Harper is the Producing Artistic Director of the award-winning Cyrano’s Theatre Company.  In this capacity, Harper is responsible for programming, marketing, fundraising, and project management for each production.  Sandy and her husband, Jerry, founding members of Cyrano’s Theatre Company, spent their earlier years under the mentorship of Obie award-winner Rachel Rosenthal.  Both were core members in Rosenthal’s innovative new theatre form, called “Instant Theatre” and “Instant Fairy Tales”, in Los Angeles.  While in LA, Sandy earned her Master’s Degree in Human Development from Pacific Oaks College in Pasadena.

In Alaska, Sandy has served on the national board of the Last Frontier Theatre Conference, the Anchorage Downtown Partnership, the Rasmuson Foundation, and the Anchorage Downtown Association.  She also served as President of the Anchorage Cultural Council.  Sandy continues to co-host a monthly radio program about the arts on KSKA public broadcasting in Anchorage.

Sandy’s awards include: the “Contribution to Literacy in Alaska” award, as the founding member of the Alaska Center for the book; the YWCA “Notable Woman of the Year”; and was inducted into the ATHENA Society in 2009.  In 2010, Sandy was recognized by the Soroptimist society for her encouragement of women in the arts.  In 2011, Sandy received an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from UAA and the Lorene Harrison Lifetime Achievement Award.  Sandy has been featured in the national magazine American Theatre for producing a series of plays honoring the indigenous peoples of Alaska.

Sandy Harper

In 2010 Mary Katzke and her 10-year-old son, Corin, sold all their worldly possession and bought one-way tickets to Ireland. It was just the beginning of a world-class adventure. Twenty-eight countries and a world education later, Katzke and her son share their adventures in the documentary “World School.” Cruise ships, bicycles, airplanes and almost every form of transportation available carried them around the globe. Corin says his favorite places were Dubai and China, “…it’s like being in school, and being teleported to the places in your textbook.”

Kids grow up so quickly and there is no getting that time back,” said Mary Katzke. “Family travel allows both education, and the chance to savor this precious time.”

Cover of Mary Katzke’s World School

Philip “Flip” Todd is a native of Washington DC, a graduate of the Sidwell Friends School and Boston University with a degree in government. He began work at Lappi’s Chevron in Gulkana, Alaska in 1969 where he was a proficient tire changer before joining the Anchorage Times that year as an obituary writer. He progressed to covering the Anchorage School board before being drafted into the U.S. Army.

Stationed at Ft. Bragg, N.C. attached to the Special Forces before being transferred to Ft. Richardson, AK, he worked as a general assignment and sports reporter at the Anchorage Daily News at night and on weekends while in the Army.
A fourth generation journalist, he returned to the Anchorage Times after discharge from the Army in 1972 and spent several years as a business writer and editor.

In 1976 he became a full time free-lance writer and photographer for the AP and both local and national publications such as Alaska Industry Magazine, Business Week and the Washington Post. He is a fourth generation journalist.

In 1978 he began publishing the Alaska Directory of Attorneys, a semi-annual publication still produced by his publishing company, Todd Communications. The directory which lists all active members of the Alaska bar along with information ranging from members’ year of admission, undergraduate school, year of graduation and major, to law school and e-mail address, has become the bible of the Alaska legal community.

He brought the first color scanner to the state in 1982 when he founded Alaska Color Scan. He is president of Todd Communications which publishes many books, calendars and maps. The company is also the state’s primary wholesale distributor of these products to more than 700 stores, as well as providing international print brokering services to other publishers.

He is a past president of the Alaska World Affairs Council and has served on its board for more than 20 years.

He has led Todd Communications for more than 35 years and developed it into a fully integrated publishing and publishing services company serving publishers ranging from the largest New York houses to regional and local concerns.

Increasingly its services are focused on assisting Alaska and Pacific Northwest authors and photographers to self-publish their own works.  It accomplishes this by offering editing, book design, printing and wholesale distribution of books about Alaska and by Alaska authors. The company has 20 employees and offices in Ketchikan, Juneau, Fairbanks and Juneau serving the entire state with publishing services and wholesale book, calendar and map distribution.

Philip “Flip” Todd

After many years at KTUU-Channel 2, Rhonda McBride is moving across town to KTVA-Channel 11. Currently she’s employed by GCI, which is in the process of buying KTVA. Until the sale goes through, Rhonda will be working with her old boss at KTUU, former news director John Tracy, who has been hired by GCI as a consultant to take KTVA’s newsroom to the next level. Rhonda’s focus at KTVA will be on rural Alaska, one of her passions. From dental health to education to politics, Rhonda has won several national awards for her coverage of rural issues.

She gained her experience reporting in the Bush at KYUK, a public radio and television station in Bethel, which broadcasts in both Yup’ik and English. Rhonda has also been a producer at the Alaska Public Radio Network — and hosted political debates and public affairs programs at KAKM-TV, Channel 7. In 2008, Rhonda took a break from broadcasting and worked for Governor Sarah Palin as her Rural Advisor.

Rhonda McBride

Elise Sereni Patkotak was born many, many years ago into a much kinder and gentler world. Her initial view of life was bounded by the Italian immigrant neighborhood in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in which she was raised and the nuns who taught her throughout her early years. She is now a recovering Catholic.

Elise lived in Barrow for 28 years, during which time she aged with astounding rapidity. While living in Barrow, she was a nurse, health director, social worker, columnist, radio show host, public information officer, city recreation director and Guardian Ad Litem (GAL), working with troubled kids in the Barrow Court System. She now lives in Anchorage with five parrots, a cockatoo and a very nervous little dog that thinks all the birds are out to get his stuff.

Elise has a small writing/graphics company, Precious Cargo, Ltd., that she hopes will actually turn a profit before she dies. She is a columnist with the Anchorage Daily News and is the author of Parallel Logic, the story of her years in Barrow.

Elise continues to work as a GAL with the Barrow Court System and also volunteers with a wild bird rehab center in Anchorage. She is a foster parent for the companion bird rescue organization, Parrot Education and Adoption Center (PEAC). She is a member of Alaska Professional Communicators and has been both its president and membership chair. She is also a past co-chair of the Alaska Public Broadcasting Commission.

Elise belongs to a wide variety of animal welfare organizations and truly believes that the world will be judged by how it treats its most helpless inhabitants, including its elderly, its young and its animals.

She spent her youth wantonly wasting her money on travel to exotic locations with her sister Judy before those places decided to start killing travelers for sport. She has visited every continent in the world except Antarctica. After living in Alaska she felt that was redundant.

Her primary goal in life now is to live long enough to spend all she has saved for her old age. Thanks to recent economic trends, this may turn out to be much easier than she initially believed possible.

Elise Patkotak

Steve Lindbeck came to public broadcasting in July 2007 after a 30-year career in journalism and public affairs. He is President and General Manager of Alaska Public Telecommunications, Inc. (APTI), which includes KAKM-TV, KSKA-FM and the Alaska Public Radio Network.

He also has served as Vice Chancellor for Advancement at the University of Alaska Anchorage, Associate Editor of the Anchorage Daily News, and Executive Director of the Alaska Humanities Forum. His journalism career included editorial positions at the Anchorage Daily News, the Anchorage Times, the Everett (Wash.) Herald, and the Boston Globe.

He has volunteered on many boards and committees, including the Anchorage Museum Association, the Alaska World Affairs Council, Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Anchorage, United Way of Anchorage, Anchorage Cultural Council, Alaska State Council on the Arts review panels, Downtown Anchorage Rotary, and Commonwealth North.

Lindbeck, an Anchorage resident since 1968, is a graduate of West Anchorage High School and Stanford University. He is married to Patty Ginsburg, a former journalist who now works as a consultant. He loves reading, music, travel, hiking, golf, and the natural and cultural splendor of Alaska.