For a week during the winter break, brother Michael Goldman ’16 participated in an externship with Macquarie Group in Manhattan.

Macquarie is a global investment bank founded in Australia in 1969. They are the largest infrastructure investor in the world and help corporations and wealthy investors. Goldman shadowed Jim Hummerstone ’86, a former student athlete and Greek organization member at Lafayette.

During the externship, Goldman had the opportunity to meet with a variety of people at the company to get a hands on experience of how the business is run. Goldman also traveled to the Bloomberg headquarters where he was given an inside look at the company’s operations through a detailed tour.

Following the conclusion of the externship, Goldman attended the Lafayette Networking Night in New York to reconnect with his host and share his experiences with other Lafayette students and alumni.

As an economics major, Goldman plans to use his externship experience to help assert himself in the financial world, with an end goal of landing a job on Wall Street.

Over the winter break, the Rho chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon sent two of its members to Futures Quest, a leadership and team building workshop in Indiana. Here is chapter president Brett Lederer’s reflection:

 

“Flying out to Indianapolis on a crisp January morning, I had no idea what I was getting myself into.  I was about to fly into a place on the verge of being hit with a historic snowstorm and low temperatures that I had never thought possible.  I didn’t know what to expect and the impact this conference would have on my fraternity and myself as a leader.  However, by the time the weekend had ended and I graduated the program, I gained an invaluable experience that I will carry with me throughout my time at Lafayette and the rest of my life.

One of the main lessons the mentors of Futures Quest instilled into us is the importance of our rituals.  They stressed the idea that rituals are not just practices we do in secret a couple of times each year.  They are values that our fraternity was founded on.  We need to live our rituals every single day as fraternity men.  The mentors challenged us to think back to what our founding fathers built the organization on.  Without these rituals, we would be just a social group rather than a strong fraternity.

We were also challenged to look inward to ourselves as leaders.  By creating lists of our values and taking part in various activities such as trust falls, we were asked to decide what kind of leaders we would be.  On the first night, the group watched the movie ’12 Angry Men’.  The lesson from the film was that it’s important to stand up for what you believe in.  Regardless of what the majority says, it is pivotal for a fraternity to make decisions based only on its values.

The following day, the snow began to fall and did so all day and throughout the night.  Many of the activities that were supposed to be done outside had to be either cancelled or moved indoors. Despite these conditions, we turned them into challenges that we overcame.  We learned that being a leader started with trusting the people around you.  We learned this through climbing a huge rock wall while blindfolded.  Despite not being able to see what was ahead, the climber knew that the people down below were walking him through it each step of the way.  This taught us that although we don’t know what lies ahead, we know that we are part of a brotherhood that supports us.

This ties into another value that the mentors of Futures Quest emphasized to us.  They told us to look around and realize that despite the fact that we all came from different fraternities, we were all the same.  Greek Life as a whole is a brotherhood.  With only four fraternities left on campus, this idea could not be more important at Lafayette.

As a leader of my fraternity and a member of Lafayette’s Greek Life I know that we are currently trying to improve our standards on campus.  After taking part in Futures Quest, I believe that I can take what I learned and bring that back to better our Greek community.  If we stick to our values and trust in the people around us, then we will continue to flourish as leaders on campus.  I want to thank Jon Williamson and the rest of the Futures Quest staff for the incredible experience they afforded me.”

 

Here is brother Kevin McAndrew’s reflection on his experience at Futures Quest:

 

“The John Williamson Futures Quest was quite an experience.  Located at Camp Tecumseh, about 70 miles outside of the city of Indianapolis, this program does its best to create an isolated space clear of distractions, generating a fantastic environment for personal reflection.  Each day, the team building activities and group discussions that I participated in taught me lessons that I feel improved my leadership ability and could improve the entire Rho Chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon as well.  With representatives from many different fraternities across the country, I received a diverse education.  Though geographically disconnected, we saw the common fraternal values we shared and ended up becoming very close by the end of the program.

Futures Quest began with some icebreakers, making everyone a little more comfortable with each other.  Then things jumped immediately into team challenges.  These activities required every member to execute their part or else the entire team effort would go to waste.  Though at the time I did not realize it, each team activity directly correlated to a fraternity.  Like a fraternity, these teambuilding games required good communication, encouragement, and vision.  In order to achieve the goal, the entire group needed to be involved and fully aware of what we were trying to accomplish.  At Lafayette, the goals we set as a chapter require the same traits.  With strong leadership and every brother giving his best effort, I have no doubt that we will make the changes that will lead to the overall chapter improvement that we want to see in the future.

Later that day, we discussed strategies for becoming a better leader and standing up for what you believe in.  As a leader, you need to stand strong by your beliefs; however, you also need to accept the opinions of those around you if they are different than yours.  Many times when someone takes on a leadership role, they are overbearing.   They have devised their own plan and expect the scheme to be carried out exactly in the image that they have imagined.  That should not be the case.  Anytime a group gets together, each member needs to have their input heard.  It is very common for someone to be too afraid to give their opinion if that means they are going to be the only one in the group to object to something that has already been decided.  Sometimes that one person’s outlook could be the difference between a project’s success and failure.

By the end of this program, I am confident that I became a better leader and can bring some new ideas to improve my chapter and the Greek community.  Futures Quest made me think differently.  For years I had the same leadership strategies; but after graduating from this program, the flaws and strengths of my beliefs were exposed.  In anything we do, teamwork is key.  At Lafayette, every Greek organization can benefit from each other if we work together as a team.”

This past Saturday the Rho chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon hosted its annual Winter Leadership Conference in Kirby Hall of Civil Rights. The focus of this conference was to recap the past semester and highlight the points we as a fraternity need to focus on, both positive and negative. This conference is used as a tool to evaluate where we stand as an organization as well as a member of the Lafayette community.

DKE welcomed back four alumni brothers for the conference, Alumni President Michael DeLisi ’03, Jared Piette ’11, Michael Rupolo ’11, and Paul McCurdy ’82. The brotherhood looks to use their ideas and insight to help guide the chapter going forward. Lafayette Director of Fraternity and Sorority Life Daniel Ayala also made an appearance at the conference to formally introduce himself to the alumni and student brothers.

Brothers elected to executive positions attended a morning session, while all brothers from the chapter attended the afternoon session.

During the morning session, the newly elected brothers holding executive positions sorted through paperwork designated for each position to adequately define the boundaries for each position and prepare each new executive brother for the semester ahead.

Brothers participate in the position sorting exercise

Brother Brett Lederer ’15, the newly elected Chapter President, led the conference throughout the day, highlighting the chapter’s basic strategic goals for next semester. Shortly thereafter, other brothers presented a more in depth analysis for the goals that fell under their position’s responsibility.

Brother Brett Lederer presents during the Winter Leadership Conference

Brother Matthew Soloway ’16, the newly elected Scholarship Chairman, recapped the brotherhood on their academic performance during the fall semester. As a chapter, DKE exceeded the unaffiliated male average GPA in the fall.

Brother Matthew Soloway discusses the chapter’s academic goals

Alumni Relations Chairman brother Wiley Houldin ’15 presented the updated strategy for our ongoing 160th Capital Campaign. The focus being on enhancing our effort in reaching out to alumni brothers, and expanding the current DKE x10 program.

Brother Sam Todd ’15, the newly elected Director of Service and Philanthropy led an engaging workshop in an attempt to create additional events for our brothers and the Lafayette community to engage in both service and philanthropy programs.

It was a productive day for the Rho chapter of DKE, and the brotherhood is confident that it can adequately use the conference to its advantage in order to have yet another strong semester on the Lafayette campus.

Over the winter break brother Drew Friedman ’16 participated in an externship experience at Altitude Sports and Entertainment. Altitude Sports, a Kroenke Sports Entertainment affiliate, is the main sports network for the Rocky Mountain region and is based in Centennial, Colorado.

Friedman flew out to Colorado from his home state of New York to shadow Steve Hurlbut ’79, VP of Programming and Production at Altitude.

Friedman attended Hurlbut’s board meetings and had to opportunity to work with the production team in their on-site truck at the Pepsi Center for a Denver Nuggets basketball game and a Colorado Avalanche hockey game.

“It was a great experience,” said Friedman. “It was very unique because my extern boss treated me like I was part of their team. It gave me a rich and one of a kind experience of what they do.”

(Friedman’s view from inside the Altitude Sports production truck)

 

Over the winter break sophomore brother Tory Bingaman completed an externship with Turner Construction Company in Philadelphia. Turner is a construction management company that works as a middle man to ensure the construction project is carried out to the best extent of the architect and building owner.

Bingaman worked in the Turner office with a focus on learning calculations like cost estimates. The externship also included job site tours at various locations such as The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Temple University, and Lincoln Financial Field.

Tory, recently elected Vice President of the Rho chapter of DKE, will look to take the experiences and lessons learned from his externship in enhancing his position with the chapter.

Since graduating, brother Dash Schwartz has been working as an Associate Retirement Actuary at Buck Consultants in New York City.  His team is hired by companies to solve pension related issues, including accounting, funding, governmental filings, plan administration, and actuarial assumptions.  He helps companies provide the best possible retirement benefits for their employees at the lowest possible cost, using actuarial mathematics models.  Dash, who graduated as a Dean’s List Scholar with a Mathematics and Economics degree, is one of Rho’s finest scholars and has continued to excel in the business world.

Brother Luke Spear has been working under a senior financial advisor as an intern at Ameriprise Financial this summer. His assignments include updating client information and contributing to the financial planning process. Luke is pursuing a double major in Psychology and Economics and has found that much of what he has learned at Lafayette can be applied to his work at Ameriprise. His work ethic can bee seen both inside and outside of the classroom; he was a Dean’s list scholar this past semester and has a second job in addition to his internship at the Chatterbox, a restaurant in Ocean City.

Brother Dan Toutoungi has spent his first summer out of Lafayette working as a professional risk underwriter for Ace Group in Jersey City. Dan is tasked with understanding and evaluating risk to stay on the risk adverse side. He reports that it has been an amazing learning experience but is well aware that he still has a lot left to learn. Much of his responsibilities involve networking and building relationships with brokers, however, something his time at DKE has more than prepared him for.

This past semester, Brother Nicholas DiNino ’15 studied at Jacobs University in Bremen, Germany. Lafayette College offers many exchange programs to its students. Brother DiNino had not traveled much before this spring semester, and he could not pass up the opportunity to study abroad. Nicholas chose Germany due to its central location in Europe, its proximity to other countries that he wanted to visit, and its abundance of culture and different way of living. Nicholas shared the experience with fellow Rho DKE’s Brendan Malone, Sam Todd, and Dan Zakzewski. Nicholas found it helpful to have these friendly faces on a new campus and on a completely different continent.

In Bremen, Nicholas enrolled in a German Politics and Culture course, completed his Math minor, and worked towards his Electrical and Computer Engineering degree. Nicholas often studied for the Electrical Engineering course with Brother Malone. With their German Politics and Culture course, Nicholas and fellow Rho DKE’s traveled to Berlin, Helgoland, Brussels, and St. Petersburg, where they learned about German politics, the European Union, and Russia. In addition to the educational experience, the DKE’s were given time to explore the cities, visit historical sites, and enjoy the nightlife. Nicholas spent his spring break with Brother Zakzewski traveling throughout Italy. He enjoyed seeing the country of his ancestors and spending time with one of his brothers.

Since returning to the United States, Nicholas has been working in the restaurant industry for King Coil Cleaning, a company that services draft beer systems. Nicholas has also continued his travels in Maine, Washington DC, and New York City from his home in West Hartford, Connecticut.

Since graduating this spring, Brother Peter Phillips has been working as an Underwriter Trainee in the Executive Assurance Division at Arch Insurance Group in New York. His job consists of underwriting private and public companies applying for a vast variety of coverage.  In his time at Arch Insurance Group, Peter has built strong relationships with many brokers in order to potentially gain additional new business.  With degrees in Economics & Business and Government & Law, Peter is confident his education at Lafayette will propel him in his future career in finance.