Class of 1979 Newsletter
February
20th, 2005
Houston Here We Come!!
The 10th Brat Reunion is just around the corner! It will be in
Houston from May 26th–30th at the Doubletree Hotel Post Oak, a nice
hotel in a great area. It’s just a block from the Galleria.
The Arboretum and museum district are also nearby. The Doubletree
features two restaurants, a couple of bars, a fitness center and a
large pool. Rooms are $79 per night. Be sure to make your
reservation soon, as it’s filling up rapidly. You can reach the
Doubletree at (800) 245-7299.As an added treat, Amy Thompson-Steindorff has generously agreed to host our class dinner/party at her house on Saturday evening. Bruce Burgner and Donna Hendricks-Fontenot will be lending a helping hand. I’ve been to several parties at Amy’s. Her house is a great party place and she is a wajid zane host. This will be our best class party yet!
Class Notes
Dawn Tarr-O’Hara writes:
What have I been up to over the last two decades?
Let’s see: I attended 10th grade at Hawaii Prep. It was beautiful and I met a lot of great people. Still, it was hard being away from home at 15, so I went back to PA to live with my grandparents and finish high school.
I chose Boston University because I wanted to go to a big school. I wanted to major in biomedical engineering and they had a good engineering program. After one semester I changed to undecided. I went into education the following year. I transferred to Augustana in SD because my parents were divorcing and I felt like I should be with my mom. I lived at home that year.
I returned to BU the next year because my boyfriend was still there (bad move!). One semester of putting up with him and my roommate was enough to convince me to go elsewhere. Clarion University (in PA) had a good education program and my aunt (who’s only 9 mo. older than me) was nearby at the University of Pittsburgh at Titusville. I graduated with a degree in Special Education in 1987.
One of my aunt’s friends came from Philly and invited us down for a party in the summer of '86. I met Leo at her house. We had a long distance relationship until I graduated and moved to Philly the following year. We got married in 1992.
My first job out of college was at an institution for people with severe disabilities. There were children from 6 to 21 months old. It’s a tough place to start
a career. I spent the next five years teaching in a day training center in Williamstown, NJ, where I worked with children with severe disabilities.
In 1999, we adopted our son, Zachary. We have a wonderful, open relationship with his birthmother, grandmother, and aunt. In 2001, we moved to Ocean City, MD and I began teaching in an early intervention classroom in the public school.
In August, we adopted our son, Nathaniel. I continue to teach full-time and my husband works in a small plastics company in DE. Over the past few years, we’ve traveled to western PA to visit my Dad, Philly to visit Leo's family, and to Las Vegas to visit my mom.
Zachary, Leo, Nathaniel
and Dawn Tarr-O’Hara.
