March 2022
Cooke Scholar Alumni Buzz
Hello Cooke Scholars and Alums!
Springtime is around the corner, and it can’t come quickly enough after a long winter! Here’s an update on what’s going on at the Foundation and some of the great things your fellow Cooke Scholars have done recently. Alums, we want to know what’s new in your life – send us your updates at alumni@jkcf.org.
Foundation Buzz
2022 Survey of Cooke Scholar Alumni
Alums, speaking of what’s new, here’s another great opportunity to keep us updated on what you’re doing! Complete the 2022 Survey of Cooke Scholar Alumni to update your contact info and help us support your engagement with the Cooke Scholar and Alumni community. All Alums who respond by the Friday, March 4th deadline will be entered into a raffle to win one of 25 $100 gift cards we'll be giving away. Check your email registered with us to complete the survey or email alumni@jkcf.org.
Resources: Cooke Entrepreneurs Network - Starting Point
On January 29th, Cooke Scholar and Alum entrepreneurs gathered to collaborate, ask questions, and share their experiences. Through mentorship, networking, and professional development, the Cooke Entrepreneurs Network - Starting Point event focused on cultivating relationships within the Cooke community with the specific goal of helping entrepreneurial Scholars take the next steps in executing their venture. Click here to access conversations and resources from the event.
Compass Feature: Qian Qian Tang
2001 Young Scholar; 2006 College Scholar, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Qian Qian Tang was in the very first cohort of Cooke Young Scholars, and became interested in the intersection of technology and healthcare while an undergraduate at MIT. She put that interest to good use when she helped launch the healthtech company Kinsa with the idea of building the first real time map to track and stop the spread of disease. During her time at Kinsa, Qian Qian helped launch revolutionary healthtech products from concept to market in thousands of stores nationwide, including Apple, CVS and Best Buy. One of which was an innovated version of an already commonly used household product – the thermometer. After earning her MBA at Harvard Business School, Qian Qian now works as Vice President of Product at UnitedHealth Group. To learn more about Qian Qian’s professional and academic journey, click here.
Community Buzz
New Blog - Catchin’ Up with a Cookie: Carrie Moore
2001 Young Scholar; 2006 College Scholar, Cedar Crest College; 2011 Graduate Scholar, Grand Canyon University
Carrie is a classical ballet dancer turned physician recruiter. In this month’s blog, she shares about what it means to be a Cooke Scholar from high school through graduate school, handling rapid job changes with the current economic uncertainty, and why sappy Hallmark/PBS programs has a special place in her heart. To learn more about Carrie’s passion for working with physicians and advanced practice providers, click here.
Connect with an Alum
Our Cooke Scholar Alumni network is a vibrant community of more than 2,000 individuals engaged in diverse career and personal pursuits. One way you can Connect with an Alum is to complete this form and let us to introduce you to an Alum sharing similar interests and career goals.
February Career Pathways Virtual Chat: How I Transformed My Passion into a Business
On Tuesday, February 22nd, Cooke Scholar Alum Alessandro Bailetti hosted a conversation with fellow Alums Auriel Wright, Emily Hunsberger, Lisandra Rickards, and Ty Perez on how they transformed their passion into a business. The panelists shared their professional and personal perspectives as business owners and entrepreneurs with a focus on taking us back to the moments of getting started. We discussed the significance in effectively telling the story of your business, importance of building a supportive and resourceful network, overcoming obstacles and hurdles, building a holistic set of business skills, and tips for success on the early stages of starting a business. You can check out the video from the event below.
March Career Pathways Virtual Chat: Graduate School - Expectations vs Reality
Join us on Tuesday, March 22nd as Hannah Franz, Program Associate of Graduate Advisement, hosts a conversation with a panel of Alums to discuss the graduate school experience. We will have a conversation about the realities of being a graduate student with scholars in programs including those pursuing PhD, Medical, and Law programs. More specifically, we will discuss the ups and downs, maximizing the graduate school experience, lessons learned, and practical tips related to test preparation and to help scholars explore and decide on graduate programs. A formal invitation will be sent soon, but you can register for the event right now here.
Alumni Buzz
2015 College Scholar, Harvard University
Auriel enjoys meeting others interested in and passionate about tech start ups and entrepreneurship. She founded her first company, StrattyX, during her undergraduate years at Harvard. Although the business ended given economic challenges during the pandemic, she began to work on startups and projects for others and now works at Google in Product and Google For Startups as a mentor. Auriel recently joined us for an alumni virtual chat on how she transformed her passion into a business, which you can watch here.
2005 Young Scholar; 2010 College Scholar, Bates College; 2014 Graduate Scholar, Columbia University
Bo Ra wrapped up her official first week of work in her new role as Programme Management Officer at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)! In her new role, she will be working in the UNEP Science Division, Climate Services & Capacity Building Unit on implementing its Green Climate Fund (GCF) portfolio in the Asia Pacific region. Previously, Bo Ra served as the Senior International Project Manager at the APEC Climate Center based in South Korea where she developed new project opportunities, concepts, proposals, and partnerships with stakeholders for sustainable development and climate change adaptation in the Asia Pacific region. You can watch this virtual chat with Bo Ra and fellow Alums on social impact and exploring careers in policy and advocacy.
2002 Graduate Scholar, University at Buffalo
Join us in congratulating Eugenie in recently publishing Life-Destroying Diagrams. In her most recent work, she “brings the insights of her radical formalism to bear on supremely risky terrain: the ethical extremes of horror and love. Through close readings of works of film, literature, and philosophy, Eugenie explores how diagrams, grids, charts, lists, abecedaria, toroids, tempos, patterns, colors, negative space, lengths, increments, and thresholds attest to formal logics of torture and cruelty, violence and finitude, friendship and eros, debt and care.” If you enjoy Eugenie’s academic focus on media and film studies, you can also check out The Forms of the Affects, her first book, which closely cites notable thinkers such as Sigmund Freud, Soren Kierkegaard, and Alfred Hitchcock to explore form, structure and aesthetics, and their relationship to sensation.
Scene from What We Leave Behind
2014 Graduate Arts Scholar, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
What We Leave Behind, a film Isidore edited and co-produced with director Iliana Sosa and producer Emma D. Miller will start its festival journey at SXSW on March 11th. The film focuses on Iliana's grandfather who, after a lifetime of bus rides to the US to visit his children, quietly starts building a house in rural Mexico. To find more information, including dates for upcoming screenings as they become public, click here. Also, Acts of Love, a film Isidore directed with Francis Leplay appeared on two best-of lists last year: Payal Kapadia's top five for Le Polyester and MovieWeb's top ten LGBTQ+ films of 2021. The film screened at the University of Oxford on February 22nd and will screen at Lyon's Écrans Mixtes on March 6th. To learn more about the film and watch a trailer, click here.
2006 Young Scholar; 2011 College Scholar, University of Pennsylvania; 2018 Graduate Scholar, Drexel University
As a business major in undergrad and a recent MBA graduate, Anastasia has recently been featured in multiple conversations about her business education background. First, check out this Foundation article interviewing Anastasia about the legacy of black women and importance of relationships at the Wharton School of Business. Second, Drexel University’s LeBow College of Business sits down with Anastasia to discuss the many steps she took to secure a prestigious internship and, ultimately, a full-time role at Bank of America after obtaining her MBA. Currently, she is a Project Manager at Bank of America and have served as a financial analyst for J. P. Morgan.
2013 Undergraduate Transfer, Evergreen State College; 2018 Graduate Scholar, University of Washington
Join us in congratulating Hollie for recently started her new role as a teacher for Synthesis, a virtual innovative learning experience that is designed to cultivate student voice, strategic thinking, and collaborative problem solving. She has been filled with joy creating and piloting her philosophy classes with her students. As an educator, Hollie is curious about innovative approaches to education which inspire creativity, compassion, and courage.
Hollie (second row, third from left) with Cooke Scholars in Chicago
2009 Undergraduate Transfer, Washington University in St. Louis
Monirath and his team at Teach for Cambodia (TFC) are hosting a cross-cohort gathering this month where the organization will be celebrating the milestone of growing its community to 100 teaching fellow and alumni strong. As Monirath puts it, “That’s a big family gathering united by hope and aspirations!” Check out the video below as TFC asked parents, students, teachers, staff, and alums about their hopes for 2022.
Throwback Photo of the Month
Cooke Scholars at Scholars Weekend 2015