58 | LEHIGH ALUMNI BULLETIN | CLASS NOTES my team recently welcomed a new coworker who also happens to be a Lehigh grad. Welcome to GFT, Alton Whittle ’95! Meeting a fellow Lehigh grad at the office inspired me to check in with another alum working here at GFT: Daniel Stipanov. In addition to starting his role at GFT, Daniel is pursuing a part-time master’s degree in environmental engineering at Manhattan College. Since he is based in northern New Jersey, Daniel still meets up with Lehigh friends regularly who live in or near New York City, including Achillies Mouzakis, Simone Davey, Nina Cialone and Natalia Sanches Santiuste. As former track teammates, they’ve kept a tight-knit group, celebrating birthdays, grabbing drinks after work and even cheering each other on (Daniel recently watched one of them run the NYC Marathon!). When I asked Daniel if he had continued running or participated in any races since graduation, Daniel clarified that he was a short-distance sprinter, so he prefers to stay active via sports and the gym. Grad school is going well for Daniel, too. He has been taking two classes a semester consisting of both remote and in-person evening courses. He noted that the program has been especially helpful as he continues to assist with our water and wastewater design projects at GFT. I love hearing these updates and hope to keep sharing more! Please reach out with your stories, big or small. Until next time, Class of 2024! ’25 Maya Zucker, mayazucker21@ gmail.com, (908) 963-9465 Hey everyone! It was so great seeing so many of you at LeLaf and hearing about what everyone’s been up to! Somehow, even with us being all spread around the country and in our own phases of life, being back at Lehigh made it feel like we had never left. And while I could go on and on about how proud I am of what we’ve all accomplished so far, I sit with a lot of gratitude for the community that the Class of 2025 built and continues to foster. A quick update on my life— by the time you’re reading this, I should (hopefully) be settled into my first apartment in NYC! I’m looking forward to running into many of you in the city and getting closer to our Lehigh NYC community. Looking forward to seeing many of you there and counting down the days until our first reunion! ’26 Amanda Rowan, abr226@lehigh. edu Sitting down to write this, I’m feeling extremely nostalgic about my last semester at Lehigh. Soon, I’ll be graduating, and leaving what has now become my second home. No more walking on the greenway, coffee runs at Saxby’s, Goose sandwiches, late nights in The Brown and White newsroom or soaking up the time rotting on the couch with my friends. The friends I’ve made here, the incredible professors and mentors who have guided me and helped shape me into the person I am today, I will always be incredibly grateful for. I never thought I’d find so much joy in a place, but here I am. OK sorry for getting sappy, as you can tell I really do just love Lehigh. But back to the Class of 2026. Last fall, the Lehigh football team secured the Patriot League Championship for the second year in a row and went undefeated for a 12-0 streak. Our football team has been putting in the work, and it’s been apparent through their scoring. Matt Spatny, a defensive linebacker on the football team, recently broke Lehigh’s career sacks record, recording 24.5 sacks. He surpassed the record from 1999. Matt is from Cleveland, Ohio, and studies architecture. His favorite tradition during LeLaf week is seeing all the bedsheets, and the campus spirit surrounding the big game. And for those who might not be as in the know with football, meet Sydney Cooper, one of my roommates and closest friends at Lehigh. Sydney is a global studies major with a minor in marketing, but this semester, I’ve been able to see firsthand the work she’s doing in her ethnobotany class, which is incredibly cool and I had to share. Ethnobotany is the study of the relationship between people and plants, and in class they examine the scientific use of Indigenous knowledge and its ethical implications, including drug discovery, crop research and intellectual property rights. Throughout the semester, they have been collecting plants to determine their scientific classification, and in class, they picked plants to make echinacea. For hundreds of years, Indigenous communities have used it to help with things like infections and healing, and now it is a common form of modern medicine used to boost individuals’ immune systems. Their class harvested plants such as leaves or flowers, dried them to preserve it and prevent rotting, and extracted the useful chemicals to become what it is now. Sydney got to try it and even has a jar of it in her room. It’s been so cool to learn all about it, and I’m hoping to one day try it. That’s all for now, time for me to go soak up my last moments in Bethlehem. Till next time Mountain Hawks! ’27 Ava Koslowsky, ask227@lehigh. edu and Sydney Floch, sff227@lehigh.edu ’28 Laura Preston, lap328@lehigh. edu Hi everyone! Sophomore year has been so busy, but so much fun. This semester, I was writing as associate community editor for The Brown and White, which was an amazing experience. I joined the Student Senate 38 and served on the public relations committee. I have had the opportunity to meet so many driven and dedicated Lehigh students. Clinton Graham is an economics major in the College of Business, looking to pursue a career in investment banking and private credit. He interned last summer at Westport Democratic Town Committee, assisting in research and community engagement, because he is interested in public service. He serves on Student Senate 38 and has recently been promoted to Bethlehem outreach committee chair. Through this position, he can have a voice on campus and contribute to the university, as well as connect Lehigh students to the Bethlehem community. He has contributed to many events hosted by the Bethlehem outreach committee this year, one of which being Chalk & Talk, where senators were able to engage with community members while creating sidewalk chalk drawings on the Greenway. Clinton has also become the student representative of the College of Business on the Lehigh Faculty Senate educational policy committee. He represents the student population in the College of Business during conversation surrounding academic policies to advocate for student needs and experiences. Alexander Romano is a finance and accounting major in the College of Business. So far this year, he has been working on creating his own startup, FuelMobile. His concept is utilizing app technology to mobilize gas stations for the average commuter, and allow for more efficient fuel delivery. He is currently in the process of developing his presentation to participate in the Baker Institute’s EUREKA! Venture Program, where he hopes to build momentum for his current research. Edouard Benoit is a student-athlete, a finance and economics major in the College of Business as well as #5 on the Lehigh men’s basketball team. In November, the team beat Texas State, which is in a higher conference and joining the Pac-12 this year, one of the top five conferences, so it was a big win.
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