Class Notes

Rebecca Valette (PhDFren’63) is a professor emerita of romance languages at Boston College and an internationally recognized expert in language methodology, testing and applied linguistics. She and her husband, Jean-Paul Valette, have curated several exhibitions of Navajo textiles and are co-authors of Weaving the Dance: Navajo Yeibichai Textiles (1910–1950) and Navajo Weavings with Ceremonial Themes: A Historical Overview of a Secular Art Form. In December Rebecca’s book Clitso Dedman, Navajo Carver: His Art and His World was published. It is the first biography of artist and master wood carver Clitso Dedman, one of the most important but overlooked Diné (Navajo) artists of his generation. Rebecca lives in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts.

Gerald “Jerry” Miller (Mgmt’63) is an amateur historian and writer. After retiring, he returned to his hometown of Pueblo, Colorado. He has contributed over 100 stories to the Pueblo Lore, a monthly journal, published by the Pueblo County Historical Society.

After years of visiting the Hawaiian island of Kauai and writing several whimsical rooster stories for the island’s newspaper, The Garden Island, Roger Lepley (Arch’71) has compiled these stories and more into an illustrated book — Kauai Rooster Stories and Other Tropical Tales. Roger is an architect and industrial designer in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and the president and founder of Consort Corporation, a design-oriented manufacturing company.

Erica Elliott (MEdu’77; MD’83) is a medical doctor in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She wrote a book, From Mountains to Medicine: Scaling the Heights in Search of My Calling, about searching for her life’s purpose.

Mark Masters (IntlAf’77) is a veteran band announcer and a former drum major for the 1977–78 season of the CU Golden Buffalo Marching Band. Last fall, after 33 years of volunteering, he served as stadium announcer for the marching band for the final time. He lives in Denver.

In January H. Gregory Nelch (Mktg’77) joined the San Francisco branch of law firm Hinshaw & Culbertson LLC as senior counsel. He has more than three decades of experience advising national corporations, government entities and individuals in a wide range of litigation matters, including personal injury, product liability, construction defect, premises liability and professional negligence. After graduating from CU Boulder, he received his law degree from the University of Baltimore School of Law.

Nancy Ball Weil’s (Russ’77) short stories have appeared in the anthology Electric Grace and the online journal ArLiJo. She has served as the Women’s National Book Association’s (WNBA) award chair, national co-vice president, national website co-chair and Washington, D.C., chapter newsletter editor. The WNBA has been devoted to books and literacy since 1917. Nancy is also the author of two novels: Karmafornia and Superball.

After 30 years of working for CU Presents — the home of CU Boulder performing arts — Joan McLean Beaun (Mus’81; MBA’93) plans to retire in June. She became the program’s executive director in 2001 and saw it grow to about 500 events a year, including concerts, operas, plays and musicals. “Joan’s efforts have been deeply appreciated and have laid the foundation for future success for CU performers, scholars and artists,” said Chancellor Philip DiStefano last fall. Joan lives in Boulder.

Chemical engineer Seth Darst (ChemEng’82) investigates the structure, function and regulation of RNA synthesis in bacteria and SARS-CoV-2, the causative agent for COVID-19. He was elected to the United States National Academy of Sciences in 2008, is a professor of molecular biophysics at Rockefeller University and won the Gregori Aminoff Prize in 2022. The annual prize is awarded by The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and recognizes individual contributions to the field of crystallography, the study of atomic structures in solid materials. The King of Sweden presented Seth with the award.

Musical composer Geary Larrick (DMus’84) lives in the Chicago area as a retired music professor at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. He previously spent 50 years in central Wisconsin. In the 1970s and 80s, Geary gave the Colorado premieres of his “Sonata” for bass drum, which was composed in Aspen, “Marie: A Four-Mallet Rag” for marimba or vibes and “Duo Sonata” for trombone and percussion, which was presented in the CU College of Music recital hall. In 2023 Geary completed four symphonies and a Missa brevis. Much of Geary’s work is in the CU American Music Research Center.

Dave Murrow (AeroEngr’84) retired in 2023 after a space science mission career at NASA and in the commercial industry. He has been appointed to NASA’s Planetary Science Advisory Committee, where he offers guidance on projects to explore the moon and planets. Dave writes that he still loves Colorado and “plans to camp in all of the state parks and ski at all of our state’s resorts.” He lives in Highlands Ranch, Colorado.

Journalist Tom Costello (Jour’87) was named NBC News senior correspondent in January. In his 20 years with NBC news, he has also served as a Washington and New York correspondent, reporting on many beats and topics. 

In September, Chris Warner (Geog’87) became the second American to summit all 14 of the world’s 8,000 meter peaks — the world’s tallest mountains. Chris is a motivational speaker who uses his experiences in both mountaineering and entrepreneurship to educate people. He has contributed to two books — he wrote a chapter in Upward Bound: Nine Original Accounts of How Business Leaders Reached Their Summits and co-wrote High Altitude Leadership — and has appeared on multiple national news outlets as an expert in leadership and climbing. He lives in Denver.

Shortly after graduating from CU, Doug Leibinger (Advert’89) moved to Aspen, Colorado. For the past 26 years, he has been involved in real estate, and eight years ago, became a founding partner of Compass Real Estate in Aspen, where he works in Aspen, Snowmass and the Roaring Fork Valley. This past year, the Wall Street Journal and Tom Ferry Real Trends recognized Doug as the No. 72 broker in the nation out of about 1.6 million realtors. Each year, he gets together with his Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity brothers, as well as his fellow CU Buffoons alumni.

After graduating from CU, Christopher Arndt (AeroEngr’90) served seven years in the Navy before attending medical school and residency at the University of New Mexico (UNM). He is now an attending anesthesiologist at UNM. Christopher was selected to be medical director for the UNM outpatient surgery center in 2009 and served in that role until 2020 when he was chosen as chair for the UNM department of anesthesiology and critical care medicine. He received his MBA last year. He, along with Cassie Langhals (Psych’13), opened the first master of science in anesthesia program at UNM. The program is the first of its kind in New Mexico and has a mission to serve the Southwest population.

In December, Michele Heller (Jour’90) joined FINRA, the U.S. financial markets self-regulatory organization, as director of executive and stakeholder communications. Previously, Michele was director of strategic communications and media relations at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and served in the Obama administration as the senior advisor for communications at the FDIC. Before transitioning into communications, Michele worked as a journalist, at The Washington Post and other newspapers in Washington, D.C., Beijing and Hong Kong. She lives in Washington, D.C., with her husband, two teenagers and one dog.

The city of Fort Collins honored Gregg Osterhout (FilmSt’90) for his “vision of troupe-focused artistry and education in co-founding Debut Theatre Company (established 1991) and commitment to theater for and by young people.” Gregg lives in Fort Collins, Colorado. 

Gibson Smith (Econ’91) has worked in several financial positions, including as founder and CIO of Denver’s Smith Capital Investors, LLC. Gibson is passionate about asset management, security analysis, economics and finance. Gibson and Laura Smith’s (Intl’93) son, Charlie Smith (RealEs’24), will graduate from CU in May. He is a fifth-generation Forever Buff through Laura’s family, a fourth-generation Forever Buff through Gibson’s family and has many Forever Buff aunts and uncles.

In January, Deloitte, an audit, consulting, tax and advisory service firm, named Melinda Yee (Acct’92) Houston managing partner. Melinda has worked at Deloitte for more than 30 years. Prior, she served as Deloitte’s central region risk and advisory leader and as its Houston risk and advisory leader. Melinda also serves as a board member for Junior Achievement of Southeast Texas, is a member of the energy transition committee for the Greater Houston Partnership and is audit committee chair, director and trustee at the CU Foundation. She lives in Houston, Texas.

Chris Connor (MechEngr’93) celebrated his 30th year in the semiconductor business as director of the Intel 3 and Intel 4 reliability programs, which helped enable Intel’s first chiplet architecture with the company’s Core Ultra processors and Intel’s biggest architecture change in over 40 years. He chaired the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers International Reliability Physics Symposium — a premiere conference for engineers and scientists to present new and original work in the area of microelectronics reliability — held in Monterey, California, and serves as chair of the board. He writes that he also celebrates 30 years without drinking alcohol.