Class Notes

Val Neblett Walker (B.F.A.’82/A) is author of “The Art of Comforting” (Penguin Random House, 2010) and “400 Friends and No One to Call” (Central Recovery Press, 2020) and is a blogger for Psychology Today.

Aesha Patel (B.S.’20/H&S) started working for PPD in 2021 as an assistant scientist in the Richmond area. 

W. Mark Lyman (M.S.W.’82/SW) retired in 2019 after 36 years working for Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth and Families as a casework supervisor. 

Laurette Evans Lyman (M.S.W.’81/SW) retired in 2021 following 25 years as a school social worker for the West Warwick (R.I.) School Department. Prior to this position she worked 10 years for the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth and Families. 

The JXN Project, founded by sisters Enjoli and Sesha Joi Moon (B.A.’05/H&S; M.S.’08/GPA; Cert.’09/GPA) was featured in a segment of the May 9, 2021, edition of “PBS Newshour.” The project’s overarching goal is to accurately place Richmond, Virginia's Black community in the pantheon of American history through restorative truth-telling and redemptive storytelling. More specifically, it focuses on the history of Richmond’s Jackson Ward, one of the first Black urban neighborhoods in the U.S., known in its heyday as “Black Wall Street” and “Harlem of the South.” Sesha Joi is director of diversity, equity and inclusion at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Maryland. Enjoli is the assistant curator of film and special programs at the Institute for Contemporary Art at VCU and creative director of the Afrikana Independent Film Festival in Richmond.  

Pamela Sebesky (B.S.’88/N) was elected to the Manassas, Va., school board in 2010, the Manassas City Council in 2017 and as Manassas vice mayor in 2019.

Lauren Balsamo (B.S.’21/H&S) started a job at Bode Technology Group Inc. in May 2021.

Keith Usiskin, M.D. (H.S.’89/M), started a new position in 2021 as an adjunct faculty member at Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine. He writes, “Wishing everyone well in my internal medicine training program.”

Maria James (M.S.’09/MC) was promoted from junior communications specialist with the Magellan Federal to communications nanager for Magellan Health.

Tabitha Michaud, M.D. (M.D.’21/M) began a psychiatry residency at the University of Central Florida/HCA Graduate Medical Education consortium in Orlando, Fla.