CMC Conversations

In this episode of CMC Conversations, host Parishi Kanuga ’26 sits down with Professor of Religious Studies Esther Chung-Kim to unpack some of today’s most complex societal issues. Moving past "the danger of a single story," Professor Chung-Kim explains how looking at problems through multiple vantage points is essential for tackling contemporary challenges—from inequities in healthcare...

During CMC’s Alumni Weekend 2025, members of the Class of 1980 gathered for their 45th reunion. As the first four-year graduating class after the College adopted co-education in the fall of 1976, CMC Magazine asked six 1980 classmates—four women and two men—to join us for a campus conversation to reflect on the history of the landmark year, focusing on their arrival to then-Claremont Men’s College...

Just days before they walk across the Commencement stage, our beloved senior podcast hosts, Parishi Kanuga ’26 and Natalie Chen ’26, settled into our studio —this time as interviewees. A full-circle moment. Hosted by Lena Ciganer-Albeniz ’29, this special episode is a heartfelt reflection on the Claremont McKenna Collegeexperience. From the 'summer camp' feeling of freshman year to the intellectua...

President Hiram Chodosh has spent 13 years leading ClaremontMcKenna College by asking one question above all others: What are we here to do? In this special episode of CMC Conversations — recorded inpartnership with CMC Leads — Parishi Kanuga ‘26 sits down with President Chodosh to explore what responsible leadership actually looks like in practice: not the professional title, not the authority, b...

For 13 years, Priya Junnar has led the intellectual heart of Claremont McKenna College as the fifth director of the Marian Miner Cook Athenaeum — one of higher education's most distinctive speaker series, where students, faculty, staff, and a spectrum of luminaries gather around a dinner table to wrestle with the essential ideas of our time.   In this episode, host Natalie Chen ’26 sits down with...

What does it look like to build a career by running toward something — not away from it? Jennie Kung ’04 has spent her career crossing sectors that most people never imagine connecting: capital markets, Deloitte Consulting, Disney Imagineers, Johnson & Johnson, UCLAHealth, and now the Mayo Clinic, where she leads one of the most distinctive healthcare innovation platforms in the world. In this...

What does it take to manage travel and logistics for one of the world's most famous baseball teams for over a quarter-century? In this episode, Parishi Kanuga ’26 sits down with Scott Akasaki '98, Senior Director of Team Travel for the Los Angeles Dodgers, to explore the "unseen" side of leadership. Scott shares how a homesick study abroad trip to Japan planted a seed that grew i...

In this episode hosted by Natalie Chen ’26, Professor Steven Zhou elucidates how his work offers us new ways to observe, quantify, and study leadership. By observing human behavior in various contexts, such as in escape rooms, Professor Zhou argues that we can develop innovative, data-driven approaches to analyzing leadership. He offers us a glimpse into the research he and his students engage in...

In this episode of CMC Conversations, host Parishi Kanuga ’26 sits down with Podlich Family Professor of Government and George R. Roberts Fellow Hilary Appel to discuss the ongoing geopolitical complexities of the Russia-Ukraine war. Professor Appel shares her unique perspective on the "phantom limb" rhetoric of the Kremlin, the systemic shifts she witnessed at the end of the Cold War, a...

In this episode of CMC Conversations, Parishi Kanuga ’26 speaks with Professor Nishant Dass, Charles M. Stone Professor of Finance and Director of the Financial Economics Institute at CMC. They discuss how technology and AI are reshaping finance, from payments to investment banking, and how CMC is adapting its curriculum to prepare students for a rapidly changing world. The conversation also highl...

Natalie Chen ’26 sits with Professor Amy Kind to discuss the importance of maintaining and developing our imagination in everyday life. Professor Kind addresses imagination as a human necessity, the ability of AI to imagine, and imagination’s connection to our sense of meaning and purpose in life. She also shares the impactful work she does both in the classroom, and as the director of the Gould C...

Join Professor Albert L. Park and Natalie Chen ’26 as they discuss Professor Park’s multidisciplinary expertise in the environment, Korean history, and Japanese history. In this episode, Professor Park discusses how change can stem from a social and cultural point, rather than a political one. He surveys the impact that can come to pass locally, rather than politically, and brings us into the work...

Parishi Kanuga ’26 sits down with Ella Brissett ’25, tennis athlete and president and founder of The Claremont Women Empowerment in Sports Club, and Erica Perkins Jasper, William B. Arce Director of Athletics, Physical Education, & Recreation and George R. Roberts Fellow, to discuss CMS Athletics, women in sports, and leadership within athletics. https://cmsathletics.org

Parishi Kanuga ’26 sits down with Ursula Diamond, Director for Student Opportunities, to discuss what career preparation looks like for a CMC student, her personal career path, and the invaluable resource Career Services provides for students and alumni. Ursula leads the Career Services team at Claremont McKenna College's Soll Center for Student Opportunity. She is passionate about helping student...

Pieter van Wingerden ’24 sits down with host Parishi Kanuga ’26 to discuss his CMC experience, including his unique relationship with foreign policy. His academic success led him to be recently awarded the prestigious Truman Scholarship. Pieter is a 2023 Truman Scholar and studies Government and Asian Studies at Claremont McKenna. He is interested in political, economic, and military issues in the...

Former classmates at CMC, Dianna "DT" Graves ’98 and Amy Verity ’98, sit down with Parishi Kanuga ’26 to reflect on their friendship and favorite life lessons some 25 years later. From sports to dorms to classes, they share memories and their advice to current and future CMC students. Known lovingly as “DT” by the many CMC students who she has supported through the years in a variety of roles, Dia...

Host Parishi Kanuga ’26 sits down with Professor Ran Libeskind-Hadas, the founding chair of the new Kravis Department of Integrated Sciences (KDIS) at Claremont McKenna College. KDIS, through Professor Libeskind-Hadas' leadership, is designed without discipline-defined departments; the curriculum is structured around three grand challenges related to Health (Genomics, Systems Biology, and Health),...

Host Parishi Kanuga '26 sits down with Sanaa Sondhi '25, who shares the valuable lessons she learned by cooking family dishes tied to her Indian roots. Sanaa recently published a cookbook thanks to her CMC Appel Fellowship. Entering its ninth year, the Appel Fellowship “provides first-year students with funding to support purposeful, independent experiences that culminate in a meaningful and subst...

Parishi Kanuga '26 sits down with CMC History Prof. Heather Ferguson and discusses her experience in deconstructing belief systems and cultivating critical thinking in history studies. Prof. Ferguson holds an M.A. in Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Texas- Austin and a Ph. D. from the University of California- Berkeley. Following her two-year postdoctoral work in Islamic Studies and H...

Host Parishi Kanuga ’26 speaks with Michael Gadinis ’24 on his passion for policy activism. A Government major with a Gender & Sexuality Studies sequence, Michael is the President of CMC Advocates for Survivors of Sexual Assault & Domestic Violence, and a member of CMC's Model UN team and the Associated Students of Claremont McKenna College (ASCMC).He shares about his summers as a legislat...

Host Parishi Kanuga ’26 interviews Bertha Tobias ’24 about her summer initiative made possible through the Sponsored Internships and Experiences (SIE) program: producing a TV show highlighting young entrepreneurs of Namibia, her home country. She discusses key lessons learned from her interviews, the professional experience she has gained, and how this opportunity has shaped her experience as a CM...

Host Parishi Kanuga ’26 sits down with Professor Marc Massoud P’89 who shares how he has created family in the classroom over his 43 years teaching at CMC. Professor Massoud is the Robert A. Day Distinguished Professor of Accounting at CMC's Robert Day School of Economics and Finance (RDS). Born and raised in Alexandria, Egypt, he came to the U.S. in 1967 to attend Graduate School at NYU, and came...