Association news & class notes
Based in Philadelphia, Michael D’Antonio is relishing his life as the founder of Bongo Consulting, a marketing consultancy firm. He maintains strong connections with his close friends, including Chip Dickey; Dwight Smith; Ross Hollebon; Matt Roff; Mike Caldwell, M.S.’05; and Brian Wyant.
Susanna Kuespert Aldridge is still working a lot as the owner of a veterinary practice while her lucky husband is retired. She wishes her family lived closer to Maryland for her daughter to consider McDaniel! Her son is a junior at Indiana University and her daughter is a high school senior going through the admissions process. After not really traveling since opening her practice in 2008, she traveled a bit recently with an incredible trip to Hawaii in 2022 and two trips in 2023: a Mediterranean cruise and chaperoning her daughter’s trip with the Indianapolis Children’s Choir, where they performed in Canterbury Cathedral as well as cathedrals in Edinburgh and London. She now has an insatiable desire to travel more and has started using Duolingo, where she is attempting to learn conversational Hawaiian and Italian. So far, she has mastered such Duolingo classics as, “I eat sugar,” “Kaleo does not want the blue ones,” and her favorite, “He’s an awa-loving grandpa!”
Life has been good for Brett Edwards as he just celebrated his 23rd wedding anniversary with his wife, Tracy, and his 26th work anniversary with TEKsystems, where he is the director of delivery operations for a regional recruiting team. Brett and Tracy’s children are now in college; his daughter is a junior at the University of Tampa and his son is a freshman at Penn State University. Brett still keeps up with a ton of people from WMC, and last May, a handful of friends hung out in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, including Dan “Duke” DeLuca, Kevin Koretzki, Jay DeVito ’96, Chris Kintzel ’96, and Kevin Bernhardt. They had a blast picking up right where they left off the last time they were all together and got in a round of golf and disc golf while hopping from brewery to brewery for good measure! Brett also connected with Rick Estes ’98 during the 2023 Baltimore Orioles opening day and recently reconnected with Steve West ’96 and Nick Feracci ’99 as well.
Laura Staub Steakin continues to practice as a nurse in the Baltimore area. She recently presented her work at the Sigma Theta Tau International Biennial Convention in San Antonio, Texas. She is pleased to hear there will be a nursing program on the Hill.
John Green has been working as a civil servant since February 2018, and he most recently has been working for the Air Force Medical Agency (Logistics). Having served almost 25 years in the Army, John reports that it is nice to be back on a military installation working in a building with the medical logistics elements of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Defense Health Agency. After 20 years as an officer in the Army Medical Department, he sees some of his former soldiers and supervisors frequently. When he is not working, he works even more taking care of what is left of his family horse farm in Carroll County. John and his sister recently celebrated 50 years of their family living on the farm. In his free time, John shared that he is a uniformed volunteer with the Maryland National Guard (MDNG) serving in the Maryland Defense Force (MDDF) as a modern-day citizen soldier. He works with the MDNG Joint Staff supporting the needs of the Army, Air, and MDDF as well as when called upon by the state. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, John led his unit of volunteers, the 10th Medical Regiment, supporting the MDNG State Surgeon and the COVID-19 response, and later in 2021 organized MDDF volunteers to support the mass immunizations at the Baltimore Veterans Hospital for six months.
Amy Rice Mirra works at an elementary school doing reading intervention, and she loves being back teaching again. Her oldest son is a freshman in college this year. Thinking about all of the good times and lifelong friendships made at WMC makes her excited for him and not so sad. Amy’s daughter is a sophomore in high school and keeps her husband busy as she plays field hockey, soccer, basketball, and lacrosse!
Writing from Monkton, Maryland, where I reside with my husband and three children, I am continuing in my human resources leadership role at Alera Group. I oversee an HR team that includes benefits, organizational development, recruiting, and HR generalist functions, which keeps me quite busy. In my role, I also get to travel a bit. My children are in 11th, sixth, and second grade, and they are playing several sports. So, our weekends are filled with cheering from the sidelines and seeing family. As she considers her college career ahead of her, my daughter and I recently toured McDaniel College’s campus, which was so fun. Memories rushed back! I sincerely hope everyone is doing well. Please stay in touch in the months ahead and cheers to a productive 2024 for all.
Sarah Sheckells1997 Class Reportersaraheshecks@gmail.com