Spring '26 Alumni News & Pursuits

Of Note

’01 J.D. Jason Vail is director of the American Bar Association Center for Professional Responsibility.

’05 Tim Neary is chief executive officer of the Northwest ADHD Treatment Center.

’05 Chase Perrin is senior vice president at Edelman, a corporate reputation practice working with aerospace and aviation clients.

’05 Jobin Panicker received a 2025 National Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Writing.

’07 Bonnie Leko-Shapiro is director of marketing and communications at the Humane Society of Southern Arizona.

’18 Annika Perez-Krikorian is the literary director at the Milwaukee Repertory Theater, leading new play development and helping to curate each season.

’25 Katie Harris, RN, received recognition at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, D.C., for nursing with cura personalis in mind – something Katie says she learned through her Gonzaga professors.

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More Than a Degree

Ryan Grulich ('25 M.A. COML) chose Gonzaga for personal development, but it’s given him much more as he navigates creative and professional pursuits.
Read his spotlight here.

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In Print

These Zags are proud to share recent publications they’ve authored.

’79 Larry Murillo: “Inner Child Healing”

’96 Stefan M. Bradley: “If We Don’t Get It: A People’s History of Ferguson”

’07 Laura Collins: “Beyond Recognition: Transgender Antidiscrimination Law, Rhetoric, and Ethical Responsibility”

’22 Lauren Haas: “A Heart That Holds It All: The Story of Adoption”

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Worthy of Debate

For Chuck Lloyd (’83), a single phone call from Gonzaga’s new debate coach changed the course of his life – launching him into a career defined by advocacy, justice and deep gratitude.

Debate sharpened the skills that carried him from Yakima to law school, through landmark legal cases, and ultimately to freeing an innocent man from death row. Returning to campus decades later, Lloyd and his wife, Deb Nelson, felt the momentum behind Gonzaga Debate’s new endowment and chose to make a transformative gift of their own.
“Gonzaga Debate changed my life,” Lloyd says. “This is our chance to make sure it changes others’ lives too.” Their support ensures future students will gain the confidence, discipline, and intellectual generosity that debate instills; qualities Lloyd believes are urgently needed in today’s fractured public discourse. Their legacy strengthens a program built on curiosity and the discipline of disagreement.

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Foundation in friends, purpose and action manifest in conservation work

By Kaya Crawford ('25)

Brian Muegge’s interest in conservation was cultivated in his experience as a student at Gonzaga University, and now is making an impact working with the environmental nonprofit Salmon Safe to promote sustainable actions focused on water and habitat conservation in the Inland Northwest.

Growing up in San Jose, California, Muegge spent time camping and enjoying the outdoors. He says his parents fostered an “ethos of conservation” in him. He graduated in 2016 with a degree in biology with a research concentration and a desire to work in conservation.

He conducted his undergraduate research exploring the dietary habits of yellow-bellied marmot in the Spokane area, as well as an internship with the United States Forest Service in Idaho entailed studying noxious weed dispersion throughout the Coeur d'Alene National Forest. His first job out of college focused on bolstering a more environmentally friendly food system for Impossible Foods, which was focused on transitioning our global food system away from a reliance upon large, combined animal feeding operations (CAFOs), which have an immense climate-negative footprint.    

Today he is a farm program manager at Salmon Safe, which works to keep urban and agricultural watersheds clean enough for native salmon to spawn and thrive in the Pacific Northwest. Muegge helps farmers to undergo rigorous, third-party Salmon-Safe certification of best management practices for protecting habitat and water quality, and also connects farmers to technical support and grant funding that can support necessary changes to support their conservation efforts. Last year, he also helped GU achieve certification, another step toward rewilding the urban Spokane river system.

Muegge is excited to see the reintroduction of Chinook salmon into the Spokane River by the Upper Columbia United Tribes, a consortium of the Spokane, Coeur d'Alene, Salish Kootenai and Colville tribes whose ancestors thrived alongside the salmon population in the area since time immemorial.

As a member of GU’s College Arts and Science advisory committee, Muegge looks to further connect students with research and other opportunities to engage with environmental efforts locally.

Muegge says now is the time to shine the light on conservation efforts.

“I truly don't think that we're focusing enough effort on it, globally, nationally, at the state level,” Muegge says.

“Anything that I can do to further ring the bell that the time is short to shift our focus on protecting our environment without causing future irreparable harm, I’ll do.”

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Purpose-driven Newsmaker

For more than 25 years, Kris Higginson (’98) has helped shape the news that millions of Washingtonians read each day. The assistant managing editor at the Seattle Times, she oversees the news desk, the nation/world report and the Morning Brief, and a team of copy editors responsible for editing stories, writing headlines and crafting news alerts.

Higginson traces her path back to Gonzaga, where she double‑majored in journalism and political science and spent countless hours in the Gonzaga Bulletin newsroom. “The critical thinking, the not being afraid to question authority – that Jesuit education prepared me for this work,” she says.

Her career has spanned major elections, breaking news and Pulitzer‑winning coverage, but the people remain her favorite part of the job. “Newsrooms are full of brilliant, wicked‑funny, incredibly dedicated people,” she says. “Being part of that purpose‑driven community has been the highlight of my career.”