Class Notes

Offensive lineman for the Seattle Seahawks and former Denver Broncos player Tyler Polumbus (Mgmt’07) held a free football camp in Boulder last summer for people with developmental disabilities. The former Buff player frequently gathers some of his NFL teammates to do work with his organization, Tyler’s Kids Outreach, in Colorado and Seattle. He told the Boulder Camera that members of his own family are disabled and he enjoys helping a community that is close to him.

CU couple Ariel Simpson-Johnson (Art’07) and Christopher Lavery (MArt’03) married in Boulder last July. They celebrated with a stay at the Hotel Boulderado. Ariel is an artist and Christopher is an art professor.

Creative writer Karim Dimechkie (Engl’08) received a three-year James A. Michener Fellowship in Creative Writing from the University of Texas Michener Center for Writers. His fiction piece was chosen out of more than 900 submissions, enabling him to become one of 11 fellows at the university where he will receive free tuition, an annual stipend and a development fund for travel and research.

Life is busy for Danny Schade (Mus’08). He is a private music teacher, a substitute teacher and a freelance drummer and composer. He released his first album, Predestination and Other Games of Chance . . . the Soundtrack, and composed and produced more than 90 pieces of music in 2010, which are available at dannyschade.com. Danny lives in Boulder.

Dustin Rumsey (Mus’09) is a composer and soundtrack engineer for Boulder-based Square Two Productions while also offering private music lessons. He lives in Longmont, Colo.

Campton, Ohio, resident Brandon Vaccaro (DMus’09) is an assistant music professor at Kent State University. He also spends his days as a freelance composer, audio engineer and producer.

Last summer Molly Podolefsky (MEcon’10) baked more than 50 pies in her kitchen to raise money for the nonprofit organization Greenhouse Scholars. She has been participating in Venus de Miles, Colorado’s only annual all-women road bike ride during which she received her inspiration to contribute to Greenhouse Scholars. She is a doctoral student at CU and lives in Boulder.

Musician Greg Simon (MMus’10) is an adjunct instructor of theory at CU and Metropolitan State College of Denver. He is a composition fellow at the Brevard Music Center and has performed at the Mayne Stage in Chicago, the Western International Band Clinic and the California Band Directors’ Association Convention. He lives in Denver.

The Peace Corps has been an incredible experience for Connor Botkin (IntPhys’10). He is stationed in the northern region of Ghana, Africa, in the village of Kpendua, where he has virtually no electricity or access to running water. He writes he has his issues of the Coloradan sent from home as a way to keep up with the happenings of other Forever Buffs.

Three of CU-Boulder’s journalism school graduates, Stephanie Davis (Jour’10), Phil McMichael (Jour’10) and Lauren Walter (Art, Jour’10) work for the company Tagwhat. The company’s app allows users to look through their phones at places around them to read interesting stories about the locations. Stephanie, Phil and Lauren work as multimedia content producers for the company.

Last year Trent Beckley (Fin’11) was a member of CU’s basketball team that made it to the NIT Final 4. He works for Lijit Networks, a start-up firm in Boulder specializing in advertising. He writes that more than half of the company’s employees are CU alums. Trent says the company is continually hiring and wants to share job opportunities with alums across the country.

While working on the CU Science Update video series, Jenna Browder (Jour’11) of Gunnison, Colo., Eric Duggan (Jour, PolSci’11) of Arvada, Colo., Sabina Hadzic (Jour’11) of Lakewood, Colo., Amanda Yourick (Jour’11) of Castle Rock, Colo., and CU senior Greg O’Brien won a Heartland Emmy award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. The winning episode, Pluto — The Un-Planet, was part of their advanced video editing course and featured the Space Dust Counter, an instrument made by CU students that is aboard NASA’s New Horizons mission to Pluto.

Because of his strong commitment to the engineering community, David Eason (MechEngr’11) received the Colorado Engineering Council Silver Medal award, the council’s highest honor at the university level. He also received CU’s mechanical engineering department’s “Outstanding M.E. Senior for Research” award at his graduation in May. He also earned a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, which has allowed him to pursue studies at Stanford University.

For three nights in July, artist Adam Milner (Art, Jour’11) took his living arrangement to a new level. His exhibition, “Another Room,” featured his entire bedroom in the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art where he talked with visitors and used video, photography, performance and drawing to document his interactions and routines. The exhibition was part of an ongoing series to address the key influences that shape people’s actions and decisions. Adam lives in Boulder.