Sisters Reaching New Heights!

     Hello & welcome back!! This week I am so excited to share with you all about some of the internships our sisters have received for this upcoming summer. From New York City to Seattle, our Beta Eta’s have set the bar high with these incredible, life-changing opportunities they have awaiting them across the nation.
      Katie Sluman will be interning in the Communications department of the MLB in NYC, with her main focus being the All-Star Game, prompting her to do projects for this event throughout the whole summer. Katie is a Finance major minoring in Hospitality here at Florida State. Her main interest falls in the sports department, which inspired her to apply for this prestigious internship. Congratulations, Katie!!
     Another one of our sisters, Emily Malfitano, will also be interning in New York City starting this summer. Emily has accepted a merchandising internship with the Hudson Bay Company’s Saks 5th/Off 5th Ave. This position will teach Emily about the buying and planning that goes on within a fashion brand, with buying consisting of employees marketing and negotiating on merchandise for their store based on what customers are already buying and upcoming trends, along with planning consisting of the pricing for these items. Emily was inspired to apply to this internship after going on a marketing trip with Florida State, giving her the opportunity to speak with employees who work for Saks. This internship not only consists of amazing work, but provides interns with housing at the NYU dorms, providing an affordable alternative to living in the big apple. Emily has said that she has always loved this company, influencing her to apply for her “dream job”. We are so excited to watch you succeed as your dream becomes a reality, Emily!
     Ashley Thomas will be heading over to the University of Washington in Seattle to intern at their Autism Center for the Apex Summer Camp! This camp works to help children with both Autism and ADHD on their social and communication skills. Ashley is currently majoring in Communication Science Disorders in order to fulfill her dream of becoming a speech pathologist, specializing in Autism. This position will not only give Ashley experience in her field, but will give her the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of these children. We can’t wait to see what you do, Ashley!
     Mallory Wilvert will be interning at The Club at Cordillera in Edwards, Colorado alongside the events coordinator, working to plan and host events at the country club. These events will include golf tournaments at the three different courses located at the club, along with large brunches and gatherings for both members and guests. When Mallory is not helping plan events, she’ll be working as both a server and bartender at the many restaurants found within the club. Mallory is currently majoring in global club management, leading her to pursue this incredible position at The Club. Make sure to send invites to brunch our way, Mallory!!

Jessi Bonadurer

     Finally, our VP of Philanthropy, Jessi Bonadurer, will be continuing her internship at Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP, a law firm in Chicago, which she has been asked back to for the past two summers. Just this past summer she was promoted to Supervisor, causing her to oversee the work of all the other interns. Jessi hopes to one day become either a litigator or to do advocacy work for both women and individuals with intellectual disabilities, and this experience will definitely help her get there! We are so proud of all the amazing opportunities our sisters are taking advantage of this summer and can’t wait to see the other internships more sisters acquire in the upcoming months!

Emily Malfitano

*SMH*

Sister Spotlight: Sabrina Loiacono

     Welcome back everyone!! I hope you had a relaxing and safe holiday break! For our first blog post of 2019, we’ll be featuring one of our Beta Eta sisters, Sabrina Loiacono. Over the break, Sabrina traveled to Ecuador for a service learning trip with the Medlife program here at Florida State to help individuals receive the health care that they deserve. Sabrina, hoping to work in the medical field, specifically with children, went on this trip to do just that. Often times we don’t realize how lucky we have it here in America, however, Sabrina got to see firsthand what people in countries with such little health care have to deal with every day. During this trip, Sabrina got the opportunity to work alongside a general doctor in Ecuador. In doing this, she was able to help treat patients with muscle and abdominal pains, that couldn’t walk, had loss of hearing, and infections by giving them the treatments and medications they were in need of. She also took both adult’s and children’s vitals while working alongside a dentist to help extract a child’s tooth. Finally, Sabrina taught over 50 children how to brush their teeth. Having the ability to brush my teeth is something I know I take for granted everyday, and is something that was so special to these children. Sabrina was also given the opportunity to do fluoride treatments on most of the children, along with educating them, and many adults, about public health. Having the opportunity to engage in such a rewarding and life-touching trip like this one is something our sister was so lucky to have been able to take part in, and we are proud to share! 

  

    

*SMH*

Alex Bretz, Natalie Alexander, and Kayla Scott’s Spring Break Service Trips

This past Spring Break while many of us relaxed, traveled, and spent time with sisters, Alex Bretz, Natalie Alexander, and Kayla Scott chose to spend their spring breaks giving back to those less fortunate on service trips!  Alex traveled to Cusco, Peru and Natalie and Kayla traveled to El Salvador.

Alex is a member of Medlife at FSU and throughout the year was able to raise $1,000 to go on her trip to Cusco, Peru.  This funded primary medical services as there are many in Cusco who lack access to quality health care.  For three days, she got the chance to help run the mobile clinics and shadow physicians.  In addition, Medlife also has a Healthy Homes project and Alex was able to help out with this by installing new stoves and refurbishing rooms in a community of need.  On the last day of her trip, Alex even got to visit Machu Picchu!


Natalie and Kayla traveled to El Salvador on a mission trip where they were able to share their faith and make a difference in the community.  They worked with an organization called Filters of Hope to install water filters around the community.  Around 98% of the water is contaminated so these filters will really make a positive difference in these peoples lives!  During this time they were also able to share their faith with many locals!  On the last day of the trip, they even got to hike a volcano!




We are so proud of Alex, Natalie and Kayla for spending their spring breaks helping those less fortunate and are so glad they had successful and safe trips!

Alpha Chi Omega Exceeds Goal at Dance Marathon 2018

Each year many of our sisters participate in Dance Marathon at FSU, an event where dancers stand for 20 hours to raise money for Children’s Miracle Network hospitals as well as the FSU College of Medicine.  There are fundraising events year round and this year FSU aimed to raise $2 million for the kids, something we had never done before.  Not only did the FSU community meet this goal, we exceeded it by raising a total of $2,152,382.19!

In addition to FSU exceeding it’s largest ever fundraising goal, we also exceeded our fundraising goal as a chapter!  Our goal was to raise $50,000 and we ended up raising $50,484.54!

This year, FSU decided that it was “#Up2Us to create more miracles for the kids” and they did just that by exceeding their fundraising goal!  Special shoutout to our Dance Marathon delegate, Ale Gonzales and assistant delegate Kailie Rush for all you have done for our chapter!

A big thank you to all sisters who participated and all donors!  None of this would have been possible without you!

A Successful Pizza Pie with Alpha Chi 2018!

Last night we hosted our annual event “Pizza Pie with Alpha Chi” benefiting the local Refuge House as well as the Alpha Chi Omega Foundation.  We had such a blast spending time with our sisters and the FSU community!

We are so excited to have raised awareness about this issue to the FSU community as well as over $6,000 for the victims of domestic violence!  A special thank you to our VP Philanthropy Lia Alveraz for planning the event and all of the sisters who helped make it run smoothly!

Courtney Simoncelli: Entrepreneurship Student and SmartSnax Founder

Courtney Simoncelli is a junior in the new Jim Moran School of Entrepreneurship here at Florida State who has a passion for healthy eating.  She recently launched her own business called Smartsnax, which is a healthy snack box subscription service filled with a variety of yummy snacks every month free of gluten, soy dairy and GMO’s!

Courtney loves that in the Entrepreneurship program, students don’t just get to learn about how to effectively start and run a company, they get the hands-on experience of starting their own company as well!

While many of us try our hardest to adapt to a healthy lifestyle, Courtney also has a personal connection to healthy eating.  Due to her stage IV endometriosis, she is required to eat a very restricted non-inflammatory diet.  This is where her inspiration for SmartSnax comes from.  In her search to find delicious foods that fit her diet, she found many foods that she wanted to share with everyone, and thus SmartSnax was born!

Eating healthy in college can be hard, but SmartSnax is the perfect solution!  The snacks in each box are super tasty, easy to eat on the go, and affordable for anyone of a college budget!  For parents, this is a great way to make sure your college kid has a variety of healthy snacks every month!

To order SmartSnax, visit https://www.smartsnaxboxes.com and enter the code “TALLAHASSEE” at checkout to receive free shipping anywhere in the Tallahassee area.  SmartSnax also ships anywhere in the U.S.

Way to go Courtney, we can’t wait to see your business grow!

AXO takes FTKolor!

Last week many of our sisters participated in FTKolor, an exciting fundraising event in preparation for the 40-hour long Dance Marathon in March.  For a donation, participants were given white t-shirts that they were able to decorate with over 1,000 pounds of glow in the dark paint!  If you’ve ever heard of the color run, it is sort of like that but without the run!         

It was a great night full of fun, friends, food and great music!  We love seeing so much passion and enthusiasm for such a great cause and can’t wait for 20 hours of nonstop dancing at the marathon!  Way to go girls, FTK!

   

    

Alumna Sara Zeng – Miss Florida

Sara Zeng, a recent alumna from the Beta Eta chapter, will take the stage tomorrow night to compete in the Miss America pageant as Miss Florida. The pageant will be aired on ABC at 9 pm Eastern Time on Sunday, September 10th.

Sara was a new member in Fall 2013 and graduated from Florida State last spring semester. She has a passion for playing the piano, which also doubles as her talent for the competition. Outside of Alpha Chi Omega, Sara was highly involved within FSU’s College of Music.

Beta Eta is sending you all of our love from Tallahassee, Florida this week! Alpha Chi Omega could not be more proud of how you represent our sisterhood.

Sara’s graduation from FSU
Sara after winning the preliminary swimsuit competition at Miss America

Bid Day 2017!

We are so excited to have welcomed home 91 beautiful new members into our chapter this past Sunday! Florida State University hosts one of the largest recruitments in the nation with over 2,000 total women participating. 


After a long recruitment week, all of our hard work paid off to see 91 new smiling faces accept their bids to Alpha Chi. Some of our favorite memories have been created at this house and we look forward to sharing our sisterhood with you all!

To our 8 Rho Gammas, we are so happy to have you back. Welcome home, again!


A huge thank you to Sean DaSilva for capturing all of the excitement on bid day! Photos can be found here: https://goo.gl/photos/eVYtTBokqnZ4Yhzz9 

Sister Spotlight

Ashley Mulaik, a transfer student from Birmingham-Southern College, Alpha Omega chapter, began her journey at Florida State in Fall of 2016. Besides studying Finance and being a sister of Alpha Chi Omega, Ashley owns and operates her very own photography company—Gray Style Productions.
Ashley with her goldendoodle puppy Millie

Ashley began seriously pursuing photography after a shoulder injury ended her college softball career at BSC. Ashley noted this injury as a “blessing in disguise” because she was finally able to focus her time and energy into developing her photography company.

Gray Style Productions specializes in senior photoshoots, portraits, and music group photography. Her favorite types of photography sessions? Test shoots for modeling agencies. Not only does she get to photograph her clients; Ashley gets to come up with the style, location, and overall concept of the shoot. She loves being able to get creative with her work and capture her clients’ personalities in the process.
Alina Echemendia, Alpha Chi Omega sister, even had the opportunity to work with Ashley for a portrait photoshoot (Credit: graystyleproductions.org).
We continue to be amazed by Ashley’s passion for photography & her pure talent within the industry. As for her company’s future, Ashley is looking at possibly expanding her business to include wedding photography. We are extremely excited to see where her hard work takes her!