis. He now is in Boston to study jazz at New England Conservatory of Music (NEC). Brian is a founding member of the successful Irish music duo Five Mile Chase (http://www.5milechase.com) based here in Saint Paul.

Jemimah (Ruhala) Hendry (CS, '03) writes, " I currently live on 3.5 acres outside of Tampa, FL. I am employed as a traveling database consultant, four days a week; while my husband is experimenting (rather successfully) with trading commodities. On weekends, I help take care of our chickens and setup our land for a small sustainable farming operation. We live adjacent to a state park and enjoy hiking on the trails and watching the alligators. For fun, we enjoy shooting sports and going to the not so well known Florida tourist attractions. We hope to fit out a small sailboat soon and visit the many uninhabited islands in this area."

Ben Sherwood (CS, '03) will be starting the PhD statistics program at the University of Minnesota Fall 2009. He has been a Systems Administrator for Rise, Inc.

Garth Thompson (Math & CS, '03) is pursuing a PhD in Biomedical Engineering in a joint program run by Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory School of Medicine, in Atlanta. His areas of interest include cardiac imaging and modeling of cell signaling. After Macalester, he was working in industry for about 3 years as a sales engineer before going back to school.

Emilia Simeonova '02 (math & economics major, '02) received a Ph.D. in economics from Columbia University in 2007, specializing in Applied microeconomics and Health economics. She taught for a year at the Stockholm University Institute for International Economics Studies, and now is an assistant professor of economics at Tufts University.

Einar Mykletun (CS, '01) has just finished his PhD in computer science at the University of California, Irvine, and is working for Quest Software, Inc.

Momar Dieng (Math & Physics, '00) is a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Arizona. His current work spans the areas of integrable systems theory, nonlinear partial differential equations, random matrix theory, and their interrelationship. His webpage is: http://math.arizona.edu/~momar/

Monica Mullikin ('00) is working for Willis of Minneapolis as a catastrophe risk analyst for this reinsurance company.

After teaching mathematics at the Taipei American School in Taiwan for two years, Craig Ortner (Math & CS, '00) is now in his first year of law school at the University of Michigan.

Craig Ortner (Math & CS '00) graduated from The University of Michigan Law School, cum laude, in the Spring of '09. He will join Mayer Brown LLP in their Chicago offices after a fellowship at the National Association for Urban Debate Leagues, also in Chicago.

Scot Leavitt (Math, '99) is a mathematics instructor at Portland Community College in Oregon.

Michael McGeachie (CS, '99) is finishing his PhD in Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science at MIT.

Tamas Nemeth (Math, CS, & Physics, '99) is currently employed at Macro International as a Senior Analyst, working on the development of state-of-the-art Internet and database technologies. He telecommutes on a full-time basis from Florida to the Washington, DC, office, and is married and have an 18-month old daughter.

Vahe Poladian (Math & CS, '99) is studying at Carnegie-Mellon University for a PhD in Computer Science. His work is at the intersection of Ubiquitous Computing and Software Engineering: designing middleware for adaptive systems with the focus on efficient resource allocation. Expected graduation date is somewhere in late 2007 or early 2008.