A difficult childhood and a learning disability led Thierry Senechal to turn away from academia at an early age. After traveling and working all over the world for several years, though, Senechal was ready to pursue an education in the United States where he discovered the School of General Studies. Senechal graduated from the School in 1992 and went on to devote his career to public service and humanitarian efforts through field work and the United Nations.
Opera and education have been two callings present in Fadel Friedlander-Fulkerson’s '14 life since she was a child in Louisville, Kentucky.
Before enrolling at the School of General Studies in 2002, the now-attorney was a high school dropout and troubled teen. After a life-altering experience, he sought help, earned his high school diploma at The John Dewey Academy, and found a new path.
At age 90, Miriam Kartch '70GS, '77GSAS, '80GSAS recounts her "several lives."
When John Cerrato '76, DMD, then 16, was serving as an orderly at Westchester Square Hospital, he watched a two-and-a-half-year old die in his arms, which was a serious blow to his thoughts of becoming a physician like his father and great uncle. Despite this traumatic experience, today, Cerrato is a top dentist in his field.
Edmund W. Pease has lived a double life since graduating from GS: He pursued careers as a management executive and as a visual artist, simultaneously, and has made his mark in both.
Born in Haiti and raised in Harlem, Rene Aubry has long been interested in "the different ways people could live, simply because of the different places they may have been born," he said.
In April, filmmaker Shawn Atkins was named a 2007 Guggenheim Fellow; the fellowship will support her work on The Broken Teacup, an adaptation of some of Franz Kafka’s short stories. Atkins also runs The House of Frame by Frame Fierce, Inc., a nonprofit organization dedicated to using animation as a form of artistic activism for at-risk youth.
Social gatherings are more than often fraught with cheerful greetings and ice-breaking questions such as: "What do you do?" or "Where do you work?" Gillian Hollenberg '94, known to her GS brethren as Gillian Wachsman, sampled many professions before choosing one tried and true: homemaker, or, to be politically correct, domestic engineer.