Last week, a group of young alumni were invited back to campus to speak on a professional panel for current Tulane liberal arts majors, co-hosted by the School of Liberal Arts and NTC Career Services. The five panelists all graduated within the last five years and now work in a range of industries and professions, including publishing, consulting, solar energy, marketing, and operations. 

The panel highlighted its breadth of represented majors and minors at Tulane — Environmental Studies, Classical Studies, English, Communication, Economics, Philosophy, Spanish, and the Strategy, Leadership & Analytics Minor (SLAM), and Political Science — and how studying these disciplines had informed their individual career pathways thus far. The discussion provided students with advice on leveraging soft and hard skills alike to navigate their early postgrad years, and stressed the importance of strategic networking and seeking out internships.

Conceived as an opportunity for School of Liberal Arts students to gain career insights, the event was moderated by H. Andrew Schwartz (A&S ’90), who graduated from Tulane's School of Arts & Sciences with a Political Science degree, and is now leading a think tank as the Chief Communications Officer at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. 

Schwartz asked each panelist about their own trajectories, highlights and challenges, and addressed his executive words of wisdom to current students. “The difference between those of us who are working and those of us who are not working is literally night and day. So what can you do outside of that job to also be strategically thinking about the next thing?" 

Enthusiasm and stepping up when given the opportunity to learn more were both also emphasized by the speakers. "Employers love young people who are happy to be there, who put their nose to the grindstone and try to master whatever it is they are doing," noted Schwartz. This willingness to adapt and explore added responsibilities was underscored by Ishanya Narang (SLA '20) who started at the ground level at GRUBBR and held roles in marketing and PR before being offered her current job of Director of Communications & Implementation at the start up

Following the discussion, some audience questions allowed for group feedback and closing thoughts from each of the panelists, before an informal networking session where students spoke with panelists one-on-one, putting the evening’s advice into practice.

Highlighting Young Alumni’s Journeys

The panel showcased the varied trajectories, demonstrating how a liberal arts degree often opens unexpected doors across industries.

• Sophia Gutierrez (SLA ’22): With a Classical Studies degree and a Master’s in English, Gutierrez credited a summer publishing course and making connections while interviewing for helping her land her sales associate role at Simon & Schuster. “Make sure you're being kind to people along the way," she reminded students, as she described having been referred to her current supervisor by a previous interviewer upon whom she had made a strong impression, despite not being selected for that role. 
   
• Sahil Inaganti (SLA ’23): Now working in mergers and acquisitions at Nexamp, a solar energy company, Inaganti emphasized how his multiple majors — Environmental Studies, Political Economy, and Public Health — shaped his flexibility and approach to working. “I benefited from taking a variety of classes,” he explained, noting the importance of a broad perspective and maintaining hobbies to keep oneself actively engaged and interesting. He also shared that his strategy at any new job was to leverage his own inexperience, making a point of asking questions and learning as much as he could from the start.
   
• Charles Lieberman (SLA ’22): As a consultant at Deloitte, Lieberman’s background in Economics and Philosophy have been invaluable. He shared how interpreting Socrates’ texts sharpened his critical thinking skills, now making complex business documents seem straightforward. “The nature of a liberal arts education is fluid and exploratory,” he said. “Curiosity has been my biggest strength in my current job.” 
   
• Stashia Thomson (SLA ’23): Now in a dual role across sales and marketing at Atomic Black Spirits and The Drinkable Company, Thomson emphasized how her Spanish minor augmented her social skills, giving her a “touchpoint to connect with people.” She encouraged students to start networking early, sharing her belief in building connections to achieve career success, and learning about her audience both before and during sales meetings.
   
• Ishanya Narang (SLA ’20): Working as Director of Communications & Implementation at GRUBBRR, Narang discussed the importance of pursuing independent ventures. “One thing liberal arts students shouldn’t shy away from is entrepreneurship,” she asserted. “There’s no better way to control what you want to do than doing your own thing. We have good cultural and social understanding of problems — in a way that sometimes other degrees may lack — so having that cohesive education gives you a very good perspective on what really matters.”

Liberal Arts as the Foundation of Success

Each panelist underscored how their humanities and social sciences studies have been integral to their early career outcomes. From critical thinking to creativity, debate, adaptability, and constant curiosity, they proudly identified themselves as chameleons and high-achievers whose potential was only starting to really show.

Gutierrez humorously, yet profoundly, summed up a common misconception about college majors: “Oh, what are you going to do with an English degree, read a book? But that’s exactly what I do for my job every day — that is a profession, in fact.” Lieberman added, “I think the nature of a liberal arts education instills a very deep sense of curiosity. And when I apply that to my actual job, I would argue that curiosity has been my biggest strength.”

Tactics for Students

The importance of internships and networking in opening doors to career opportunities was persistent throughout the evening. Schwartz, drawing from his own experiences, emphasized that internships help position students to be “in the right place at the right time.” Narang added, “Once your foot is in that door, how do you make the most out of that opportunity?”

Thomson encouraged students to start building connections early, while Lieberman and Inaganti highlighted cross-industry communication as tools for growth. The panel’s practical focus resonated with students in attendance, who lingered to connect with the alumni during the post-panel networking session. This format for asking questions, exchanging ideas, and building relationships helped bridge the gap between education and career success.

Reflecting on the event, Lieberman offered an apt summary: “With the School of Liberal Arts, your options are unlimited. Maybe there’s less structure — but there’s more opportunity.”

Panelists answer questions from the audience during the Young Alumni Perspectives discussion.

Exceptional works of art, literature, and scholarship from our Liberal Arts community receive recognition on the global stage.

Assistant Professor of English Karisma Price has won the 2025 Whiting Award in Poetry, one of the most prestigious prizes recognizing emerging writers in the United States. Whiting Awards are presented annually to 10 exceptional emerging writers in fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama. Each winner receives $50,000 in recognition of early accomplishment and the promise of outstanding future work.

The selection committee writes about Price and her work, “The poems of Karisma Price are songs, howls, portraits, critiques; they move nimbly between the narrative and the lyric. Price bends form and time, bringing together unexpected interlocutors to make sense of what cannot make sense — but the effort is sanctifying. Her architecture surprises; full of rhythm and light, it houses steady compassion alongside flashes of violence. The reader feels the necessity of the work and, held by Price, rises to meet it.”

A native New Orleanian, Price is a poet, screenwriter, media artist, and the author of the debut collection I’m Always So Serious (Sarabande Books, 2023), a New York Times Editor’s Choice.

Anthropology Professor Christopher B. Rodning has received the 2025 Presidential Recognition Award for service to the Society for American Archaeology (SSA). The award recognizes Rodning’s work as a “highly responsive, effective, and forward-thinking” editor of the SAA Archaeological Record, which he has been editing since 2019; as the successful book review editor of American Antiquity since 2018; and as co-organizer of the President's Forum at SAA 2024; among other roles. The award will be presented at SSA's annual meeting in Denver at the end of April.
 

Assistant Professor of Economics Patrick Testa is the recipient of two highly competitive grants for his study entitled: “The Geography of Race and Ethnicity in the United States: Uncovering a Hidden History of Expulsion and Exclusion.” Patrick and co-authors won a National Science Foundation (NSF) and a Russell Sage Foundation (RSF) grant. The funding will support their research using cutting-edge techniques from large language models to identify episodes of local forced migration in U.S. history, between 1850 and 1950, including the individuals and groups affected by them.
 

French Professor Fayçal Falaky will join the National Humanities Center 2025 Residency, a program designed to provide scholarly resources and promote the knowledge and deeper understanding in all areas of the humanities. Falaky is a specialist in 18th-century French literature, culture, and politics.
 

Karrie Gaspard-Hogewood has won the 2025 Wilbur Award of Merit by the Religion Communicators Council for the podcast "Spirit & Power: Charismatics & Politics in American Life.” Gaspard-Hogewood is a Sociology Doctoral Fellow and Social Policy Adjunct Professor.
 

Lindsey Cliff (SLA ‘25), a fourth-year Honors student, has been selected to participate in the Spring Research Symposium at the Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia at NYU — an honor granted to only 19 undergraduate students nationwide. As a double major in International Relations and Political Economy with a minor in Russian, Cliff will present her research on how Russian-led organizations shape narratives about the post-Soviet region, often marginalizing the voices of non-Russian communities.
 

Newcomb Dance Company members Madeline Lorio (SLA ‘25) and Amalia Nájera (SLA ‘25) performed their original piece Tethered at the American College Dance Association Mid-Atlantic Conference in March and were one of three pieces selected to be performed at the ACDA’s National College Dance Festival in May. This is the first time the high honor has been awarded to Tulane University dancers. 
 

March 2025

Exceptional works of art, literature, and scholarship from our Liberal Arts community receive recognition on the global stage.

Brandon Davis, an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science and the Murphy Institute, has received a $50,000 Institute for Human Studies Faculty Fellowship. Davis’ research focuses on American and Race politics and normative and empirical approaches to institutions, representation, and criminal justice. This sabbatical funding goes towards his project, Audemus Jura Nostra Defendere: We Dare Defend Our Rights Strategic Legal Mobilization and the Alabama Democratic Conference.

The Renaissance Society of America recently awarded Professor of Practice Alexis Culotta a 2025 RSA-Samuel H. Kress Research Fellowship in Renaissance Art History. One of only a few recipients for this highly competitive award, Culotta will use this fellowship to continue work on data collection and curation with a focus on work of artists active between the 16th and 17th centuries in the Viceroyalty of New Spain. This work is in relation to her larger digital humanities initiative to build the Artistic Network Toolkit (ANT) with Co-PI (and fellow Tulane faculty member) Aron Culotta and their research team.

Fan Zhang, assistant professor in the Newcomb Art Department & Asian Studies Program, has been awarded a Mellon Fellowship for Assistant Professors from the Institute of Advanced Study (IAS). With support form the Andrew Mellon Foundation, the School of Historical Studies at the IAS chooses three assistant professors per year to welcome as members to the institution and to grant a $40,000 stipend in support of their scholarly work. The fellowship was awarded for Zhang’s research project, A Center on the Border: Migrations, Identities, and Cross-Cultural Encounters in Fifth-Century North China, on the understudied scholarship of 5th century Chinese art.

A film by New Orleans-based stage director Natasha Ramer, with editing and cinematography by Department of Theatre & Dance Professor Antony Sandoval, and starring Tulane Theatre alum Erin Cessna, has been sweeping the festival circuit, winning awards and garnering glowing reviews. Oleksandra Basco’s A Non Fiction War adapts the real-time war diary of the Ukrainian writer into theatrical script for the stage and screen. It won 2024 Best Experimental Film at the London Women Film Festival, Berlin Women Film Festival, Santa Barbara International Movie Awards, Los Angeles Movie & Music Video Awards, and received many other awards.

Cheryl Narumi Naruse, an associate professor of English, received the 2025 Outstanding Achievement Book Award by the Association for Asian American Studies (AAAS) for her book Becoming Global Asia: Contemporary Genres of Postcolonial Capitalism in Singapore. Winner in the Literary Studies category, Naruse’s work explores the “soft power” and cultural capital of neoimperialist Singapore through a literary lens, as she examines the work in genres like literary anthologies, coming-of-career narratives, and princess fantasies. This is her first book.

Belinda Andrews-Smith, former Musical Theatre director and visiting assistant professor in the Theatre and Dance Department, won the 2024 American Prize in the Musical/Theatre division, for stage directing her production of The Mystery of Edwin Drood. A musical theatre adaptation of Dickens’ last and unfinished work, Andrews-Smith staged the play in the 2023 theatre season while at Tulane.

A composition by Music Professor Barbara Jazwinski has recently been selected by the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM) for performance at the ISCM World New Music Days 2025 in Portugal. Jazwinski serves as the head of the Composition Program for the Newcomb Department of Music and is an internationally-recognized performer, conductor, and promoter of contemporary music. Her composition Soliloquy was chosen by an international jury, including composers and conductors from 18 countries. ICSM consists of members from more than 60 organizations in over 50 countries, and has been promoting and advancing contemporary music since 1922. This year’s festival will take place at the end of May in Lisbon and Porto.

AJ Golio, a doctoral candidate of Sociology in the City, Culture, and Community Program, received the 2025 Best Article in the Journal of Race, Ethnicity and the City Award for his paper ”What makes gentrification ‘white’? Theorizing the mutual construction of whiteness and gentrification in the urban US.” The annual award was selected from an array of international articles published in Volume 4 (2023) and Volume 5 (2024) of the journal, and the award recognizes an article for its particularly outstanding contribution to the field of urban affairs.

Nick Chapoy, PhD candidate in Biological Anthropology, along with Kathy Jack, professor of Anthropology and associate dean for Research and Graduate Programs, have been awarded a $30,000 grant from the National Science Foundation for Doctoral Dissertation Research: Vocal Communication and Dominance Rank in a Non-Human Primate. The doctoral research project combines behavioral observations, acoustic analyses, and hormone assays to asses the link between vocal communication, hormone levels, and social rank in non-human primates. Prior to joining the PhD program, Chapoy served as a field assistant for the Santa Rosa Primate Project, a long-term research site co-directed by Jack on the northwest coast of Costa Rica.

On Friday, February 13, Tulane Green Wave Football Head Coach Jon Sumrall spoke to Economics and SLAM Professor of Practice Marcus Coleman’s Principles of Leadership SLAM 3010 course. Throughout the course, students assess their own leadership capabilities through the study and understanding of leadership theory, and the different styles and characteristics of proven leaders like Sumrall. Sumrall spoke about his experiences as a coach and the values he believes define a good leader. He shared his personal leadership philosophy, emphasizing the importance of leading by example, fostering accountability, and developing a strong work ethic. “A leader doesn’t look to be served; a leader looks at how they can serve,” he told the class.

Prior to taking the head coach position at Tulane, Sumrall was the head coach at Troy University. During his time there, he boasted a 23-4 record and led the Trojans to two Sun Belt Conference championships. In his first season with the Green Wave, Sumrall guided the football team to a 9-5 record and their third consecutive conference championship game appearance.

Sumrall outlined the four core values that define his football program — attitude, toughness, discipline, and love — and explained how integral these values are to shape both his players, and current and emerging leaders. He continually stressed that leadership starts with self-discipline and high character. “Thoughts lead to actions, actions lead to habits, habits lead to character, and character is everything,” he shared. He also highlighted the importance of mental toughness, noting that “Success isn’t just about physical endurance but about perseverance and having a growth mindset — embracing challenges, learning from feedback, and celebrating others’ success rather than feeling threatened into a scarcity mindset about it.” On the value of discipline, he emphasized, “Discipline is not something that somebody does to you; it’s something you do for yourself. It’s an investment for the future.” Finally, he defined love as genuine care for teammates, emphasizing the importance of building strong, meaningful connections. “Love always demands sacrifice,” he explained, reinforcing that true leadership involves putting others before oneself.

A leader doesn’t look to be served; a leader looks at how they can serve.

– Coach Jon Sumrall

Sumrall’s genuine and hard-learned insights reinforced key learning objectives of the SLAM Program. His leadership philosophy, with its emphasis on mental toughness and discipline, tied into the core of leadership concepts and practices. Furthermore, his reflections on leadership within the evolving landscape of college football, and how he adapts along with it in the culture he creates for his players, provided insight into critical perspectives on business, industries, and society in a manner catered towards the SLAM pathway of helping students connect leadership to larger markets. A student in attendance remarked, “Hearing Coach Sumrall talk about leadership in a high-pressure setting like college football really reinforced what we’ve learned in class for values based active and balanced leadership.” His visit demonstrated how the SLAM Program truly equips students with real-world leadership skills, reinforcing that leadership isn’t about authority — it’s about positive influence, service, evolution, and the ability to inspire and elevate those around you.

Sumrall speaks with students after his guest lecture for Professor of Practice Marcus Coleman’s Principles of Leadership class.

As arts students, one of the most meaningful experiences of learning and growth occurs when given the chance to hear from and work with experienced artists and learn from their wisdom. On Tuesday, February 11, and Thursday, February 13, students from the Newcomb Department of Music and the Department of Theatre & Dance got this opportunity in the form of a master class with Tony Award winner John Cameron Mitchell. Laura London Wagner, assistant professor in the Newcomb Department of Music, hosted the event.

John Cameron Mitchell is most famous for his work as the writer, director, and star of the rock musical-turned-movie Hedwig and the Angry Inch, which radically tackles queerness and identity. Throughout the sessions, Mitchell answered students’ questions about his work, beliefs, and passions, and were then given the chance to workshop performances with him personally. Throughout this process, students were inspired by his intense passion for the arts, identity, and New Orleans.

During the first day’s Q+A session, Mitchell answered questions that students prepared, all while sharing stories of his experiences as a performer, director, and artist. He encouraged students to explore all the realms of creativity they could, advising them to never turn down an opportunity due to “fear of the unknown,” which he described as the things that often end up leading to the most growth in one’s life. It was inspiring to see Mitchell’s way of pushing boundaries and not letting negative reactions stop him from creating. He is extremely passionate about the importance of encouraging creative growth rather than criticizing or limiting ideas, a philosophy he takes into every project he does.

I thought that he really found physical ways to make actors open up to what they were singing about.

– Eliza Mullins (SLA ’26), student participant

The second day of the master class was more intimate, and five students performed for Mitchell and received feedback. This process was educational for both those watching and those performing. “I thought that he really found physical ways to make actors open up to what they were singing about,” described one student, as she recounted watching the performances, “as well as just opening up their voice more.” In many of the scenes, Mitchell would give actors physical props to use, allowing students to get out of their heads and create more vivid story imagery for themselves and their audience.

As both a performer and a writer, so many of Mitchell’s stories and workshop moments resonated with me. His encouragement to write down story ideas as they come to you — advice he shared as he explained his own creative process — has already started to shape my own process as a storyteller. His emphasis on visualizing the story one is telling in their head as they are performing has helped me as I perform my own songs and scenes. Overall, this experience was extremely beneficial for me and the other students and faculty who were able to attend, and, if anything, it has solidified the need for artists to learn from other artists as they continue to grow in their craft.
 

John Cameron Mitchell poses for a group photo with students from his master class, hosted by Musical Theatre Professor Laura London Wagner (far right).