After Vassar
Where are they now?
Our Vassar English family includes poets, fiction writers, journalists, and editors; teachers at every level of the educational system here and abroad; many, many attorneys; as well as some careers, vocations, and occupations you may not have imagined (yet) for yourself.
Writings that make a difference in people’s lives
—Marian Yim ’79
Just a phone call away: “Without Vassar, and specifically the English department, I might never have found my way into the music business.”
—Ron Shapiro ’86
Two years out and a world away: looking toward a future as a healer in the developing world
—Delia French ’06
“Perhaps the fact that I have begun, at age 78, to write a blog about sex education would make an interesting story for present English majors”
—Susan Wilson ’51
From Portrait of a Lady to Law & Order: Special Victims Unit via Beowulf and The Faerie Queene
—Ken Storer ’92
A Junior Year Abroad at Trinity College, Dublin becomes a life as a poet and scholar in Ireland
—Richard Barakat ’81
A “words and ideas” person now building a future for Harvard in Allston
—Peggy Hayes ’83
Got Talent?
—Nancy Wolfson ’90
An Editor with a Cause
—Jeannette Hopkins ’44
Living Every Teenage Girl’s Dream
—Melissa Walker ’99
Occupations
- Vice president of market leadership
- Neurologist
- Television archivist
- Working on a musical
- Stay-at-home working mom running marketing/public relations business
- Director, Human Rights and National Security Law Program
- Feminist scholar specializing in educational studies
- Director of communications for health insurance company
- Banker
- President of MSNBC
- Transcribing my great grandmother’s diary from Italy, 1914
- 80-year-old active writer, workshop participant, and scholar
- Mystery writer just published third book
- BBC reporter
- Technologist and author of 14 books
- Physician, Cleveland Clinic
- Otolaryngologist
- First year of study at Harvard School of Dental Medicine
- Run a small software company for nonprofits
- Communications specialist, Oracle Corporation
- Media Cloisters manager, Vassar
- Raising two kids and working from home as a fiction writer
- Reproductive Health Program with the NGO, BRAC in Dhaka, Bangladesh
- Financial planner
- Auditor and accountant
- PhD program in U.S. History, Columbia
- Boeing Communications team
- PhD program in sociology, CUNY
- Work with my mother at a small, family-owned real estate firm
- Edit curators’ exhibition scripts and lavishly illustrated art books
- Fashion magazine writer and arts and entertainment publicist
- Faculty member and director of mental health, Department of Psychiatry
- Social worker
- Work with Free the Slaves, a Washington DC-based non-profit
- Music publishing and independent musician, released first CD
- Vice president of top-five biotech company
- Writer of Red Sox fictions, computer guru, humorist
- Foundation relations manager, the Wilderness Society
- Publisher, not-for-profit literary press
- Managing director, Operations
- Change management analyst
- Director of pre-K through 12 curriculum
- Director of professional development
- Master’s of divinity degree program, Union Theological Seminary
- Editor and writer for nonprofits
- Managing director, mutual fund
- Publisher’s Weekly reviewer and researcher
- Speech writer
- Huffington Post editor and contributor
- Author of three books and radio cohost, “A Way with Words,” NPR
- Development director
- Senior manager of post production for media company
- Direct mail specialist for investment company
- Corporate manager, manufacturing
- Restaurant owner and writer
- Director of admissions for a K-9 independent school
- Keyboardist and choral conductor
- Clinical social worker and career counselor
- Assistant director of development and a major gifts officer
- Stay-at-home mom after 14 years as English teacher
- Eighty-year-old writer working on a memoir
- Developer of documentaries and non-fiction television
- Associate professor, cinema, photography, and media arts, Ithaca College
- 50 years as internationally known puppeteer
- Cruise line humorist/speaker
- Lutheran parish pastor and writer
- Executive worldwide corporate litigation matters, IBM
- Professor of law, University of Maryland School of Law
- Voiceover and branding coach, demo producer, e-casting director
- Health Sciences fellow, Lainya County, South Sudan
- Graphic designer, Cartoon Network
- Member ACLU National Advisory Council
- Puppeteer, created “Quirky Circus” for families and “Prnch” for adults
- Sex educator, blogger