Alums gather from the Bay Area and beyond to celebrate Lunar New Year.

Dear fellow alums,

As the months pass, it’s hard to believe we’re staring down nearly a year of being in quarantine due to the Covid-19 pandemic. We are so grateful for technology that allows us to see each other virtually and be in community even though we have not been able to meet in person in so long. We began February celebrating the Year of the Ox with a lively Lunar New Year dumpling cookalong hosted by NorCal board member Sarah Lau ’07. Thanks to Zoom, alums from not only the Bay Area, but also New York and Connecticut were able to join! Almost all of our events are open to all MHC alums regardless of location–one silver lining of virtual events. Club co-president Steph Corrales ’16 hosted an alums of color dinner to recognize Black History Month and support local Black-owned restaurants by getting takeout. We again welcomed Attorney Barbara B. Creed, who presented a special webinar of Supreme Court cases to watch this term, and we celebrated Mary Lyon’s birthday with our annual tea hosted by Club treasurer Pauline Au ’87 and Membership co-chair Marija Vulfs ’08. At the tea, conversation turned to ways in which we can all work to be more assertive and take charge of ourselves as well as when to ask for help and outsource–as attendee Rhonda Bennon ’73 put it: “You are the CEO of your own life.” Words to remember as we head into March! Didn’t make it to an event last month? Check out our slate of upcoming events–we hope to see you at one of them.  

Join the Board

We want you! For those interested in being more involved with the Club, please consider joining our board. We welcome alums from our entire Northern California region, not just the Bay Area. Our Board meetings are via Zoom even in non-pandemic times, so location truly doesn’t matter. We would love to have representation from throughout our incredibly large region! 

The next term begins July 1, 2021. Peruse the board descriptions and let us know if any positions spark your interest by reaching out to us by email. We’re always looking for fresh perspectives and look forward to hearing from you. 

In Memoriam

The NorCal club would like to acknowledge Northern California Club member Margaret Crystal ’43 of Pleasanton who recently passed away. Our sincerest condolences to her family and friends.  

Get in touch!

As we continue virtual planning for 2021, please let us know what types of virtual events, programs, and resources may best support you at this time or any which you may wish to offer. 

• What events or programming would you like to see? 
• Have a talent you’d like to share? A group you want to start? A community you’d like to nourish? Host one of our monthly M&Cs or another virtual event! Email us or fill out this form to get started. 
• We’d love to showcase members of our alum community on social media. If you’re interested in sharing your story with our local community online, let us know here.

We’re also still welcoming any recommendations of alums who have founded, work for, or volunteer at local Northern California organizations doing anti-racist work or fundraising and will include them in upcoming newsletters. Please send any recommendations to the Board at mountholyoke@gmail.com.

Our very best wishes,

– The Board   

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Virtual Programming from the Alum Association

The College is offering a range of virtual programming and opportunities to connect. Learn more on the AA Events page.

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Membership Dues

Interested in supporting the Club further? Join the Club by paying your annual, tax-deductible Membership Dues! And if you don’t want to remember to pay your dues every year, make one payment to join us as a Lifetime Member. You can pay your dues or become a Lifetime Member here: MHC Club of Northern CA Membership Dues. The Club’s fiscal year is July 1 to June 30. Please note: If you would prefer to pay by check, please email us. 

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Stay Connected 

To hear the latest about our programming in-between our monthly newsletters, we encourage you to connect with the Club on one or more forms of social media. We hope to see you at an event soon! 

• Join our Club Facebook Page & follow us Instagram
• Share resources, your virtual events, and more, directly in the Club Facebook Group
• Bookmark our Club website
• Connect with our growing professional network on LinkedIn
• Email us if you’d like to get further involved with the Club or share feedback 
• Learn more about and consider joining the Board

Screenshots from our Uncommon Alums, Uncommon Paths event and our Eggnog & Speculaas cookies cookalong 

Dear fellow alums,

Happy New Year! We made it to 2021, after quite a grueling year. Between navigating a global pandemic, the raging wildfires, working from home and distance learning, along with many personal and professional hurdles, we have all struggled with so much in 2020. And yet. Despite the many challenges we faced, the Board is happy to have been able to connect with many of you. Since March, we have hosted 24 virtual events! We have gathered via Zoom with alums from all over the Bay Area and beyond–a definite bonus of online events. We are looking forward to turning the page on the year and have a fantastic slate of virtual events planned for 2021. 

You can look forward to the continuation of our book club where we read books by BIPOC authors to a cookalong for Lunar New Year to our Annual Mary Lyon Tea, to a special Black History Month Alums of Color Dinner (at home!), to a virtual Zumba (Zoom-ba!) class, to M&Cs for resume building, small business networking, and connecting with current students. Keep your eyes peeled for lots of chances to be in community with NorCal alums in the coming year. 

Join the Board

For those interested in being more involved, please consider joining our board! The next term begins in July 2021. Peruse the board descriptions and let us know if any positions spark your interest by reaching out to us by email. We are always looking for fresh perspectives and look forward to hearing from you. We hope to see you all, in one way or another, in 2021! 

Lifetime Members 

Special thanks to these local alums who recently became our newest Lifetime Members: Rhonda Bennon ’73, Helen Sirica ’73, Verity Chegar ’00, and Margaret Wagner ’81. 

Verity Chegar ’00 has lived in Northern California since graduating from Mount Holyoke. She works in sustainable investing, and currently serves as Vice Chair of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board. She lives in Mill Valley with her husband and daughter, and is grateful for clean air, public libraries, and loving family and friends. Verity was also a longtime NorCal Board officer. We are so grateful for her service and for her donation! Margaret Wagner ’81 is a writer, dancer, and artist who has written articles for World Screen and won three Travelers’ Tales Solas Awards for Best Travel Writing. Margaret is the founder of WRITE IN THE BEATTM, workshops that pair mindful movement with written poetry and visual art. Save the date for a special virtual writing workshop Margaret will be offering our club members on March 21–more details to come. 

Thank you for your generous donations, and for your continued support of the NorCal Club! If any other alums would like to become Lifetime Members, we’d love to have you. Additionally, if your company offers corporate matching or incentives for volunteering or being a part of a non-profit organization, we are happy to work with them to find ways to financially support our club!   

In Memoriam

The NorCal club would like to acknowledge two Northern California members who recently passed away: Anne Read Chalfant ’71 of Walnut Creek and Demaris E. Doherty (née Johnson) ’49 of San Francisco. Our sincerest condolences to their families and friends.  

This past July, we shared that former Board member and longtime Club supporter Nancy Kenyon ’56 had passed away. We wanted to let fellow alums and friends of Nancy know that her family invites you to a virtual celebration of her life on Sunday, January 17th at 1pm PST on Zoom. From her family: “Given the duration of the pandemic, we have decided to celebrate virtually. We know we don’t have all of her contacts so please help us by inviting others. If you’d like to be a speaker contact Blythe Perryn at mail@sandybar.com. We encourage folks to share their stories!”

Get in touch!

As we continue virtual planning for 2021, please let us know what types of virtual events, programs, and resources may best support you at this time or any which you may wish to offer. 

• What events or programming would you like to see? 

• Have a talent you’d like to share? A group you want to start? A community you’d like to nourish? Host one of our monthly M&Cs or another virtual event! Email us or fill out this form to get started. 

• We want you to share your story with our membership! We’d love to feature uncommon alums in our network in another installment of our “Uncommon Alums, Uncommon Paths” event series. (See event details below and register for our second event on January 24!) Please get in touch if this sounds like something you’d like to participate in.  

We’re also still welcoming any recommendations of alums who have founded, work for, or volunteer at local Northern California organizations doing anti-racist work or fundraising and will include them in upcoming newsletters. Please send any recommendations to the Board at mountholyoke@gmail.com.

To hear the latest about our programming in-between our monthly newsletters, we encourage you to follow the Club on Facebook and Instagram. We also invite you to share resources, your virtual events, and more, directly in the Facebook Group.

Our very best wishes for the New Year,

– The Board 

Virtual Programming from the Alum Association

The College is offering a range of virtual programming and opportunities to connect. Learn more on the AA Events page.

If you’re interested in joining any of these virtual events but unsure about using Zoom, check out this resource and reach out to the Club with any questions. 

Scenes from our Dutch Baby cookalong: the ingredients, the group on Zoom, and the finished product from Turner Wiley ‘16!

Dear fellow alums,

Hello and happy holiday season to all! Even if we may not be feeling as festive as in years past, the virtual gatherings over the last month brought plenty of community and connectedness. We loved cooking Dutch Babies using a recipe from Penny Setchko ‘44, discussing work/life balance and professional transitions in the face of COVID-19 at our monthly Virtual M&Cs, and digging deep into meaningful conversation of Girl, Woman, Other at the NorCal Book Club. 

As we look ahead to December, we have a full docket of events planned, with the hope that all of us can enjoy some holiday cheer together during this challenging year. We hope to see many of you at one of our upcoming events. 

Lifetime Members

The NorCal Club would like to acknowledge three more local alums who recently became Lifetime Members: Lisa Ali ‘79, Liz Hirsch, ‘75, and Margaret Wagner ‘81. Thank you for your generous donations, and for your continued support of the NorCal Club! If any other alums would like to become Lifetime Members, we’d love to have you.

We Want YOU!

As we continue virtual planning for 2021, please let us know what types of virtual events, programs, and resources may best support you at this time or any which you may wish to offer. 

• What events or programming would you like to see? 
• Have a talent you’d like to share? A group you want to start? A community you’d like to nourish? Host one of our monthly M&Cs or another virtual event! Email us or fill out this form to get started. 
• We want you to share your story with our membership! We’d love to feature uncommon alums in our network in another installment of our “Uncommon Alums, Uncommon Paths” event series. (See event details below and register for our first event this Sunday!) Please get in touch if this sounds like something you’d like to participate in.  

We’re also still welcoming any recommendations of alums who have founded, work for, or volunteer at local Northern California organizations doing anti-racist work or fundraising and will include them in upcoming newsletters. Please send any recommendations to the Board at mountholyoke@gmail.com.

To hear the latest about our programming in-between our monthly newsletters, we encourage you to follow the Club on Facebook and Instagram. We also invite you to share resources, your virtual events, and more, directly in the Facebook Group.

Our very best wishes,

– The Board 

Membership Dues

Interested in supporting the Club further? Join the Club by paying your annual, tax-deductible Membership Dues! And if you don’t want to remember to pay your dues every year, make one payment to join us as a Lifetime Member. You can pay your dues or become a Lifetime Member here: MHC Club of Northern CA Membership Dues. The Club’s fiscal year is July 1 to June 30. Please note: If you would prefer to pay by check, please email us. 

Stay Connected 

To hear the latest about our programming in-between our monthly newsletters, we encourage you to follow the Club on Facebook and Instagram. We also encourage you to share resources, your virtual events, and more, directly in the Facebook Group.

We hope to see you at an event soon! 

• Join us on our Club Facebook Page & Instagram
• Bookmark our Club website
• Update your contact info in the Alum Directory to receive Club e-newsletters (instructions)
• Connect with our growing professional network on LinkedIn
• Email us if you’d like to get further involved with the Club or share feedback 
• Learn about the Board and connect with us on LinkedIn

Dear fellow alums,

What a wonderful virtual Mountain Day! We made the best of our unique circumstances and connected with over 30 alums from across the Northern California area on Zoom! Special thanks to Eleanor Chang ’78 for sharing these stunning photos from one of her visits to campus. 🍂It was such a joy to celebrate a virtual Mountain Day together. 

Left: Fall foliage on Mount Holyoke’s campus, photo credit: Eleanor Chang ‘78; Right: Alums gather virtually to celebrate Mountain Day.

As we continue virtual planning for the winter and beyond to 2021, please let us know what types of virtual events, programs, and resources may best support you at this time or any which you may wish to offer. 

• What events or programming would you like to see? 
• Have a talent you’d like to share? A group you want to start? An M&Cs gathering or any other virtual event you’d like to host? Let us know by emailing us or filling out this form.
  

This month, we’re thrilled to showcase the work of Pact – an Emeryville based non-profit organization whose mission is to serve adopted children of color and all of their families. We were honored to interview Katie Wynen ‘05 who works at Pact as an adoption social worker and LGBTQ+ advocate.

Check out the Spotlight interview below to learn more!

We’d love to showcase you and/or your organization as well! We’re still welcoming any recommendations of alums who have founded, work for, or volunteer at local Northern California organizations doing anti-racist work or fundraising and will incliude them in upcoming newsletters. Please send any recommendations to the Board at mountholyoke@gmail.com.

To hear the latest about our programming in-between our monthly newsletters, we encourage you to follow the Club on Facebook and Instagram. We also invite you to share resources, your virtual events, and more, directly in the Facebook Group.

Our very best wishes,

– The Board 

Spotlight on Katie Wynen ‘05 and Pact

Hey, Katie! Tell us a bit about yourself and your time at MHC. I’m Katie (she.her), class of 2005. I am a Latinx/Colombian adoptee who was raised in Florida by white adoptive parents. I’ve lived in MA, CT and now CA. At MHC I was on the crew team, a writer for J-Show and a DJ for WMHC. I worked in the dining hall (yea! first year), at Tailgate and for student programs. I have my masters in social work and teach fitness (Zumba, Spinning) on the side.  You work for an adoption organization called Pact. Tell us about Pact’s mission and your role. I’ve been at Pact since May 2013 and I am the adoption social worker and LGBTQ advocate. Pact is a non-profit organization whose mission is to serve adopted children of color and all of their families. My main role is the placement program where I predominately support adoptive parents of color, but I also get to lead webinars, support groups and other trainings. Watch: Rewriting the story of adoption—with the child in mind Could you highlight a few services offered by Pact and their respective impact? We have placement, education, support and community programs, because adoption is a lifelong journey. Our organization is also run by direct members of the adoption constellation so we come to this work personally and professionally. In our adoption placement program we focus on supporting adoptive parents of color and this is huge, because the majority of adoption agencies, lawyers, facilitators, etc. cater to white adoptive parents. For many adoptive parents of color they have to enter a program run by white people and featuring only white families; they are not represented. At Pact we support families of color and our staff is majority BIPOC. When families of color contact us, they are represented. They see other families that look like them, a staff that looks like them and they are the majority in our placement program. For expectant parents considering adoption, they have a real choice of finding a family that looks like them, will look like their child, will understand the importance of race and racial identity. I’ve seen how powerful this is for the families of color (birth and adoptive) who have worked with Pact. Having support groups for adopted tweens/teens of color, adult adoptees of color and adoptive parents of color has been really impactful for these communities to have a safe space with other people with similar experiences. Our groups are local and national. Our education, support and community programs are open to any adoptive or foster family parenting a child of color.  What does Adoption Awareness Month mean to you, and your team at Pact? National Adoption Awareness Month was established to celebrate families that have grown through adoption and to bring attention to the more than 125,000 children waiting in foster care. Over the last several years there has been a push from adult adoptees (of all races) to shed truth on the adoption experience. To have people question/think about why we celebrate the trauma and lifelong impact of family separation. It even has the tag of #FlipTheScript, because the script is dictated by adoptive parents and other adoption professionals and it needs to be the voices of adoptees and first/birth families who are the most impacted by adoption. As an adoptee and adoption professional I am all about #FlipTheScript and I use my social media throughout the month to highlight all parts of the adoption journey.  For Pact we like to say that we are trying to be interrupters, so Pact fully supports and believes the month should focus primarily on the voices of lived experience from adult adoptees and first/birth parents. We do support bringing awareness to the children in foster care because homes are needed, but we also focus on the adoptee and first/birth parents who bring awareness to the private adoption industry and how it’s problematic. Adult Adoptees of Color Group How can alums support PACT’s mission or get involved? Spread the word! If someone you know is pregnant, we offer full options counseling (parenting, abortion, adoption). If you know a BIPOC person/family interested in adoption, tell them about us. If you are or know an adoptee of color, adoptive parent of color or first/birth parent we have support groups (all on Zoom). Donate! As a non-profit, every dollar helps! You can donate to our general fund, or a specific program. Thank you so much for taking the time to share your work with us! Thanks to the Club for reaching out to highlight alums working with/for BIPOC communities/individuals. Adoption is a business that likes to focus on cis, het, white and wealthy people. Pact spent many years to reconfigure their adoption placement program to support, exclusively, adoptive parents of color. I’m honored to work for an organization that focuses on the underserved and underrepresented members of the adoption constellation. I get to watch expectant parents of color get real options counseling which includes not having to do an adoption placement and figuring out that they can, and are entitled to parenting their child. I get to lead the support group for adult adoptees of color, like me, who are navigating the lifelong journey of adoption. It is so powerful to watch the healing and support in the group. I could talk about Pact for hours, so thanks for highlighting just a little bit of the work we do.   To learn more about Pact and get involved: Contact Katie directly via email Connect on Facebook Donate  Instagram: @pactadopt for our general org Instagram: @yeswedoadopt for adoptive parents of color Twitter: @pactadopt