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Tampa theatre critic Mark E. Leib has been named as the top critic in the state of Florida by the Society of Professional Journalists, South Florida chapter. Leib’s weekly theatre criticism in Creative Loafing was named the best of 2009 in a statewide competition that included newspapers from Jacksonville to Miami. The citation on the award presented June 5, “There’s no whitewashing in Leib’s style. He eloquently tells readers the good, the bad and the ugly about a production and its cast. And he does it matter-of-factly without a Simonized you-suck attitude.” Leib, who teaches at the University of South Florida and Eckerd College, is also a dramatist whose latest play, Four Middle-Aged Jewish Men Discuss Love, Death, and the Inescapable Presence of God, was given a staged reading in April at Sarasota’s Banyan Theatre Company. He and his wife Elizabeth and son Jeremy are members of Congregation Kol Ami in Tampa.

Graduation news

Congratulations to Tampa native,

Jeff Phillips, son of Carol Phillips, who received his MBA with an emphasis in nonprofit management from American Jewish University in Los Angeles on May 16.