Alumni Mentors

Las Tortugas

Click on the name to see contact info and short bio for each mentor.

Team 1 - tor1@mit.edu - Bob Gurnitz and Jessica Lin

Team 2 - tor2@mit.edu - Bob Kusik and Jorge Ortiz and Arthur P. White

Team 3 - tor3@mit.edu - Sharon Wason and Marcelo Targino and Rogerio Mascarenhas

Team 4 - tor4@mit.edu - David Oka and John Schatz and John Goddard

Team 5 - tor5@mit.edu - Jeremy David and Danny Fain

Bob Gurnitz 1966 Course 10 PhD
Team 1
 
  email: RGurnitz@aol.com or rgurnitz@alum.mit.edu
       
 

Bob Gurnitz has been a mentor for several Missions.

Experience:
* 1997-2001 Envirosource, Inc., Horsham, PA - Chairman
* 1991-1997 Northwestern Steel and Wire Co., Sterling, IL - Chairman and CEO
* 1988-1991 Webcraft Technologies, Inc., N. Brunswick, NJ - President
* 1985-1988 Bethlehem Steel Corporation, Bethlehem, PA - President, Shape and Rail Products Division
* 1984-1985 Rockwell International Corporation, Troy, MI - Vice President/General Manager, On Highway Axle Division;
* 1980-1984 Rockwell International Corporation, London England and Troy, MI - President, Body Components Division; 1978-1980 Rockwell International Corporation, Troy, MI - Vice President/General Manager, Supply and Mass Transit Div.
* 1977-1978 Rockwell International Corporation, Troy, MI - Vice President, Business Development;
* 1974-1977 Rockwell International, Pittsburgh, PA Senior Engineering Executive, Corporate Staffs.
* 1973-1974 President's Executive Interchange Program U. S. Government, D.H.E.W., Washington, DC Director, Office of Management Technology
* 1966-1973 Rockwell International, Canoga Park, CA Manager, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Rocketdyne Div.

Education:
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA: S.B. 1960 Chemical Engineering; S.M. 1961 Chemical Engineering; Ph.D. 1966 Chemical Engineering
Hobbies include sailing, skiing, fishing, traveling, and reading


and

  Jessica Lin   1999, EE/CS, 6-2
  Team 1    
       
  Home Phone: 617-577-1102
       
  email: jessica.lin@alum.mit.edu
       
  Jessica Lin Spent a year abroad in Brazil. She has recently moved to the Cambridge area for a job with Capgemini, so she actually can meet students on the weekends or after work.

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  Bob Kusik   1970 SM in Course 6
  Team 2    
  Work Phone: 978.369.3240
       
  email: bkusik@alum.mit.edu
       
  Bob is especially interested in this year's topic. He's been diving on the barrier reef off Belize although he didn't go to the Blue Hole. This past winter he spent two weeks in the Galapagos. Previous trips have taken him to the Serengeti in Tanzania and the rain forests of Costa Rica. He likes to experience nature.

Bob is a retired software executive. His professional career has ranged from an information retrieval research project in the Electronics Systems Lab at MIT, to advanced development of online financial systems, to computer aided design of VLSI chips and computer systems, to nonlinear video editing systems, to telemedicine (plus a few more stops along the way). He received an SM in Course 6 in 1970.
He has also attended advanced management programs at Stanford and INSEAD.

He lives in Concord so interaction on campus or by eMail would be convenient for Bob.

and

  Jorge Ortiz   2003, SB in EECS (course 6)
  Team 2    
  Phone: 617-784-6550
       
  email: jortiz@alum.mit.edu
       
  Jorge Ortiz was born in Caracas, Venezuela. His family is mainly from the Caribbean cities of Barranquilla and Cartagena in Colombia. He has not been back to Venezuela since he was 2 years old, which is when they
moved to Queens, New York, where he was raised. He grew up in a housing project in Queens, so the environment was sometimes a bit rough, but hisparents always stressed the importance of education.

"I took an exam in the 8th grade and was accepted to the Bronx High School of Science, where I learned
about MIT and eventually applied and got in. At MIT, i majored in course 6-3 and graduated last year (June
2003). I now work as a software engineer for Oracle, in Burlington, but Ii'm in the process of applying for
my PhD in computer science starting next Fall. I enjoy watching baseball very much (I am a native New
Yorker, so I have been a Yankee fan my whole life). I grew up in New York City and went to the Bronx High
School of Science. I have traveled to several cities in the US. I have also visited Japan, Colombia (where
my family is from), Venezuela (where I was born), and I often go to Puerto Rico (to visit my fiancee's
family).

I'm best reached by email, but the students may contact me by phone or email."

Publications:

Jorge is currently working on an article for Dr. Dobb's Journal, but as an undergraduate he wrote a paper for a student conference. http://sow.csail.mit.edu/2002/proceedings/oritz.pdf

EXPERIENCE:

Oracle Corporation;Enterprise Planning and Budgeting (John Clark, Manager; Denise Wang, Mentor) Burlington, MA9/03-present

Charles River Analytics;Karen Harper and Sean Guarino Cambridge, MA6/03-9/03

MIT Laboratory for Computer Science- Oxygen Research Group;Professor Larry Rudolph Cambridge, MA 9/00-6/03

International Business Machines (IBM) T.J. Watson Research Center; Collaborative User Experience Group (CUE)- Dr. Li-Te Cheng Cambridge, MA 5/02-8/02

Merrill Lynch Technology Group-Technology Infrastructure Services- Network Services Group (TIS-NS)Corporate and Institutional Client Group Desktop Engineering (CDE) New York, NY 5/01 – 8/01 6/00 – 8/00

MIT Media Laboratory- Personal Information Architecture Group; Professor Michael Hawley Cambridge, MA 1/00 – 5/00

and

  Arthur P. White   2001 Ph.D Geology
  Team 2    
  Phone: 212-446-7183
       
  email: arthur_white@mckinsey.com
       
 

I received my PhD in Geology from MIT in 2001, where I was a student of Kip Hodges studying the extensional evolution of the East Greenland Caledonides. Since that time, I have been working at McKinsey,
where I am an Engagement Manager serving Fortune 500 companies as a Management Consultant. I work primarily in the healthcare sector with pharmaceutical and medical device companies helping them to deconstruct and problem solve their complex strategic and tactical issues. Having been a TA for Solving Complex Problems Mission 2004 (the first mission), I am excited to be able to help the students in any way in this new mission.

Arthur P. White
McKinsey & Company, Inc. United States
55 East 52nd Street, 21st Floor, New York, NY 10055

Tel: 212-446-7183, Fax: 212-891-4647, Mobile: 917-566-2592

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  Sharon Wason   1979 SB Course 4
  Team 3    
  Work Phone: (781) 784-5691
       
  Home Phone: (508) 668-5134
       
  email: swason@massaudubon.org, swason@alum.mit.edu
       
  Sharon Wason is the director of Advocacy for the southeast region for the Massachusetts Audubon Society, the largest conservation organization in New England. Previously, she was employed over twenty years as a city planner with local, regional, and state government. Educated at MIT in Architecture and Tufts in Urban and Environmental Policy, she is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners and has served on her local Planning Board and Sewer and Water Commission and is presently a member of the MBTA Advisory Board.

and

  Marcelo Targino   1997 Course 4 SB, Harvard School of Public health
  Team 3    
  Work Phone: cell 617-233-6583
       
  Home Phone: 617-441-6226
       
  email: targino@alum.mit.edu or marcelo_targino@hms.harvard.edu
       
 

Marcelo is currently an Occupational and Environmental Medicine resident at the Harvard School of Public health. Prior to this he trained in Internal Medicine at Cambridge Hospital. He is interested in researching the health consequences of architectural design, indoor air quality issues, and how toxins and poisons disperse themselves in the environment.
He completed medical school at USF in Tampa Florida, and finished MIT with an SB in Architectural Design (course 4) in 1997. He was born in Brazil and he speaks Portuguese and Spanish.

Best way to reach Marcelo: Text page. Go to www.arch.com Enter: 617-546-0522, type short message
Second best way: cell 617-233-6583 Third best way: home 617-441-6226

and

  Rogerio Mascarenhas   2002 MBA Sloan
  Team 3    
  Work Phone: (617) 753-2177
       
       
  email: Rogerio_Mascarenhas@mckinsey.com
       
  Rogerio Mascarenhas is an associate with McKinsey&Company. Rogerio is a Sloan MBA (class of 2002) and holds a bachelor degree in Mechanical Engineering from Univesidade Federal da Bahia, Brazil. Working with Mckinsey, Rogerio has served clients from a variety of industries from asset managers to retail and basic materials. In a recent study, McKinsey helped a large Brazilian industrial conglomerate to pursue growth options in other emerging markets (e.g., China, India and Russia).

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David Oka 1978, combined SB and SM in course 6A in 1980, (Electrical
Engineering with the Co-op option).
Team 4
 
Home Phone: 508-277-3868
     
  email: oka@alum.mit.edu or oka@charter.net
       
  David Oka has been to the Galapagos on an MIT Alumni sponsored cruise with his family. They spent 11 days in Ecudor, 7 days on a tour of the Galapagos. David thought it was awesome. They toured aboard a large boat and went on Ecuadorian naturalist led hikes twice a day. The best parts were the unstructured snorkeling that they let them do. The sea life was awesome.
His work is in the area of Semiconductor testing and he worked for Alex d'Arbeloff's company Teradyne right out of college. He bounced from one ATE company to another and he is currently starting up his own.

His hobbies are outdoor oriented. He likes to rock climb, mountain bike and skiing in the winter. He usually gets out climbing and/or biking once a week in the summer time. He goes on family ski trips in the winter. He likes to combine travel with his sports and has climbed and skied throughout the US and a couple of trips to the Alps.

David can be involved via phone, email or meeting as he lives in Southborough MA.

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John Schatz  
Team 4
 
Phone: 858 792-7410
     
  email: jschatz@jfsrc.com
       
  John Schatz is located in San Diego
JFSR&C
858 792-7410 (office)
760 473-8843 (cell)
866 848-7496 (fax)

and

John Goddard 1964 S.B. Chemistry (MIT)
Team 4
 
Home phone: 716-773-6252
     
  email: J.Goddard@worldnet.att.net
       
  John has a B.S. Chemistry degree (1964) from MIT and Ph.D. Inorganic Chem. (1969) from Northwestern U., Evanston, Illinois. From 1968-1985 he worked for Union Carbide Metals Div. in Niagara Falls, NY on inorganic chemistry and extractive metallurgy research. In 1985, he transferred to the Linde Div. of Union Carbide in Tonawanda, NY, where he managed the gas analytical services lab for 8 years, then returned to
individual researcher on analysis and purification of their products used in the Electronics area. In 1992, Linde Div. became Praxair, Inc., a company independent of Union Carbide. He is still employed there.

The best way to reach him is by home email. You can also reach me at work, 716-879-7216, or at home, 716-773-6252. John's daughter Laura also was with us on that trip, and she now has a B.A. and Ph.D. in entomology (Cornell U. and UC-Davis) and works at NIH. Since hers is a degree at least in the biological sciences, she has offered to help as well, but for now, her input will be channeled through John.

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  Jeremy David   1999 SM, Chemical Engineering Course 10
2000 SM, Technology and Policy.
  Team 5    
   
  email: jeremie_david@yahoo.com
       
 

Jeremy has enjoyed being a mentor last year on Mission 2007 and would like to do it again. In addition, he has just visited Ecuador in April, and while Jeremy has not been to the Galapagos, he has heard enough about it to make it his next trip!

Preferred communication - email. Jeremy works on emerging markets for Capital One, based in London.
Hobbies include traveling, hiking, and flying airplanes.


and
  Danny Fain   1999 SB, Geoscience
  Team 5    
   
  home: 781-373-2407
  email: dannyf@alum.mit.edu
       
 

Danny is a course 12 alum (SB 1999, Geoscience). Since graduating, he has been working as a science and math teacher at various schools in the Boston area. Currently Danny is starting his third year as a science teacher (grades 8-11) at the Learning Prep School, an independent school in Newton for
kids with learning disabilities. He was originally in the MIT class of 1987; after a few turbulent years, he took a leave of absence to work as a software engineer in the CAD/CAM field, and returned in 1998 to complete his degree.


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