Sagolla graduated from Swarthmore with a degree in English Literature and later obtained a Masters in Education from Harvard. He has contributed to Macromedia Studio, Adobe Creative Suite, and Odeo. Currently, he works at DollarApp, an iPhone app development company.

President Rebecca Chopp

She shared that experiencing other people's passions is one of the great joys of her job as president and she celebrated the accomplishments of several alumni she's met since joining the Swarthmore community. President Chopp also suggested that students might learn from the faculty's life experiences, when she said "even as you study the subjects that the faculty teach you, study the faculty as exemplars of passionate living."

In more than a dozen future events, and in general, she adds she is "particularly eager to gain insight into which aspects of the Swarthmore experience should endure; what values we most treasure; and how those values can help shape our decisions as we look forward to the future together."

Peggy Seeger was a special guest at Swarthmore's 2009 Alumni Weekend. She gave a talk titled "Scalpels or Sledgehammers? Music as a Tool for Activism." Her visit was organized by Swarthmore Folk, a group of alumni interested in carrying forward the tradition of folk music on the campus.

Currently a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a professor at Georgetown University, Rivlin is the founding director of the Congressional Budget Office and is an expert on urban issues as well as fiscal, monetary, and social policy. She has served as the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget in the first Clinton Administration and as vice chair of the Federal Reserve Board .

The Bernie Saffran Lecture is named for an economics professor who taught and mentored generations of Swarthmore students until his death in 2004.

"Tonight," she added, "we induct you into the Swarthmorean tradition of minding the light: critical thinking, questioning your own judgment and that of others, being skeptical but not cynical, taking risks in your exploration of the arts, sciences, humanities, and social sciences, and participating vigorously in this intensely scholarly community."

Joining President Chopp at the event were Reid Wilkening '10, sociology professor Sarah Willie-LeBreton, and Acting Dean Garikai Campbell '90.

Reid, a biology and history major from Denver, Colo., is an RA and a member of the Student Health Advisory Council. As captain of the men's swimming team, he was named to last season's Centennial Conference Academic Honor Roll. Last fall, he also helped bring Broken Social Scene and RJD2 to campus as chair of the Large Scale Events committee.

After an introduction by Sven-David Udekwu '09, Professor of Spanish Aurora Camacho de Schmidt delivered the Last Collection on May 30, 2009. Speakers at this address, an assembly-style gathering, are chosen by the senior class.

Morgan, Sarah Lawrence Lightfoot Professor Emerita of History, was the first African American professor at the College, and the first African American woman to be granted tenure. She is the author of Children of Strangers, the first work of African American family folklore by a folklorist.

Orchestra 2001 will honor President Al Bloom at the world premiere, taking place Fri., Feb. 6, at Philadelphia's Kimmel Center. A second performance will take place in Lang Concert Hall on Sun., Feb. 8.

Woo is a professor of economics at the University of California at Davis, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington D.C., and the director of the East Asia Program within the Earth Institute at Columbia University. An expert on the East Asian economies, particularly China, Indonesia and Malaysia, he has advised the U.S. Treasury Department, the IMF, World Bank, and the United Nations.

Hughes joined the public policy faculty of Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School at the age of 25, then later taught public policy at Penn's Fels Institute, Harvard's Kennedy School, and at Swarthmore College. He has been a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute and his research has appeared in the leading journals of several academic disciplines, including the Journal of Urban Economics, Political Science Quarterly, Economic Geography, Journal of the American Planning Association, and Urban Studies.

In the 2008 Bernie Saffran Lecture, Michael Greenstone '91 provides estimates on the impact of climate change on mortality in the US and India. He also presents estimates of the costs of the adaptations that people will undertake to protect themselves against the health risks posed by climate change and finally, he analyzes the implications for climate policy.

Michael Greenstone '91 is the 3M Professor of Environmental Economics in the Department of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also is a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and a Nonresident Senior Fellow at Brookings.

At First Collection, held in the Scott Outdoor Amphitheater, each new class is welcomed to campus by members of the Swarthmore community.  After an introduction from President Bloom, political scientist Rick Valelly '75 welcomed the Class of 2012 by sharing the prophecy, and caution, he brought with him to Swarthmore when he transferred to the College, why he was and remains so happy here, and his top 10 list of things to do that he says will guarantee their happiness as undergraduates. Valelly joined Jess Engebretson '09 at this annual event.

In her welcome to the Class of 2012,  encouraged them to reach out to each other and search out their different gifts.  "But keep in mind that the rest of us will also be learning from you," she said.  "You are going to enrich this campus with your humor, your compassion, your curiosity.  We are so glad that each of you is here."

Engrebretson, an English literature major from Washington, D.C., is a senior producer at War News Radio who worked this summer for the ENOUGH Project, which works to end genocide and crimes against humanity.  She was followed at the podium by political scientist Rick Valelly '75.

"Honoring Our Changing Stories"

In her address at Alumni Weekend, environmental lawyer and award-winning author Rishi Reddi '88 spoke about "honoring change in our lives," including examples from the College's history in which students "challenged this school to live up to the ideals of its Quaker founders."

Rishi Reddi was born in Hyderabad, India, and grew up in England and the United States. Her book Karma and Other Stories, published by ecco/ HarperCollins in April 2007, received the 2008 L.L. Winship/PEN New England Awar and one of those stories, "Justice Shiva Ram Murthy," appeared in Best American Short Stories 2005.

Writing is only one of Rishi's professional paths. She earned her law degree from Northeastern University in 1992 and, having been interested in nature and the environment for years, became an environmental attorney for Massachusetts.

Rishi continues her dual pursuit of law and literature, working part-time for the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection and writing a historical novel based on the first South Asians who moved to Southern California in the 1910s. Rishi also serves on the board of South Asian Americans Leading Together, a national, non-profit organization dedicated to fostering an environment in which all South Asians in America can participate fully in civic and political life, and have influence over policies that affect them.

Lok Siu, associate professor of anthropology and Asian/Pacific/American studies, New York University

In her talk, Lok Siu proposes an approach to Asian American studies that examines more fully the extent to which hemispheric dynamics and processes link the experiences of Asians across the Americas. Siu, author of the award-winning Memories of a Future Home: Diasporic Citizenship of Chinese in Panama, argues that adopting this approach will inevitably transform the historiography of Asian America and will bring Asian American studies into productive dialogue with fields such as Latin American studies, Canadian studies, and American studies. Siu is introduced by Assistant Professor of English Literature Bakirathi Mani.

The Genevieve Ching-wen Lee '96 Memorial Lecture was established in 1996 by her family to promote awareness of and research on Asian American issues. Each year the College welcomes to campus a leading scholar in the field.

The environmental and social impact a business has on the world around it is a rapidly growing source of competitive advantage. CEOs of some of the world's leading companies are now tackling global challenges such as climate change and the widening rich-poor gap, not as cost constraints but as business opportunities. Based on his new book, Sustainable Value, published by Stanford University Press in February 2008, Chris Laszlo '80 discusses sustainability-driven business leadership and emerging sustainability practices based on case studies at DuPont, Wal-Mart and other global industry leaders.