First Person

Date: Oct. 9, 2008
From: Josh.Boissevain@gmail.com
To: Alan Kirkpatrick@colorado.edu
Subject: J-school connection

Hi Alan,

I am a News-Ed alum (winter '06), and I was in your news editing class in spring of '06 (and I helped out with a few Bylines articles, too).

Anyway, I had a really interesting experience the other day that I wanted to share.

I am currently a Peace Corps volunteer serving in Moldova, where I teach English in a high school.

The other day, another volunteer (whom I'd never met) came down to my town to check out a project my school had done in the past and that his school was considering doing. After showing him around, we got to talking about where we were from and where we went to school, a common conversation for us volunteers, and it turns out that he also is a J-school alum.

Not only that, but he was News-Ed and he graduated in winter '06 as well. His name is Erik Heinonen, and he said he had you for a class, too. I just think it's really funny that the whole time at CU we never knew each other, though we must have passed at some point in the Armory, and here we are meeting on the other side of the world.

What are the chances that two alumni would be sent to the same country (especially one as small as Moldova)? I guess it goes to show how tight the school's network really is.

Anyway hope all's well,

(Also, I was wondering if you had any current contact information for Doug Cosper. Although I never had him as a professor, I heard a lot about his work in setting up school newspapers in Romania and Azerbaijan, and I wanted to talk to him about his experiences because this is a project I am considering doing here in Moldova.)

- Josh Boissevain