UCLA Anderson Alumna’s Memory Lives On through Fellowships

Ask alumni of UCLA Anderson’s Executive MBA program what continues to inform their lives and careers after graduation, and many will cite a lesson learned in the classroom or a piece of advice from a professor. But it seems no graduate of the program ever fails to mention the relationships they formed with classmates and study group teammates, the reliable career network they developed or the personal “board of directors” they cultivated and still lean on for advice of all kinds. Anderson’s EMBA offers a first-rate education, no doubt; but the lifetime connections are the hallmark of the program.

The EMBA Class of 2021 however, faced a particular challenge as the shelter-in-place policies resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic migrated the program online. On top of the technical challenges of converting in-person courses to remote learning, gone were the hallway talk, the conversations in the coffee shop and the walks across campus, where personal bonds are built. Still, out of that experience, the class came together and found a way to forge those friendships in a manner unique to their experience.

Julieanne (Jules) Tadeo (’21) and Juliette MacKay (’21) got to know each other in the several Anderson courses they took together. They teamed up for their capstone project, which they launched post-graduation as BundleRoo, a sustainability-focused company offering rental clothing for children newborn through age five. EMBA classmate Brian D’Souza (’21) and MacKay bonded first over common geography, as MacKay made her home in Thousand Oaks, California, where D’Souza began his career at Amgen and is currently the director of digital technology and innovation. The two were also on the same post-graduation trip to Barcelona, where they took in a soccer match together.

Caption

Last May, it was D’Souza who got the message that Juliette MacKay had suddenly died during a business trip in Paris, where she was pitching Evoia, the plant technology company she founded, at the Extreme Tech Sustainability Startup Challenge.

“Juliette’s husband Andy didn’t know who to tell what had happened,” says D’Souza. “He happened to see that I was the administrator of a UCLA WhatsApp group, and that’s why he reached out to me. We verified that information and rallied the class with the help of Jason Kong (’21), a close friend and classmate of Juliette’s. We were all shell-shocked, given how loved Juliette was.

“At first, I didn't believe it. She had just posted her pitch on LinkedIn and many of us were wishing her well,” continues D’Souza. “It was hard to imagine that six hours later she had a cardiac arrest and passed away.” D’Souza says Kong also helped organize a GoFundMe campaign to support MacKay’s family in their immediate needs.

“She was one of the smartest people in our class,” recalls Tadeo, who serves as director of brand experiences at Shiraz Creative. “She was quite inspiring, being a female CEO at her age.”

MacKay served as chief executive officer at Evoia, a role she held from February 2021 until the time of her passing. Evoia’s patented “climate-smart agriculture” is a seed treatment for row crops that, according to the company, increases seedling root and shoot growth, improves seed vigor and enhances the ability of the seedling to tolerate abiotic stress. Before earning her EMBA, MacKay served in a variety of executive roles at Colorado-based Cool Planet — a renewable energy semiconductor manufacturer — before becoming a VP. She had also worked at ExxonMobil for 11 years and, in between, even worked for a while as a wedding photographer. She earned her undergraduate degree at Rice University.

Caption

In order to honor, celebrate and remember the life and career of Juliette MacKay, Tadeo, D’Souza and the EMBA Class of 2021 launched a crowdfunding campaign to establish a fellowship in her memory. “We wanted to create something that was the essence of Juliette, a woman CEO who was focused on sustainability and who was also a wife and mother with three kids,” Says Tadeo. “Brian had a similar experience fundraising for the Kwame Firempong fellowship, and we talked together about creating this fund and what it would embody.” Firempong, a joint UCLA M.D./MBA beloved by his classmates, passed away unexpectedly in 2021.

Caption

The EMBA Class of 2021 spearheaded the Juliette MacKay Memorial Fellowship Campaign with the goal of raising a minimum of $100,000 by May 31, 2024. Their hope is that recipients of the fellowship will share MacKay’s passion for environmental sustainability and for making the world a better place.

In the final weeks of the campaign, they are charging full speed ahead to meet their fundraising goals. Their class has planned a reunion in San Diego the weekend of May 3–4 as a way to reconnect and also raise money for the MacKay campaign.

“We believe that Juliette’s life was extraordinary. She was a North Star to a lot of us,” says D’Souza. “We are spreading the word across UCLA and the various cohorts that knew Juliette so we can raise money for this campaign, and help benefit future Anderson students to walk down the path Juliette took.”

Caption

Contribute to the Juliette MacKay Memorial Fellowship Campaign

Would you like to learn how to establish a memorial fellowship in honor of someone close to you in the Anderson community? Please contact Lauren Seebold, UCLA Anderson’s senior director of leadership and annual giving, at lauren.seebold@anderson.ucla.edu.