Our Board, Staff, And volunteers

BOARD

Laura Boyer (Chair, Building Committee)
Laura Boyer is a licensed architect and project manager at Christopher Williams Architects LLC in New Haven. She has over thirty years’ experience designing, managing, and consulting on residential, institutional, municipal, and historic preservation projects. She maintains a particular interest in the intersection of building design with material science and performance. She holds AIA, NCARB and Historical Architect certifications, and formerly co-chaired AIA Connecticut’s Committee on the Environment. Her teaching experience includes four years as a lecturer at the Yale School of Architect where she co-taught the course ‘Critical Systems: Materials and Methods’ and served on studio juries. She is proficient in French and when not engaged in all things architecture spends time pursuing her creative interests in a capella chorus, gardening and cooking.

Joseph Banks
Joe Banks is a licensed Architect in CT, and currently works for Wesleyan University as the Director of Construction Services.  Joe has a varied and wide work and volunteer experience, including construction, landscaping, music editing and coding.  He’s lived in the greater New Haven area since 2008, spent 6 years on Hamden’s Planning and Zoning Board, and currently serves on the Hamden Historic Properties Commission, as well as the MakeHaven board.

Thomas Cavaliere
Tom is the Director of Community Engagement at Tweed Airport, where he leads their civic and public relations efforts. Prior to joining Tweed, Tom worked in statewide economic development at AdvanceCT, driving job creation and new capital investments in Connecticut. Tom also serves as a Commissioner of the New Haven Port Authority and on the Board of Directors of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra

Jared Clark
Jared Clark is a proud New Haven native and an attorney at ASML, where he advises on international trade matters. He previously practiced law at Wiggin and Dana LLP in downtown New Haven and, before that, served as a clerk at the New Haven courthouse. He has also held a variety of political campaign roles, including campaign manager, communications director, speechwriter, field organizer, and legal department staff member. Jared is an avid reader and a lover of history, art, and nature, with a particular affinity for horseshoe crabs (Limulus polyphemus). He is honored to serve an institution with such a distinctive place in New Haven’s intellectual and civic life.

Michelle Cohen (Treasurer)
Michelle brings an eye for detail to the Institute Library’s finances, as well as practice in creating environments that foster learning experiences. With a BA in Art and Art History from the University of Rochester, and a Masters degree in Entertainment Technology from Carnegie Mellon University, Michelle’s past design work includes museum exhibitions (Field Museum, Chicago, IL), interactive technology consulting (MAYA Design, Pittsburgh, PA), and educational programs (Two Bit Circus, Los Angeles, CA). However, she feels most at home in her native New Haven. Her current interest is based around how ‘third spaces’ can promote stronger social connections within the community. Michelle enjoys playing tennis, reading books, tending her indoor jungle, and time with family, friends, and her terrier mutt, Fannie.

Jeanne Criscola
Jeanne Criscola is principal of Criscola Design, an award-winning studio focused on social justice and arts and culture projects. Her work spans decades of publication design created for Soros' Open Society Foundations with one in MoMA's Franklin Furnace Artists' Book Collection. Jeanne's design praxis includes objects and experiences, curatorial and exhibition design, and cultural production multiples for authors, artists, and organizations. Her imprint, OctoberWorks.com, is a publishing/think-tank/research initiative focused on digital print technologies to foster experimentation with the multiple using emerging technologies on paper, fabric, and other materials. Her drawings, moving images, installations, generative art, performances, and books have been exhibited and screened in international venues. As a designer and educator, Criscola brings her interests, research, and experimentation into the classroom to instigate students to think beyond the forms and conventions of today's information.

Bennett Graff
Bennett Graff is digital collections editor at Gale, a leading publisher serving public and academic libraries. A scholar in the field of American literature, he has worked nearly 30 years in the field of publishing. In addition to developing and acquiring book projects in the fields of religion, American history, and music, he is a specialist in the transformation of historical archives into digital research databases. These latter projects have covered a wide array of topics, from the history of public health policy in the modern United States to documenting refugee crises during World War II. He also is former publisher of New Haven Review and current program organizer for the Institute Library’s longstanding “Listen Here” short story reading series.

Sharon Lovett-Graff
Sharon Lovett-Graff has worked as a librarian and administrator in Connecticut and Vermont for over 20 years. She has a master’s degree in library and information science from Southern Connecticut State University. Sharon loves working with the public, building events, and sharing "library joy" with new users. As a longtime New Haven resident, she is committed to improving the lives of people in New Haven.

Joshua Mamis
Josh Mamis is the former publisher of the Advocate chain of Connecticut alternative newsweeklies, and before that the editor of the New Haven edition. He is a long-time journalist with experience in Nairobi, Kenya, Burlington, Vermont, and New Haven, Connecticut. Though raised in New York City and born in southern Vermont, Josh is a happy transplant to New Haven, and honors the city's roots and the institutions that make the city unique.

Eileen Mydosh
Eileen Mydosh RPH, MBA is a Clinical Pharmacist currently working at Yale New Haven Hospital in the Investigational Drug Service. She has previously served 2 years on the board of Temple Emanuel of Greater New Haven, where she successfully organized two fundraising concerts featuring Yale a capella groups including Magavet in 2013 and the Whiffenpoofs in 2014. She has been a long time show and actor sponsor of the Yale cabaret (Meis Julie, Celeste Arias). Eileen loves local theater and is currently a sponsor of the Listen Here program. For the past 11 years she has organized a monthly YNHH book club meeting group, which often includes providing local New Haven talent as entertainment. Her outside interests include running, gardening and ocean swimming in Cape Cod.

Maryann Ott (Board Chair)
Maryann Ott was formerly the Executive Director of NewAlliance Foundation, a charitable foundation that funds $1M in grants annually to non-profit organizations in 41 Connecticut communities. She is now retired. Maryann is a visual artist, working in traditional photography, hand bound books, and mixed media collages, using antique paper, vintage handwriting and ephemera. As an amateur astronomer, she enjoys traveling to hard-to-reach corners of the world to observe, in person, solar eclipses.  She is co-founder of the Connecticut Map Society, a Civil War buff, a bibliophile and Hamden resident.

Sarah J. Rosner
Sarah J. Rosner was born and raised in New Haven and Branford, CT. Trained in studio art and with an MA in Art History and Museology, her earlier career focused on curatorial and educational roles in art museums. Moving into the for-profit business world, Sarah worked for over 30 years for European luxury textile and furnishings companies, traveling extensively throughout the U.S., Canada and areas of Europe in sales management, product development and custom textile design. She volunteers at the Library one day a week, heads up the Membership Committee on the Board, regularly attends events and programs, and believes that the Institute Library is a unique organization, and the best thing since sliced bread or Post-its (although both products post-date the founding of the Library)!

Scott Schudt
Scott Schudt is an artist living in Milford and has a Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering. He was an engineer at Boeing for 20 years, where his job was to calculate and document aerodynamic and inertial loads. He was the lead engineer for nacelle and strut loads for all Boeing commercial airplanes. In 2005, he left his job 2005 to work full time as an artist. From 2014 to 2016, he was co-curator and facilities manager for Artspace's City Wide Open Studio Alternative Space.

Joanne Scuilli
Joanne Sciulli has spent nearly three decades working in nonprofit leadership, fundraising, communications, and community-building. She founded and led Solar Youth for 22 years and has since continued her work as a nonprofit consultant and development professional. Joanne is delighted to serve on the Board of the Institute Library, where she hopes to put her experience to good use while indulging her love of community, creativity, and lifelong learning. When she’s not working, you’ll likely find her making collages, doing puzzles, or occasionally attempting to play the ukulele.

Janice Swiatek (Secretary)
Janice Swiatek has thirty years of experience working in libraries, including the Stowe Library at the UConn Health Center and Quinnipiac University’s Bernhard Library.  In her role as a director, she has been responsible for planning and delivering library services. Her commitment is to make resources discoverable and accessible to users. She has worked with traditional and electronic resources and understands the values and different advantages of each. As a life-long lover of books, she enjoys creating welcoming connections to information. 

Christin Sandweiss
Christin began her career as a professional fundraiser in Yale’s Development Office, working in the Major Gifts division. Since then, she has led fundraising efforts for organizations including Yale-China Association, Mory’s, and Special Olympics Connecticut, as well as several New Haven nonprofits, including Bethesda Nursery School, Friends Center for Children, Neighborhood Music School, and Creative Arts Workshop.

An avid reader and longtime supporter of New Haven’s vibrant nonprofit community, Christin is thrilled to be part of the Institute Library and to contribute to an organization that is woven into the historic fabric of our Elm City. 

Amy Vatner
Amy Vatner is a juvenile justice attorney in New Haven.  She is an Assistant Clinical Professor at the Yale Child Study Center and is the co-chair of the Education subcommittee of the Juvenile Justice Policy & Oversight Committee. She writes children’s picture books and loves old buildings.

Ben Wrobel (Chair, Nominating/Governance Committee)
Ben Wrobel is a writer, social entrepreneur, and nonprofit leader focused on philanthropy, economic opportunity, and community-led change. He is the co-founder and publisher of Proximate, a nonprofit media organization covering participatory philanthropy and grassroots movements, and previously held leadership roles at Village Capital and the NAACP. Ben is also the co-author of Letting Go: How Philanthropists and Impact Investors Can Do More Good by Giving Up Control.