A message to all Alumni/Alumnae:
We would like to hear from our alums, wherever you may be! Keep us informed about what you are doing, and about developments in your lives and careers. Please note that the information you send us will be printed in an upcoming departmental newsletter and might be edited. Please e-mail your updates/photos to gsll@colorado.edu or mail to Germanic and Slavic Languages and Literatures, Attn: Newsletter, 129 McKenna, 276 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309-0276.
Here are alum updates since our last newsletter in Fall 2006:
Anja Bendel (Richmond) (German M.A. 2006)
I am living with my husband in Chugwater, Wyoming. My current position is the Marketing Director and Project Facilitator for the Town. My position revolves around creating, building, and promoting the Chugwater Business Park, which is funded by a Business Ready Community Grant from the Wyoming Business Council. I have been working closely together with the Town Council, the Clerk/Treasurer, Chugwater Economic Development, and local businesses in order to see this project come to fruition. The projected completion of our business building is March 1st, 2008, and the final infrastructure for our light industrial lots is June 1st, 2008.
In March 2006 my husband and I purchased a decommissioned Atlas E missile silo here near Chugwater. My husband runs his company, Frontier Astronautics, from the silo. In the silo we can do rocket engine testing and store rocket propellants. We are also working with the FAA to receive a license to become a private space-port. Our hope is, someday soon, to launch some rockets from here!
Patrick Hege (German B.A. 2004, German M.A. 2006)
Patrick is in a PhD program for German Intellectual History at Fordham University in New York.
K. Jeramy Hughes (Russian B.A. 2002)
I was excited to receive the postcard about the online newsletter. My name is K. Jeramy Hughes. I studied Russsian and Physics at CU and I graduated in 2002. Alas, I am still a student. I am now studying to get my PhD in cold-atom physics at University of Virginia. 
I have about a year or so left until I finish up. I haven't been back to Russia for a while, but there are several Russians in my department and I'm able to sustain at least a low-level of conversational fluency by talking with them. My wife, Meredith, and I had a son about a year and a half ago. His name is Logan and he is the cutest thing (of course my opinion is not biased). Well, I hope everyone is doing well. If anyone remembers me, I'd love to hear back from you.
Cheers,
K. Jeramy Hughes
Brunhilde Künne (German B.A. 1970)
Hello Dept. of Germanic and Slavic Languages,
Since I have been teaching German (at all levels) for UMUC ( University of Maryland University College) in Germany for almost 30 years, I certainly have an interest in the German Dept at CU and appreciate this opportunity to keep in touch. My Web Page, http://faculty.ed.umuc.edu/~bkuenne contains a synopsis of my professional development and can be included in your online Newsletter, if possible.
Vielen Dank für Ihre Information - Brunhilde Künne
Anne Morris (Realph) (German B.A. 2000, German M.A. 2002) and
Joel Morris (Comparative Literature M.A. 2004 and TA in German)
Joel and Anne met while they were graduate students at CU-Boulder and were married in 2003. They are living in Chicago and both doing well. Anne is teaching German and English at New Trier High School in Winnetka, and Joel is working on his Ph.D. in Comparative Literature and German at Northwestern University.
Jim Robinson (German M.A. 1969)
Taught in the German Department, Gustavus Adolphus College, St. Peter, MN from 1968 to 1974. Began second profession as real estate appraiser 1974, received M.A.I. designation from Appraisal Institute in 1981. That same year established Robinson Appraisal Co., Inc. in Mankato, MN and operated the business until 2002. The business continues to operate as Robinson Appraisal and Associates, Inc., where I work as a part-time consultant. I have been married to Cheryl for 38 years; we have two sons, Brady and Jordan. They are both married; we have one granddaughter and another grandchild due in February 2007. Cheryl and I are both native Minnesotans but we met at a summer square dance on the patio just outside the Student Union
Juliette Rood (Ph.D., German Literature, 1975)
Juliette, a Professor Adjoint in GSLL at CU Boulder, is both a Nordic Studies and a German Studies scholar.
Life of a Nordic Studies scholar: In April, Julie presented a paper on a contemporary Swedish novel at the 97th Annual Meeting of the Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study (held at Augustana College); the paper was entitled “What’s in a Name?: Examining Majgull Axelsson’s Aprilhäxan.”
In August she traveled to L’Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland to examine first-hand archaeological evidence of a Viking settlement over 1,000 years ago.
Life of a German Studies scholar: Julie spent the first few weeks of fall semester in Switzerland and Liechtenstein exploring archaeology, art collections, cultural history, geology, language and literature (and, of course, chocolate).
Click here for photos.
Sally Schneiders (Solberg) (German B.A. 1982)
I attended CU from ‘78 to ‘82 and studied in Regensburg from ‘80 to ‘81.
I currently only know the whereabouts of Joanne Scherer. I would love to know what everyone with whom I studied in Regensburg is doing now!
My maiden name was Solberg. I am married and have 5 children. Our second child, Sam, is almost 18 and just accepted into CU. He also studies German…..I’m not sure he is going to go to CU, as there are luckily a few choices for him.
After graduating from CU, I went to Sao Paulo and taught English, while trying to learn Portuguese. While a senior at CU, I was closed out of Spanish due to my incessant lack of planning, and so took Portuguese by default. At that time, if you completed the Portuguese 101, first semester without any problem, you went right into reading literature (!). All one had to do was show up everyday to get an A, without understanding a word. Maybe there are some courses offered in between Portuguese 101 and 505….
Anyway, after settling in Winnetka, Illinois almost 20 years ago, a not-for-profit began, as an art show, in my home in 1996. It is called Do Your P’Art Foundation and I believe all of my experiences in Germany, Brazil, and other places kind of led me on this path, to be part of something which provides venues for kids from all over to cross cultural borders while creating art. More on that at our website: www.doyourpartfoundation.org.
Last year, Do Your P’Art partnered with Illinois Institute of Technology, and the professor was German. He, Frank Flury, had his design/build class work with over 800 students from 26 schools in greater Chicagoland to create an interactive sculpture. The resulting piece, 100 FT long, 12’ wide and 8’tall, stood on exhibit at Chicago’s Northerly Island for 6 months. The exhibit showcased 13 pieces of sculpture created by the school partnerships…
Your postcard caught me at a good time. Do Your P’Art had its roots in my year in Germany, when I think about it! I loved getting the German language enough to understand jokes. And I do remember understanding my first joke over there- then a little later, of responding in a conversation instantaneously, meaning I was really part of the exchange and not having to concentrate on the meaning of each word. That point, you could say, was the beginning of absorbing more of the German culture. That’s what we like to do here with the kids- using art as the vehicle, making it possible for kids to exchange ideas about things that affect all of us- and realizing that although we come from different backgrounds and cultures (which is great), we do have similarities as humans and we need to work together on solutions.
If you got through this- thanks!
I will never forget my year in Germany- it was truly transformative!
Sally Schneiders
Frank Sitchler (German M.A. 1973)
Hi, German Department - -
I got my M.A. in German at CU in August 1973. Instructors whom I can recall are Ulrich Goldschmidt, Bob Foster, Frau Feyock, Wes Blomster (I still see him at concerts in Boulder), Brian Lewis, Clifford Hall and Hugo Schmidt. Dr. George Scherer helped get me into the M.A. program, but he died before I met him personally.
I was teaching at Greeley West High when I got the M.A. (Hugo Schmidt and David Rood were on the examining committee). During the 70's I organized and took my Greeley students of German on tours and homestays in Germany and Switzerland five times. I quit teaching in 1979 and started directing a student exchange program between Colorado, Germany, France and Spain. My colleagues and I administered over 6,000 (ja, sechs tausend) homestays between 1979 and 1998.
I think I'm still pretty good at German. Germans compliment me on my pronunciation and general fluency. I took the placement test on your website and placed way high in the top rank. I think I got everything right, but I'd like to see the itemized results. I wasn't sure about Stimme. In this context the closest guess was 'vote.' I thought it was Abstimmung. Ah. Checking my Langenscheidt, I see that it's both.
I'm retired now, although I dip my finger into the German pie now and then. I am a reader for Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic. Earlier this year we were assigned Dr. Faustus. Two other readers and I made our way slowly through Mann's tome. I had read it with Wes Blomster in summer 1971. I do a little translating now and then, and I am the resident German pronunciation guy when the church choir or the Alpine Chorale (Westminster) needs a little ie - ei coaching with Bach or Mendelssohn. I live in Denver, but I come up to Boulder regularly to sing in the Boulder Chorale.
Kind regards,
Frank Sitchler
Carol Tiegs (German M.A. 2001)
Carol is the Assistant Director of Advancement, in charge of alumni relations at New Mexico Technology in Socorro, New Mexico.
Jennifer Virskus (Distributed Studies B.A. 2003)
It was so great to be in Boulder, it seems my visit was already last year... how time flies, especially when you work in a magazine and now is already yesterday and next month is today!
I promised to write some stuff for the newsletter, well, first, the link to the website (in English) is http://www.kalnuslidinejimas.lt/ereliai/index_en.htm. It needs to be updated a little bit, but we've got a guestbook there which is new, and the most recent photo galleries will take you to our group page on flickr (http://www.flickr.com/groups/kalnuereliai/).
A little history:
I formed the first group of kids together in January 2005 when we had the Lithuanian Championships in Crans-Montana, Switzerland. There were some kids with potential there, and I suggested to the parents that we start training them properly. One of those kids is now one of the best skiers in Lithuania, 15 year old Dominykas Juknelevicius. The name for the team comes from that group of kids, as we rode up the gondola on the last day to ski for the first time together as a group, I told them we needed a name for our team. The kids decided on Kalnu Ereliai which means Mountain Eagles.
Back in Lithuania, we started skiing together a couple of days per week on a small hill called Liepkalnis, only 10 minutes from the center of Vilnius. They have two t-bars and a learning area. Every day we went out, I had another parent ask if his kid could join the group, and by March, I had 11 kids skiing with me. The next fall, I partnered with Miroslavas Urbonavicius, a friend of mine from the ski federation and the only other certified ski instructor in Lithuania, to turn Kalnu Ereliai into a non-profit organization which could officially receive sponsorship money. By January 2006, we had 30 kids registered in the club, a growth of nearly 300% in one season. We made friends in the Latvian ski federation and began to take the kids to Sigulda to compete in their youth league. Those races remain as the bulk of our winter season. In March, we took them to Italy to race in the Lithuanian championships where they took nearly all the podium positions impressing the members of the ski federation. We also competed for the first time in the FILA sprint races sponsored by Alberto Tomba www.filasprint.com.
In the spring, we partnered with Audi, which enabled us to purchase a minivan.
In October of 2006 we joined together with a ski club from Latvia, Rigas Favorits, and drove on a bus with more than 40 kids and 5 coaches to Stubai, Austria for a week of glacier training. It was a great experience both on and off the hill as the kids discovered they could communicate with each other in English, and were able to learn a lot and make new friends.
For the 2007 season, we added 3 new coaches, Andrius Grigaras, the secretary of the Lithuanian ski federation and a competitor at the world alpine ski championships; Andrius Bublys, expert in sports nutrition and supplements and the father of one of our youngest girls, and Viktorija Vasilauskaite a former national champion water-skier. With 5 coaches, we had 45 kids in the club this winter. We raced in Latvia, Austria, Italy, Slovenija, Slovakia and Norway.
For the 2008 season, we've added a junior coach to help with our learn to ski group, and also added a FIS group to be made up of the best kids, by invitation only. This group will be considered the junior national team, and will have races as well as in the above mentioned countries, will travel to Sweden, Czech Republic, and perhaps Bulgaria, Turkey and France. Our fall camp will be Oct 27-Nov 3 in Stubai, Austria and this year's Lithuanian championships will be in Bad Gastein Austria, January 12-19.
The ski club is looking for sponsors in a variety of ways. The first is by buying a t-shirt. For a donation of at least $35 you can get either a long or short-sleeved team shirt. See: http://www.kalnuslidinejimas.lt/ereliai/pages/donate_en.htm
Here is more information on becoming a sponsor: http://www.kalnuslidinejimas.lt/ereliai/pages/sponsor_become_en.htm
Browse the website and you'll find lots of more information about the coaches, our program, and our goals. Though, I'll be working hard to update it in the next week or two, so keep checking back, as it will be changing.
Take care,
Jenn