1985

It's been a while since I've reported – I think I missed my last deadline and I apologize for that. The good news is that the column is a bit newsier than normal.

Last summer, I heard from Francisco Cucalon. Francisco moved to Ecuador in 1991 to join a family agriculture business. In 1994, Francisco and his father formed a snack company called Ecofrut where Francisco served as general manager. Ecofrut is devoted to the production and export of tropical snack chips, with more than 90 percent of its production going to over a dozen countries worldwide. Francisco and his wife Estela have three children: Ricardo (18), Sofia (16) and Diego (14). Ricardo is attending the University of Chicago, while Sofia and Diego are still working through their high school years.

Bruce Boisonnault reports from upstate New York. Bruce left Disney in the early 1990s to pursue "running something" and "working in public policy." He is president and CEO of Niagara Health Quality Coalition, a nonprofit company that develops and supports initiatives that improve transparency in health care. He periodically gets back to Evanston, to work with the Kellogg economics department on healthcare policy matters. Bruce and his wife, Joan, have two sons, Alex and William. Both are very accomplished musicians, following in their mother's footsteps. She is a teacher and orchestra director in Williamsville, N.Y.

Vimal Bahuguna reports that he is using video conferencing extensively to significantly cut down his weekly commute to his office in Morristown, N.J. Vimal and his wife, Bulbul, are enjoying their place in Bannockburn, Ill. He and Pat McGarvey connect frequently. With his commute time cut, Vimal is able to serve on the board of trustees of the American India Foundation and the board of Pearl Business School — a newly established graduate business school in Gurgaon, India, in collaboration with Babson College, Mass. The school focuses on the special needs of entrepreneurial and family-owned businesses. Finally, and he may be the first in our class to proudly report this – his daughter Iva Bahuguna '09 is attending Kellogg and he is looking forward to handing her the diploma at the 2009 commencement ceremony!

This fall, Ted and I had the chance to catch up with Sheila Spencer Beck, who was dropping her son Jimmy off for his first year at St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia. It was great catching up with her. She and family are living in Wilton, Conn.

Christmas cards brought news from Mary Michelson Schwartz who is still at Northwest Airlines, and was consumed by the Northwest/Delta merger at the end of the year. She is leading the wholesale pricing analysis group which covers just about all the products that are not retail or Web fares. Unfortunately, Mary anticipates that this position may be short-lived as her position will eventually be transferred to Delta's headquarters in Atlanta — and she will not be following it there. Mary lives in Minnesota with her husband Mark, daughter Alex (14) (who is so in love with the Jonas Brothers) and son Kyle (11). Working for an airline has its perks, she reports. Mary and her family traveled to Colorado, Riviera Maya, Mexico, London, Bahamas, Chicago and Phoenix.

Greg French's Christmas note reports that oldest son Tom is a sophomore at Miami University of Ohio, plays club water polo and joined a fraternity — "all's well." Daughter Katie is a senior in high school and has narrowed her school search to somewhere between "Penn and Colorado." JP, his youngest son, plays travel baseball and his team won the division title last summer. Greg and his wife Kathy are doing well living and working in the Chicago suburbs.

Ted and I also had a chance to visit with Peter Colgan and his wife Susan in the Boston area this fall. They are doing very well. Peter is director of marketing at Integra Life Sciences. Their oldest son, Tommy, is a sophomore in college and received his Eagle Scout Award last summer. Their youngest son, Drew, is active in swimming and hopes to complete his Eagle Scout Award very soon.

We are doing very well. Just a quick update on my projects: Technology in Action, the introduction to computer literacy textbook that I published with Pearson/Prentice Hall, is in its sixth edition and is being used in about 200 two- and four-year colleges nationwide. It is positioned to become the leading textbook in its area this year. In January, I published Better Business, a textbook for the introduction to business course offered by two- and four-year colleges. It has already received much positive reception, so we are very excited! Lastly, I was recently appointed as series editor for Prentice Hall on their leading computer application textbook series, Exploring. I am still teaching at the community college, serving on the board at our local hospital and trying to get to as many of Teddy's soccer games as possible. Ted is trading options and is teaching finance and economics courses at the community college. He is still actively involved in local politics, serving on the board of supervisors for our township and on the Montgomery County Lands Trust. Our daughter Laura is a sophomore at the University of Richmond, Carolyn is a sophomore at The Hill School in Pottstown, Pa., and Teddy is enjoying his eighth-grade year before heading off to high school in the fall.

I hope to hear from many of you in the near future. I am on Facebook and LinkedIn, so you can find me there and of course feel free to e-mail or phone or just stop by if you're ever in the Philadelphia area!