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May 3,
2002
Reaching
across Time 1980 to 2005 Alumnae Career Panel
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Photo: Fred Leblanc
(Left
to right) First-year students Leah Serinsky and Quiana Salazar-King
chat with Emily E. Sherwood '80.
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by Cynthia L. Reed,
president,
class of 1980
The energy in the
New York Room during the afternoon of April 28 stood in stark
contrast to the gloom of the rainy day. Members of the class of
2005, hosted by current class officers, gathered to hear six of
my classmates recount their career journeys in the first of several
events planned to bring together the classes of 1980 and 2005,
whose twenty-fifth reunion and graduation celebrations will coincide.
The session started
with formality and ended with the familiar sounds of MHC women's
voices sharing and laughing and finding common ground. It was
an afternoon of insights from women who followed different and
amazing paths. They are thriving today in ways that were unimaginable
to them as students. They credit the skills of analytical thinking
and the ability to assimilate information and learn new languages
as critical to career development and transformation.
The April 28 career
panel discussion was initiated when the class boards of the two
classes met last fall. This semester, I worked with Laura Khor
'05, president of the class of 2005, to organize this panel discussion
with Dawn Elise Evans '80, Shawn Hartley Hancock ‘80, Ellen
J. Kapinos '80, Molly J. Liskow '80, Emily E. Sherwood '80, and
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney '80. Said Khor of the event, “Cynthia
found a diverse alumnae panel for our class to enjoy and learn
from. I found this event so exciting! The alumnae had such interesting
stories about their jobs and how they got to where they are now
in life. Their insight and knowledge is a must for any MHC student.
These women are excited about working and about meeting class
of 2005 students.”
Ellen Kapinos was
a biology major at MHC. She went on to a master's program in biology,
deciding after the first year that law school was the next step.
Three years later, with a law degree and a master of science in
biology, she decided to work in the emerging field of patent law
in genetic and pharmaceutical-related fields. Her message to students
who are interested in science is that there are many jobs that
require scientific backgrounds, so think beyond medical school
as the only career suitable for someone with a degree in the sciences.
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Photo: Fred Leblanc
Connecting
with Dawn Elise Evans '80 (far right) are Caroline Brennan
'05 (far left) and Karin Power '05.
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Emily Sherwood was
the voice for public service at the discussion. While a political
science major at MHC, she never imagined that she would end up
working for the Massachusetts State Legislature one day. Her work
experience includes tenure at a company that produced and promoted
concerts and a stint at Greenpeace before she became a state employee
and, eventually, chief-of-staff to a representative to the Massachusetts
State Legislature. Her experience there catapulted her into her
current position of project manager for a pilot program for the
Division of Medical Assistance in Massachusetts. She describes
her job as cultural translator for the five agencies that are
working in cooperation to make this pilot project succeed.
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney
describes her career as most like the life that MHC students have
now. She is a professor of English at Holy Cross College. Her
path has not changed from her days as an English major on campus.
Susan pursued an M.A. in English, an M.F.A. in poetry, and a Ph.D.
in English at Brown University. Her life follows the same academic
schedule that is familiar to students, though her summer months
are spent on research. Susan encourages students who love learning,
reading, and researching to consider a career in academics. She
cautions that it also means a lifetime of final exams.
Molly Liskow majored
in history and classics while at MHC and earned her J.D. at Harvard
Law School. She worked in various small law firms while being
active in organizations that promote reproductive rights and projects
that support victims of rape and domestic violence. Molly had
opportunities to teach law courses and started working on cite
checking and proofreading for a firm. Her inclination to proofread
and correct even the newspaper prevailed as she moved to positions
in several law publishing firms. Her current position as editor
at Matthew Bender & Co. requires that she develop a keen understanding
of employment, immigration, civil rights, education, and admiralty
legal decisions. Molly believes that MHC women have the skills
to learn new materials quickly and to move with agility into different
opportunities in a given field.
Shawn Hartley Hancock
left MHC to pursue her dream to live in New York City and become
a magazine editor. She accomplished that goal with years of hard
work and the good fortune to work at well-edited and prestigious
magazines. During this decade of work, she developed the widest
range of editing skills possible, from story conception to newsletter
creation. She also started her independent writing career. Her
next career was freelance writing full time, mostly in the travel,
health, and business fields. On the side, she started working
part time for a surgical practice. As this job became nearly full
time, Shawn learned the details of running a small business, including
managing people and processes. Today, she is a board member of
the New York Junior League and serves as communications manager,
overseeing more than one hundred volunteers and staff while venturing
into her current career as general contractor and interior designer.
Hancock decided to do the renovation work on her own New York
City apartment and has been doing the same for others for the
past few years. Her advice to students started with the word failure.
“As long as you take the time to learn from failure, it will
serve you well, so do not fear it,” she said. Hancock believes
that “none of us is as smart as all of us.” She recommends
that students seek mentors whenever possible.
Dawn Elise Evans entered
MHC with the expectation that she would prepare for medical school.
Her psychobiology major and all that she studied supported that
cause. To boost her chances of medical school acceptance, Evans
worked in a health clinic for a year following her graduation.
She met wonderful, committed doctors who lived full professional
lives and had no time for family or social lives. After careful
analysis of her long-term interests, she made the difficult decision
to abandon her medical dream and relinquish her slot at medical
school, her first “leap of faith.” She went to work
at a health-care management consulting and software firm and acquired
an on-the-job business degree. She took those skills to a small
corporate training company and eventually to a bank, as director
of marketing. During this time, Dawn experimented with writing.
She reached a crossroads with the birth of her first child and
the acknowledgement that she wanted to spend more time with her
daughter. Evans found that she was able to write and sell work
on a freelance basis and offer professional training sessions,
as well as training about writing. Her career now allows her the
flexibility to work from home as a writer of novels and magazine
articles. Her life is very different from how she imagined it
while a student but is fully satisfying. Dawn hopes that students
remain open to trying new endeavors and listening to their inner
selves about what really makes them feel happy and fulfilled.
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