Chapters

BOSTON

Reed on the Road hit Boston last December with a visit from Russian professor Lena Lencek giving her popular beach lecture in Cambridge. In January, Reedies celebrated the Chinese New Year with a dim sum brunch.

NEW YORK CITY

We celebrated Oktoberfest at one of the city's most authentic German pubs, and many members also turned out October 21 for Professor Lena Lencek's terrific "Reed on the Road" lecture on the cultural history of the beach. We scheduled our annual volunteer day for the New York Cares Gift Drive on December 12 and a wine tasting event on February 8. We also reprised our career initiative get-together on January 13, meeting at the beginning of Paideia to help current students, recent graduates, and area alumni make connections, offer advice and keep in touch as they navigate the New York job market.

Spring and summer plans include a picnic and tour of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and a minor league baseball outing. Contact Lauren Asher '95 at laurenasher@hotmail.com or Will Swarts '92 wswarts@ yahoo.com for information on upcoming events. The book club meets every other month. Contact Kees Schouten '98 at kschouten@gmail.com for information on our reading selection and meeting times.

PORTLAND

On the Sunday evening before fall-semester finals, a handful of alumni volunteers staged a "feeding frenzy." We fed somewhere between 50 and 70 students in front of the library. There was barbecuing from 7 p.m. to 1 a.m. (48 cheesburgers and 48 veggie burgers were served!). Rob Mack '93 manned the grills, Holly Hart '68 donated food from her restaurant (Old Wives' Tales), and other area alumni brought homemade goodies and snacks.

An event for new alumni is being planned for shortly after graduation and a number of other social events will be cropping up along the way. Check the Portland chapter website for details.

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

Watch the next edition for details about this year's picnic, probably in July or August. In the meantime, the book group continues to meet monthly, usually in the afternoon of the second Sunday. Alumni visiting from out of this area are invited to call ahead for particulars, read the book, and join the discussion. For further information call Robert Hadley '53 at 310/391-1427 or send email to BobPatHadley@aol.com.

WASHINGTON, D.C.

In mid-October, with just a few weeks to go in the presidential campaign, Reed on the Road brought Professor Paul Gronke, chair of the political science department, to talk about political forecasting models and their application to the 2004 election. About 25 alumni and friends gathered at the Monocle restaurant, a Capitol Hill institution, for a fascinating discussion about computer models, the purposes and uses of forecasting, and the world of political campaigns. Gronke's non-partisan prediction: "''W' is for Winner" (which we can now see confirms the 95-percent accuracy rate of said forecasting models).

On other fronts, the Oral History Project continues its work and is planning a celebration of completed histories later in the spring. A tour of the district's boundary stones is coming up, too – watch your mailbox and the chapter website for the announcement!