Joe Sasto (B.A., communication, ’10) was a contestant on the latest season of Bravo’s Top Chef television series, making it to the Final 3 before exiting the show.
Eva Mehl (Ph.D., history, ’11), an assistant professor of history at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, wrote Forced Migration in the Spanish Pacific World: From Mexico to the Philippines, 1765-1811 (Cambridge University Press, 2016).
Ofunne Okwudiafor (B.A., communication, ’11) was recently featured in a BuzzFeed article about her new app, Cocoa Swatches, that helps people of color select makeup. A recent graduate of Columbia University's Master of Science in Communications Practice, she blogs at ofunneamaka.com.
Steve Cote (Ph.D., history, ’11) has published Oil and Nation: A History of Bolivia’s Petroleum Sector, the inaugural book in West Virginia University Press' new Energy and Society series. Oil and Nation places petroleum at the center of Bolivia’s contentious 20th-century history. Bolivia’s oil, Cote argues, instigated the largest war in Latin America in the 1900s, provoked the first nationalization of a major foreign company by a Latin American state, and shaped both the course and the consequences of Bolivia’s transformative National Revolution of 1952. Oil and natural gas continue to steer the country under the government of Evo Morales. Cote is an interpretive ranger for the National Park Service, stationed at Alcatraz Island in the San Francisco Bay.
Austin Sendek (B.S. physics, ‘12) was named to Forbes annual 30 Under 30 list of individuals making an impact in the field of energy. Sendek founded his own company, AIONICS, which develops machine learning platforms for accelerating new battery designs.
Photographer Jason Engelund (M.F.A., art, `13) has been selected to exhibit artworks in “Boundless: A California Invitational” at the Museum of Photographic Arts in San Diego. The exhibition runs Oct. 15, 2016 – Jan. 29, 2017. “I use photography as a metaphor for the mind’s camera eye and my process is abstraction,” Engelund said. “Images are made with film and created in camera through multiple exposure. I compose a piece by taking multiple shots on one film frame and combine together different elements from the seascape and the sun.”
May Wilson (MFA, art, ’13) has won the 2017 San Francisco Artist Award from the San Francisco Art Dealers Association (SFADA). As winner, she will have a solo exhibition at the Themes + Projects gallery, Minnesota Street Project, 1275 Minnesota St., Sept. 9 – 30. Wilson creates sculptures and installations with industrial materials — vinyl, industrial felt, nylon strapping, sand and concrete. Around 30 artists were nominated for the biennial award by art professionals, collectors and other artists.
Following graduation, Austin Ray (B.S., applied mathematics, ’13) founded an education finance policy nonprofit, EdBuild. The nonprofit helped governors and legislators make sure more money went to public schools serving low-income students. Ray is now returning to school to earn an MBA at Duke University.
The Rev. Mae Elise Cannon (Ph.D., history, ’14), executive director of Churches for Middle East Peace, wrote "A Land Full of God: Christian Perspectives on the Holy Land" (Cascade Books, 2017).
Megan Kennedy (BA, philosophy and political science, ’14) was featured in a Davis Enterprise article, "Female veteran offers support, inspiration to others at UC Davis." She is a UC Davis undergraduate admissions adviser and a student veteran advocate.
James Rizzo (B.A., political science, ’15) has won a prestigious new scholarship for a year's graduate study in Beijing at one of China's leading universities. Rizzo is one of the 111 members of the inaugural class of Schwarzman Scholars selected from more than 3,000 applicants worldwide.
Three months after graduating, Nicholas Dias (B.A., psychology and communication, ’15) was preparing to wing his way to a writing internship in Argentina. Dias, who graduated in June 2015, planned to leave in late September for a year in Buenos Aires as part of his internship with national honors society Phi Beta Kappa. He will write for Phi Beta Kappa’s The Key Reporter and seek a job with an English-language publication in Argentina’s capital.
A former California Aggie staffer, he is a data journalist—“meaning that I use my own statistical tests, rather than interviews, as the basis for my reporting.” Eventually, he’d like to attend journalism school and research the optimal roles of different types of media in informing citizens of particular democracies.
Sertan Usanmaz (B.A., political science and international relations, ’17) is an associate government program analyst for the California Tax Credit Allocation Committee in the State Treasurer’s Office in Sacramento.
