When the debut issue of New Canaan-Darien arrived in 2002, two teens with energy to burn became our first cover girls. They charmed readers with megawatt smiles, but what have they been doing since then?
Jessica Fields graduated with the 2003 class at Darien High School and went onto the University of Southern California, where she graduated with a bachelor’s in business administration. She took a job in San Francisco with a health-care consulting firm before going back to school in July 2011. She’s now pursuing her MBA at the University of North Carolina. She tells us she recently came out of an interview for a summer internship in New York City, during which she met with a graduate of New Canaan High School. “The Darien-New Canaan rivalry gave us a lot to talk about,” she says. “We had fun ribbing each other.
Elise Urbahn was a sophomore at New Canaan High School in 2002. Following graduation, she hit the books at Wake Forest University in North Carolina and graduated in 2007. After a few years in the medical marketing field, she moved into the financial services industry. Today, she’s a VP of strategic marketing at a leading financial management company. She lives in Philadelphia with her husband—and high-school sweetheart—Jonathan Walters, who is enrolled in the Wharton School of Business. The couple visits New Canaan often as their families still live there, and have even cheered from the stands at a couple of Turkey Bowls.
Although Jessica and Elise put down their cheering pompoms after high school, both girls say the time they spent jumping, tumbling and shouting from the sidelines imparted valuable life skills, confidence among them. “When you have to get out there in front of your peers, you need confidence, and that’s helped me in my career,” says Elise. “Success is all in the delivery.”