Our Contributors

Victoria is the founder and editor of Palo Alto Pulse and has lived in Palo Alto since 2007. Victoria's diverse professional background includes working as the editor of GreatSchools.org , as a senior writer for KIPP and Teach for America, and as a radio producer for City Visions on KALW (91.7FM San Francisco). She is a graduate of Leadership Palo Alto and a member of the Palo Alto Partners in Education Advisory Board.

She has a BA in English from Tufts University and Masters in Education and Secondary Teaching Credential in English from UCLA.

Sakshi Satpathy is a student of Henry M. Gunn High School and a Girl Scout in Palo Alto. She is very active in both her school and local community; at Gunn, she is a MUN club officer, president of Gunn Amnesty International club and GLI (Girls Learn International) club, and member of the French Honor Society. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, spontaneous road trips, reading voraciously and writing. Sakshi looks forward to giving Palo Alto residents a keen insight on local news worthy events and individuals.

Jim Migdal lives in Palo Alto and has spent most of his career in technology, helping consumer internet companies to grow through partnerships and product innovation. He has worked with several different Valley companies, including WebTV, Ingenio, eBay and Facebook.

Jim is the Chair of the Palo Alto Public Art Commission and has a deep interest in art that stems from growing up in Chicago as the son of a local sculptor. Jim is the father of two girls and can often be seen zipping around town on his electric bicycle and walking his dog Abby.

Lisa Wang is a Gunn graduate who now attends Stanford University. She began contributing to Palo Alto Pulse while still in high school and is continuing her interest in journalism through work for the Stanford Innovation Review.

Aisha has a passion for hunting down and sharing stories which stir the hearts and minds of her readers. She was born in Pakistan and grew up in East Asia and Connecticut, and received her BA from Smith College in Massachusetts. Aisha worked on Wall Street for many years before turning to her creative calling - content design and writing! She is a marketing and media design professional, and has been living and raising her family in Palo Alto since 2005.

Ian is a graduate of Gunn High School who is studying creative writing and international relations at Carnegie Mellon University.

Jake recently graduated from Palo Alto High School, where he studied Advanced Journalism for two years. He will study Film at Chapman University this fall.

Journalist and violin teacher, I especially love writing about food. At the moment I'm obsessed with my Waring Quik Stik immersion blender and making all sorts of pureed soups and sauces.

Joan Semeria is a freelance writer living in Palo Alto.

Sandra Slater has lived in Palo Alto for the last 26 years. Her current position is Northern California Director of the Cool City Challenge, a project to achieve deep carbon reduction, create resilient neighborhoods, promote green economic development and reinvent our cities from the bottom up. Sandra has served as a consultant to the Golden Gate National Recreational Parks Conservancy, to Zeta Communities (a net-zero energy, LEED Platinum start-up), has led her own design firm, Sandra Slater Environments. Sandra lives in downtown Palo Alto in a home she designed to showcase green design principles.

Pooja Goel is a recent graduate of Castilleja School. She will be studying political science at USC this fall.