62 | LEHIGH ALUMNI BULLETIN | CLASS NOTES never seem to rest. There is no counting the organizations they support with their leadership, time and fiscal support. In late March, they were honored by receiving the Ben Appelbaum Advocate for Youth Award from SCOPE: Summer Camp Opportunities Promote Education. By funding camperships, SCOPE support reinforces the connection between academic achievement and the enriched recreational and educational experiences at summer camp. Jay and Neil are both managing directors and wealth partners with J.P. Morgan Wealth Management. In their spare time, Jay serves as board member of the David B. Falk College of Sports and Human Dynamics and Neil sits on the advisory board at the Newhouse School of Public Communications, both at Syracuse University. In addition, both are board members of The Pediatric Cancer Foundation, My Money Workshop and The Athletes vs. Crohn’s & Colitis Organization. ’90 Michael Lewis, mpl1968@yahoo. com and Dave Tratner, dctsports@gmail.com Hello, Class of 1990! On the day of our submission for this issue of the LU Alumni mag, I (Michael) happened to be in a Krispy Kreme collecting eight dozen doughnuts for my daughter’s school event. Blaring on the speakers in that Krispy Kreme was none other than The Smithereens’ “A Girl Like You.” Kind of the only way my fraternity brother Steve Saul would have it every day at 7 a.m. of senior year Greek Week. Boy, that was some serious PTSD! Back to our Class of ’90 updates: We got the scoop on Vicky (Kowalsky) Menand and her husband, Stephen Menand, a “classmate couple”! Stephen is now flying internationally for American Airlines out of JFK. Look for him as your pilot on any future flights to Doha and Tel Aviv. Vicky has retired from her job at St. Clair Hospital after working as an IT project manager for 25 years. They now winter in Naples, Fla., where they have attracted many visitors, including Lisa (Aschenbach) Barker, Robert Kruklitis, Susan (Colgan) Zimmerman ’91 and Justin Zimmerman ’91, and a spring break descent from their daughter, Sara Menand (Lehigh ’25), plus a few of her friends. Vicky, enjoy your retirement! You’re now free to fly all over the world in the AA jump seat (if that’s still a thing!). Up the East Coast from Naples, David’s freshman roommate Tom Neff has claimed class elder status for a fantastic reason—he served four years in the Army before entering Lehigh. This means he may be a few steps ahead of the average Class of ’90 member when it comes to retirement planning and which we presume also means he’s still the oldest member of our class. He and his wife are building a retirement home in the world-famous golfing hamlet of Pinehurst, N.C. Apparently, all golfers are welcome, but watch it if you’re a Duke fan: UNC’s retired Coach Roy Williams lives a few blocks away. Congratulations, Tom, on your pending retirement as well as for your son Robert’s pending graduation from Loyola-Chicago, after which he also plans to build a career in the U.S. Army. Thank you to the Neffs for their service. And finally, Jill Ricken is holding strong in Puerto Rico after her two kids flew the coop. Her second child, Nadia, left for Georgia Tech this year. Her son, Leo, is finishing up a mechanical engineering degree at Florida Tech. Thanks to her years playing and coaching soccer at Lehigh — she was our club women’s soccer coach for two-plus years while she enrolled in a grad program at Lehigh (master’s of science in mathematics ’93) — Jill continues to play soccer in San Juan. She has also taken up beach tennis this year. Is there anything not awesome about Jill’s setup in Puerto Rico? That’s it—35th LU reunion at Jill’s place. Book it! Thank you, Vicky, Tom and Jill for writing in. And as for the rest of you, there’s another alumni mag coming out in four months. Check in with us. We promise we won’t make you chug a beer! ’91 Diana Zoller Perkins, dianazoller@gmail.com It’s April, and things in Israel are incredibly tense and complicated at the moment. I won’t go into all of that, but I do want to mention that my daughter, Zelda, just completed her service of two years and eight months in the Israel Defense Forces. She ended her service as a combat medic in Magav, the border police, and spent the majority of her service in Hebron at the Tomb of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs. We are so incredibly proud of her commitment to Israel and her choice of one of the most difficult services available to women. In February, I had the immense pleasure of spending time with Andrea Strong, who was on a family trip in Israel. We had a great time catching up, and I loved meeting her family. You can read all about her visit, including the best restaurants and sites, at The Strong Buzz. (The Strong Buzz is Andrea’s NYC restaurant newsletter on Substack—it’s all about where to eat and drink through the eyes of someone who has covered the business for 20 years and is also a single parent living in Brooklyn with two kids. Here is the link to sign up: andreastrong.substack.com.) In March, Andrea announced the creation of the NYC Hospitality Alliance Impact Foundation, a groundbreaking nonprofit that will focus on major programs and initiatives to help alleviate hunger and hardships and support workers and owners in the hospitality industry. Jill (Merriam) Dulitsky was also in Tel Aviv with a group from the Jewish Federation of West Hartford, of which Jill is the incoming president. It was wonderful to see Jill and to meet her mother. They had a very meaningful trip. Jill’s son, Brady, is a freshman at Tulane, and her daughter is graduating from high school. After a long career as an all-star cheerleader, she was a slot receiver for her high school football team this year! Stacey Levine has been working as an in-house lawyer at a pharma company in the oncology space and really enjoys the work. She says, “Even though I’m not one of the scientists, it gives me purpose to feel like I am helping to bring drugs to market for people with cancer.” Her daughter, Ella is 16 and goes to Pingry, where she was recently a finalist in the Dr. Robert H. LeBow ’59 Memorial Oratorical Competition. Her topic was advocacy for animals and our environment. Jon Kaplan is a Grammy Award-winning mixer, producer and composer. He became a bass player and performed in several cover bands at Lehigh, jamming each weekend at local bars and fraternity parties. Following a dream-defining stretch in the 1990s as a member of Atlantic Records’ band The Hatters, his career behind the glass began in NYC as an engineer on hit records for *N Sync, Jennifer Lopez, LL Cool J, Mariah Carey and others. After 25 years in NYC, in 2013, Jon moved to LA, where he began to write music for film and television. As a mixer, he works to maximize the creative intent of an artist by combining all of the elements, both creatively and technically. “I am the last pair of trusted ears,” he says. Jon has been nominated for a Grammy eight times and
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