Alumni News

after six months in the florida sun, i have moved back to the michigan winters and will start to work at the flint journal on march 29 as a page designer and copy editor in its sports department. if any of my lifers would like to get in touch, e-mail me at smanley1980@yahoo.com

i hope everyone else is doing well! as always, keep it reel.

Hi everyone! Just wanted to drop a line and say that I’ve been living in New Mexico for almost four years now. I came out here in 2002 to work on my MA in English, which I received in 2004. I’ve spent the past two years doing technical writing and project management.

However, I’m going to switch gears again. I was recently accepted to Miami University of Ohio’s Ph.D. program in Composition and Rhetoric for fall 2006. The offer came with a teaching associateship and a summer scholarship that will enable me to study abroad and continue research throughout the summer.

It’ll be interesting to move back to the midwest after so much time in the desert. I guess I have to re-learn how to drive in the snow!

Hope my fellow Lifers are doing well!

Starting March 15, I’m the sports editor at the Chippewa Herald, a small daily in Chippewa Falls, Wis. My wife, daughter and son are looking forward to the move. Nice to see other LIFErs doing well also. If anyone wants to contact me, e-mail me at bossick@yahoo.com

After a very brief stint at the Ionia Sentinel, I moved to Hollywood in the mid-80s to write screenplays. There, I ran into John Pozza, Tom Payne and Lenny Grassa from CMU, who were forming a band, and became their manager. “The Leonards” went on to become one of the most successful L.A.-based indie rock bands of the late 80s and early 90s (see Trouser Press Record Guide).

I co-founded the “Alternative Power Source,” a confederation of music groups that banded together to promote their shows collectively. It was very well-received by music fans and the Los Angeles media.

For a couple of years, I wrote a local music column for the left-leaning alternative weekly paper, “LA Reader,” along with features on art and entertainment.

In 1992, I took a job as a music flack at the publicity monolith, Rogers and Cowan. Some of the clients I worked with included Paula Abdul, Quincy Jones and Lionel Richie. I was Clint Black’s tour publicist in 1993 during the Country star’s “Black & Wy” tour with Wynonna Judd.

In 1994, I made a brief stop at Virgin Records, working with Janet Jackson, Smashing Pumpkins and the Rolling Stones (ask me someday about the huge celebrity party we threw for the Stones… that’s a story!)

A year later, I began a 10-year stint at Fox Television, as the Talent Executive on the morning Show, “Good Day L.A.” winning Emmy Awards in 1997, 2000 and 2003. I served in the same capacity when the show went national as “Good Day Live” and was also the Talent Exec on Comedy Central’s quirky talk show, “Turn Ben Stein On.”

In 2005, I exited Fox to join the start-up network, SiTV. There, I am Talent Producer for Network Programming, working on such shows as “The Drop” (a hip-hop version of MTV’s “TRL”), “Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner” (a cross between “Politically Incorrect” and IFC Channel’s “Dinner For Five”) and “Not So Foreign Filmmakers Showcase” (an indie film show).

My greatest memory of LIFE? Crawling down into the basement of Anspach at about 10:30 on a Sunday morning with a massive hangover and an 11am deadline, and banging out 25 inches on the band I was partying with the previous night. That, and scaring half the female staff with Roger Hitts at a LIFE party at our place (affectionately dubbed “The Bunker”), half naked, dancing on our coffee table to the Violent Femmes.

Rose M. Handon, CMU, 1990, is a current PHD student at Walden University Public Policy & Public Adm. She has been selected for appointment into the position of Bureau Chief for the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services. She brings over 27 years of child welfare experiences into the position. In addition, Rose has been selected to present an abstract on “Workplace Violence: HUMAN SERVICES WORKERS AT RISK: “AN ADMINISTRATIVE CHALLENGE.” This will be posted in the conference proceeding at the AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION, and will occur at the
WORK, STRESS, AND HEALTH CONFERENCE: MAKING A DIFFERENCE IN THE WORKPLACE. MIAMI, FLORIDA ~ MARCH 2-4, 2006.

It’s so good to see everyone doing well… and getting engaged! Congrats to Costanzo, Speer, and Manley. Pacheco, are you next?

I didn’t take the newspaper route. I’m now living in Hoboken, New Jersey and working in the marketing department of MetLife. My job consists primarily of project management, with some emphasis on graphic design and writing. I’m very happy, but hope to move back sometime in the next couple of years.

If anyone is ever in the NYC area, let me know! I’d love to see a familiar face!

Hello all,

I didn’t even know there was a forum like this on the Web site. Anyway, I try to keep in touch with those who I worked with at Life, but for the rest of you who may be curious I am the education and business reporter for The Bay City Times. I was hired in January, so I am approaching my one-year mark. It doesn’t seem like it has been that long, and it sure doesn’t seem like 1.5 years since I graduated. I am glad to see everybody finding good jobs and doing well. I also am still dating another former lifer, Natalie Lombardo, who covers Northern Oakland County for the Oakland Press.

After doing my time in the basement of Anspach as a LIFE reporter then an ANE in 1995-1996, I graduated in Dec. 1996 and started working as a reporter at the Huron Daily Tribune in Bad Axe. I worked there for a year and then hightailed it to Midland, where I worked at the Midland Daily News.

I stayed in Midland for almost two years and might have stayed longer if love and marriage hadn’t pulled me back to the Metro Detroit area.

I initially worked at Ward’s Auto World, an automotive industry trade magazine. Alas, automotive reporting was not for me and after six months I got back into the world of newspapers.

I’ve worked at the Daily Tribune in Royal Oak since 2000, first as a copy editor and currently as the associate editor of special sections.

Hey all,

Becky and I are now the proud parents of a healthy baby girl! Emily Catherine was born Oct. 3 in Port Huron, and everyone is doing great. I think I’m going to love this Dad stuff.
Hope everyone is well, keep in touch.

Hello all,

I just wanted to let you know I have accepted a job at the South Bend Tribune and will be starting toward the end of the month. I have been working at The Daily Telegram for the past year and a half after graduation and am excited at the chance to be moving to a paper with about five times the circulation.

I’m glad to hear so many former Lifers are doing great as well.

If any of you find yourself in Indiana, give me a call, or drop me a line at chris_gautz@yahoo.com.

After nine months as the Greenville city reporter at the Daily News, I have uprooted myself to Lake City, Fla. as the Lake City reporter copy editor, page designer and, soon, entertainment columnist.

Melissa and I are now looking at a summer ’07 wedding to give us time to get settled here and to get money together so we can pay for the wedding ourselves.

I’m glad to see everyone is doing well. congrats to those who have found full time jobs!

Keep in touch, and, as always, keep it reel.

Daniel Eizans has been named Web editor at Crain's Detroit Business, a weekly business publication serving more than 40,000 executives in print circulation and 48,000 registered web users.

Dan will be leaving his reporter/columnist duties at the Monroe Evening News, where he primarily covered cops/courts/fire.

Hope all is well with my former lifers.

Look me up if you're in the big D.

Wow! Glad to see my old co-lifers are doing well! Congratulations on everyones jobs, engagements, etc. Good luck with everything. I am now in what I hope to be a long-term position after about a year of internships and job-changes. I am a staff writer at the Grand Rapids Business Journal, a weekly in (what else?) Grand Rapids. I cover law, education and Lakeshore economic development. It's quite different from the feature stories that I used to favor at Life, but I'm getting better at it. Mike and I bought a beautiful old house and are now fixing it up. All is well, hope it is the same with all of you!

Holly and John Thorpe (both CM Life alumni) will be expecting a baby sometime at the end of February, 2006.

I just got hired at New Digital Group, the company that does all the Web hosting for CM Life. Glad to see you guys picked one of NDG's stock templates (which I coded ). So sad to see the previous design go (which I coded as part of my independent study). So HA! You haven't gotten rid of me yet!

Oh, and I expect the future Online Managers to continue cm-life.com's tradition of dominating the Michigan AP's awards for online newspapers, seeing that we've won every year since 1999.

-- Later.

I've always had a problem with the word 'lifers' because I automatically think of Shawshank Redemption, but I can live with it because of what it actually means.

So fellow lifers, I'm writing to get all of you updated on my life.
I went to the Hillsdale Daily News as the Hillsdale City beat reporter which gave me a tremendous amount of sympathy for all news reporters. In June I was promoted to Sports Editor, which is where I now sit.
I was also recently engaged to Kate Brighton, who is a student at CMU.
Hope everyone is doing well and to see some of you this fall while watching the Lifers - I mean Chippewas on the gridiron.

Hey everyone. After graduating from CMU, I landed a job as Sports Editor at the Gaylord Herald-Times, where I am currently stationed. I also recently got engaged to Kristin Thompson and we're getting married next June. Hello and best of luck to everyone I had the pleasure of working with during my time at CM Life.

It's been sort of a wild and wacky stretch of time for me since graduating from CMU. My first job out of school was as the Sunday business editor of the Sault Evening News. That was a stint that only lasted a few months. By September of 1996, I was working in Gaylord at the Herald-Times, where I stayed on staff for about a year and a half. Still a college student at heart, I headed back to campus almost every weekend and in doing so, met Emily Brockman, who I eventually married in 1998.

After some time in Gaylord, I returned to my stomping grounds in the Novi-Northville area, and worked at the Novi News / Northville Record for about six and a half years. In April 2004, I made the decision to strike it out on my own in business. (www.yourpageone.com.) It was a gutty decision that didn't pay big dividends, so in January 2005, I took a position with Baseview Products in Ann Arbor, and now am an installer / trainer for Baseview's advertising software. Emily and I live in Novi with Sammy The Wonder Beagle.

Hey everybody figured it was time I posted. Things are great in Texas and I just got promoted to Captain in the U.S. Army's JAG Corps. I am currently stationed at Fort Hood, Texas after graduating from Wayne State law school and passing the bar last year. I have nothing but great memories of LIFE and wish I could make the Hall of Fame ceremony again this fall but I don't think I'll be able to make it into town. A big hello to everybody I worked over my four year and keep in touch!

Hello fellow CM LIFErs! Well, my last name hasn't changed, so strike off the marriage and children columns. After graduating from Central, I worked at various newspapers including The Macomb Daily, The Daily Tribune in Royal Oak, and lastly as a freelancer for the Freep. The Freep job helped me go back to school so I could pursue a different career. Are you ready? I'm a high school English/journalism teacher at Lake Orion High School. I am also the adviser to the student newspaper, The Archer. Check us out online at LOArcher.com. Although I worked in journalism for 11 years and liked my various jobs, I must say I love teaching even more.

I often think of the bowels of Anspach Hall and the people who I stayed there with getting out the paper by the light of the green VDT screens until the runner came by to take the paper to the printer. Anyone know what became of Roxanne the production lady? She was a trip.

I've been moving around a lot since my exciting days in the basement of Anspach Hall. After graduating, I spent about four years at the Three Rivers Commmercial-News, covering county government, crime and courts. It was on to the Herald-Palladium in '97 to cover the city of Benton Harbor, as well as public/private health care. I moved to Chicago in 2000 and spent four wonderful years at the Daily Southtown, covering urban affairs issues, crime, politics and investigative topics in the southeast suburbs and the South Side. I met my fiancee, Tatum Adams, in 2004 - she lives in St. Joseph, Mich., ironically -- and I moved in with her and took a job at the South Bend Tribune, where I now cover transportation and general assignment. We plan to get married in October in Jamaica.

I wish everybody at CM Life the best, and know some of my fondest memories trace back to Mount Pleasant. Hope to see some familiar faces this fall if I have any vacation left after I tie the knot.

Since August 2003, I have served as Communications Director of the Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH). In this role, I work as a senior health and human services advisor to Governor Jennifer M. Granholm and MDCH Director Janet Olszewski. I have some great memories of Anspach Hall, and some great friends, like Steve Coon, Karen Emerson, Todd Schultz, Colleen Newvine, Eric Baerren, Darron Markwood, Kelly Adams, Amy Bishop, and many others.

shaun manley is no more ... i have changed my 'professional'
name to s. michael manley, as kind of a stab at those who use their
middle initials in their names ... don't worry, it's all meant in good
fun.

after a brief stint as the special sections editor with the Greenville
Daily News, i was hired as the Greenville city reporter ... doesn't
sound like much, but they've got writing an average of one story a day
monday through saturday.

bigger news: i'm now engaged. for those who worked with me at life last
year, you'll know her as the girl who came by the office during
production nights to see if i needed anything ... i believe i always referred
to her as my "roommate." her name is melissa, and we are look at a
summer 2006 wedding.

i can't stress how valuable life was to me in my time at cmu. we had
our own little word down in the basement of anspach hall, and now that it
has moved to it's new home ontop of moore hall, a new era is beginning
... but it won't be anything like the dungeonous office most of us
worked in for so many years.

good luck fellow alums, and, as always, keep it reel.

Lisa Haiss is engaged to an Army staff sergeant who is
currently stationed in Iraq. When he gets out of the Army in May, they plan
to move to Florida and finally set a date for the wedding.
Lisa currently works as the assistant news editor for content at the El
Paso Times in El Paso, Texas, and also writes a Sunday column on
Generation X.

i am now at the greenville daily news, working as the
special sections editor/business reporter in the paper's advertising
department, but i hope to get back to the editorial side of journalism before
too much longer.

i am engaged to be married to melissa thompson, some of you will
remember her as the quiet, thin girl who'd come around the office some
production days.

good luck all Lifers who now have the best looking news office i've
seen.

Hi fellow Lifers! On June 5, 2004, I got engaged to Erin
Brady, a native of Butler County, PA, as am I. We recently bought my
107-year-old family home in Evans City, within driving distance of downtown
Pittsburgh, where Erin works. I've been at the Greensburg
Tribune-Review since January 2003 as a sports copy editor. That, however, will last
no longer than next April (wedding day) since I can't realistically
commute from our home. So we'll see what life brings me then. LIFE (the
CMU one) has brought me many great journalistic experiences I never would
have had without it. Hope to see everyone Oct. 29! E-mail me at
copyeditadam@aol.com!

After putting in my time in 008 Anspach, I worked at
newspapers in Sault Ste. Marie, Gaylord, and most recently, in Northville,
where I was the Record's editor for four years. For any of a number of
reasons, I left the Record in April 2004 and have started my own
newspaper-related business, PageOne (http://www.yourpageone.com).

I am married to Emily (Brockman) Davis, who is a graduate of CMU's
athletic training program. We live in Novi with Sammy The Wonder Beagle.

"Jewell" is no more, but for all my fellow Lifers who know
me as that, they are still welcome to call me by my maiden name, because
I know that "Elizabeth" is just too long.

After graduating from my time at Life in various news roles, I married
Mike (U-M grad) May 15, 2004 and we are living in Grand Rapids until we
move on to law school (for him.) I am interning at the Lakeshore Bureau
of The Grand Rapids Press and we'll see what happens from here.
Congrats to all my friends and co-workers who graduated and to everyone
starting a new chapter in their life.

"When I was a Lifer, we didn't have things like heat or
pdf's!" Ah, how fondly I remember the antarctic subbasement of Anspach, warming our fingers on the wax melter, Little Chef at 4am, and napping on the morgue couch.

After four years of ad design at CM LIFE and a stint in freelance
graphic design, I'm happily employed at Davison Sign: Yum Brand Recruitment. I design hiring p-o-p for 33,000 Taco Bell, KFC, Long John Silver, Pizza Hut, and A&W locations. My print portfolio and experience with Photoshop and Illustrator were large factors -- so I owe CM LIFE a big thanks!

Cepak and Sarah: I miss you more than you know. Heather: I hope you're still crazy-go-nuts. Rox: Go Red Wings!

Hey all-
I wish the new Life alum luck in getting a job this summer. Also wanted to announce that I got married April 24 in Sterling Heights to Becky, who for some reason puts up with the work hours of a journalist. Thanks, dear. I'm now the maritime/environmental reporter at the Times Herald in Port Huron.

I started at LIFE my first weekend on campus and spent far more time in the basement of Anspach for the following four years than I ever did on homework. I have fond (and some less fond) memories of working with folks like Karen Emerson, Todd Schulz, Jen Chrisman, Mary Church, Matt Bach, Rick Lubbers, John Dobberstein and whole slew of others who were there in our era.

I have been a reporter and editor, at places including the Alpena News, the Ann Arbor News, the Saginaw News ... apparently I like places with News in the name ... and I was founding editor of the Insider Business Journal.

Today I am a public relations person at University of Michigan, I am working on my MBA at U-M Business School, and I am coming up on my four-year annivesary with John Tebeau. I am a member of the CMU Journalism Hall of Fame committee and I hope everyone makes the time to come to a Hall of Fame dinner soon. It's a great chance to see what's going on at CMU since you left and catch up with other alums.
It's so great to hear from Bil Boyd and Karen Britton -- I haven't heard from you guys since graduation. Hope you're well!

cnewvine@umich.edu
public relations, University of Michigan News Service
Ann Arbor

On October 4, 2003 Jeff Stacer wed Patricia Jencks (CMU Class of 2000) in Grand Ledge, Michigan. The two reside outside of Grand Rapids. Jeff works for NPA - The Worldwide Recruiting Network and serves as their director of business development.

I am a former Asst. Sports Editor (Fall 1995) at CM Life and
I, too, unfondly remember the old VDT's. I graduated a year too early
because I believe the current system came in 1996 or around that time.

Anyway, I am a teacher of English and journalism at a public high
school in Southern California. I am the Newspaper Adviser at our school, publishing a monthly edition, while passing down a few pearls of wisdom I learned from Petrick, Hartman and the boys in those JRN classes at CMU back in the day, to my students.

I recently married (June 15, 2002) my wife Cassie and we bought our
first home about 4 months ago.
Hope all the LIFE alums are doing well out there!

After six years in the Michigan Legislature, most recently
with Speaker Rick Johnson's office, I left to join a PR firm, John
Bailey & Associates. The firm has offices in Troy, Detroit and Lansing. My husband and I split our time between Lansing and Manistee.

I was the editor in chief of CM Life for one very long
semester. When my post-grad job at the Macomb Daily fell through, I wound up
in law school, practiced law for eight years, then got married,
retired, and had a baby in August 03. His name is Roger I wish I hadn't
graduated in a recession; journalism was always much more fun and
interesting than practicing law. Cheers to all the other CM Life alums.

Jon Morgan has joined the technical team at DOW Chemical in
charge of maintaining the company's global network of interactive
video conference rooms.

Tom Henry of The (Toledo) Blade has received Ohio's top
award in environmental writing for the second consecutive year from the
Ohio Society of Professional Journalists. His two-day series about the
nation's vulnerability to underground pipeline explosions received the
first-place award at a ceremony in the large newspaper category, which
includes The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer, the Akron Beacon-Journal, the
Dayton Daily News and the Cincinnati Enquirer. Last year, he won top honors
for a four-day series he had written about future diversion threats to
the Great Lakes as water shortages before more acute worldwide this
century. He has been a speaker at Michigan and Ohio universities,
including the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, and Bowling
Green State University, and was among several journalists chosen by
Harvard University's Nieman Reports magazine to write about the state of
environmental journalism for its fall 2002 publication.

Jennifer worked at LIFE for four years, and still fondly
remembers the old VDTs.

Jennifer is happily married to her husband Paul. They have 2 children
-- Cameron, 6, and Joshua, 2 -- and live in Lake Orion, Michigan.

Jennifer is a Title Examiner for Metropolitan Title Company.

Eizans is the new full-time, cops/courts/fire reporter at
the Monroe Evening News, a daily newspaper in Southeastern Michigan.
Seeking donations to supplement the pay of a full-time journalist. Miss
everyone over at Life.

Currently living in Santa Monica, CA and pursuing stand up
comedy and television.

I recently had the unique opportunity to assist in the media
operations the commissioning of the USS Ronald Reagan.

I serve as a PAO in the U.S. Navy Reserve and was selected to be part
of a group of 20 PAO's to take part in the event which took place,
Saturday, July 12 at Naval Base Norfolk, VA.

The commissioning invovled the Vice President Dick Cheney, former First
Lady Nancy Reagan and more then 15,000 invited guests.

The event was covered live by CNN, C-SPAN, FOX News and many other
electronic and print media. I was in charge of handling broadcast media
and specifically worked with the national production crew of FOX News and
Tony Snow.

Jeremy Dickman, a former Sports Editor at CM LIFE, became
engaged May 6, 2003 to Debbie Yascolt, a former CM LIFE Photo Editor.
The two met while working at CM LIFE. An August 14, 2004 wedding is planned.

I was recently named associate editor of American School
Board Journal, a monthly magazine covering K-12 education news and policy, published in Alexandria, Va. I also freelance for Washington magazines such as National Journal. Also: I am getting married, May 31 in a ceremony in Washington, D.C., and my bride's name is Hilary LaMonte.

Jon Morgan, who worked for CM Life between 1993 and 1995, announces the birth of his son, Joshua Alan, on November 11, 2002. He has a wife, Theresa, and a daughter named Kayla.

T.J. Bucholz, a 1994 graduate of Central Michigan University
and CMLIFE alumnus, currently serves as the Public Information Officer
for the Michigan Department of Education in Lansing.

In his capacity with the Department, Bucholz serves as a senior
education and communications advisor to both Michigan Superintendent of Public
Instruction Tom Watkins and Governor Jennifer Granholm.

Melissa Chavez, a fomer editor of CM Life and The Central
Review was named a finalist for the Glimmer Train Short-Story Award for
New Writers for her fiction piece, "A Morning Bed in Denver."

Bil is a senior copywriter for a Chicago ad agency who deals
primarily with meeting the needs of marketing-savvy pharmaceutical
clients. Bil and his team were recently responsible for securing more than
14 awards from the two most recent competitions -- The Rx Club and The
Globals. While he credits this round of success on his team and his
ability to deliver the "goods" under pressure, he also quips that a lack of
viable competition in the healthcare marketing field "doesn't exactly
hurt."

Karen Britton Nielsen ('91) has been named a contributing
editor at the Dallas Business Journal in Dallas, Texas. She is the
president of the CMU Alumni Association Dallas Chapter. She had a baby,
Jakob, on May 30, and previously served as editor of start-up publication Dallas-Fort Worth TechBiz, a sister publication to the Dallas Business Journal, until it folded in May.

Just wanted to say hello to the great folks I worked with at
LIFE while I was there from 1982-85. After school, I was an editor at
The Detroit News for 13+ years, then bounced to a Web site, now doing
PR. Would love to hear what others are doing!