2011 January - Notre Dame Club of Eastern North Carolina

January 2011
In this Issue:
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•
•
•
•
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When did you go to
ND?
Meet the Board
Christmas Brunch
recap
The Second “C”
ND Women’s Soccer
Upcoming Events
ND Alumni Club of
Eastern North Carolina
When did YOU go to Notre Dame?
By Joe Lipka
A few months ago when we were looking at where everyone lived to help us decide where to
locate our game watches to make them more convenient to more alumni, I began to wonder
about the age distribution of the various alumni. We saw at our last game watch that we had
seven decades of Domers at Trali Irish Pub watching the Irish whip up on USC. So I wondered
“When did we go to Notre Dame?” My theory was that the age demographic might be U
shaped, with a large concentration of senior type alums (with a nod to the popularity of North
Carolina as a retirement location) and a very large concentration of young alums (figuring that
graduate study at Duke, UNC and NCSU would account for that population) and not very many
alums in between. Seemed reasonable to me.
I checked out the Alumni Association database, did some downloading a little bit of formatting
and let excel draw me a picture of “when you went to Notre Dame.”
Cheers to a
new year
and
another
chance for
us to get it
right.
~Oprah Winfrey
I hate being disappointed by facts. My U shape was upside down! I was absolutely wrong
about the age distribution of the alumni in our club. In tabular form here is “when we went to
Notre Dame.” Are you as surprised as I am?
Graduation Year
NDAA Designation
In our club
Per cent group
National average
2000 - 2010
Young Alumni
251
23.81%
25%
1976 - 1999
Middle Alumni
528
50.09%
43%
1975 earlier
Senior Alumni
275
26.09%
32%
If you have any other similar questions about our club that you’d like answered, shoot me an email at [email protected] and I’ll see what I can dig up.
January 2011
Page 2 of 4
Meet the Board– Laura Horrigan
Note: This is the third in a series of “Meet the Board” articles
My dad is a ND alumnus, class of 1970, so I grew up an Irish fan. My parents were very
good though and encouraged me to look at all schools I was interested in, never
pressuring me to become attend Notre Dame. But when I stepped on campus (even
though my dad took me in the entrance near Stepan Center instead of Notre Dame Ave,
not sure what he was thinking), I knew it was the right fit. I was a Lions Hall girl and
spent spring of my Junior year in London, one of the best experiences I've had to date
before moving off-campus for my senior year. I double-majored in Business
Management and Sociology. Another important piece of my Notre Dame experience
was meeting my future husband, Shaun, during Freshman Orientation and as they say
the rest is history.
I moved to Manhattan and began a job in Human Resources with Morgan Stanley in
July after my graduation in May of 2004 and stayed in the New York City for 4 years.
During that time, Shaun proposed and we were married. In July of 2008, we made the
move south to Durham so that Shaun could attend business school at Duke. At that
time I started my position, also in Human Resources, with Rite Aid, working out of our
district office in Raleigh. We became involved in the Notre Dame club soon after
moving to the Triangle and participated in game watches, the Christmas Brunch, young
alumni events and volunteering with Habitat for Humanity. I also took the lead on the
Christmas Partners Project in 2008 and have continued with the project. This year there
was an open slot on the board and I let the board know I was up for the challenge. I
look forward to serving as a board member this year. Please let me know if you have
any suggestions, especially for young alumni-- [email protected]. And last, but
not least, Shaun and I are expecting a Future Domer, class of 2033, in March.
Christmas Brunch – already looking forward to the next one!
Nearly 90 people attended our Christmas Mass and Brunch held at the Prestonwood Country Club in Cary. Many thanks to Greg
Sley and Mike Flintosh for organizing the event! Pete Campbell introduced several alumni present at the brunch who were there
37 years ago when this tradition began as a pot-luck brunch in someone’s home on a Sunday morning. How things have changed!
We hope to see even more of you in this picture next December when we continue the tradition…
ND Club of Eastern NC, P.O. Box 13712, Research Triangle Park, NC 27709
And we’re on the web: http://eastnc.undclub.org
Page 3 of 4
January 2011
The Second “C” is Camaraderie
Note: This is part of a continuing series of articles by Joe Lipka.
Camaraderie represents the social events where Domers and their friends get together
and celebrate Notre Dame and enjoy the company of other Domers. Our “big three official
events” are the Universal Notre Dame night, the Student send off family picnic and the
Christmas Brunch. Fred Brinkselle chaired the UND night for a long time and has recently
passed the baton to Lynn Damitz for that event. Kevin Nickoderm is the chief motivator
behind our most popular annual event the annual student send off and Mass. Greg Sley
and Mike Flintosh put together a super Christmas Brunch at Prestonwood Country Club
this year. We have some photos from that event in this newsletter. Our best known events
are the Football Game Watches hosted by Erich Ruch (Rookie) at Trali Irish Pub at Brier
Creek. Over eighty of our fellow alums rocked Trali’s for the Purdue Opener and our
attendance this season averaged about forty. It says a lot about this group that you will
come over to Trali’s when you can just as easily sit on the sofa at home. Our longest
running camaraderie event is the first Friday Lunches hosted by Phil Carter. Just about
every first Friday you can meet other Domers for lunch at the Governor’s Inn at Research
Triangle Park. Yes, we have “our own table” and you are always welcome.
While we like traditional (what Domer doesn’t?) we started several events last year that we
will continue with this year. Rookie organized our First Scholarship Golf Tournament at
Brier Creek Country Club. We had a respectable showing for our first ever event. Sam
Leonardo and Becky Saydak organized a young alumni and a family picnic at the DBAP
this summer.
We’re always looking for social events, so if you have an idea and need some help to
make it happen, let us know. We especially would like to schedule events that would
appeal to both young alumni and young families. Talk to us! Please contact Becky
Saydak at [email protected] if you have any ideas for club social events.
Pray.ND.edu
Club Officers
Joe Lipka, Pres.
Daniel Meier, Vice-Pres.
Kevin Nickodem, Treas.
Becky Saydak, Secretary
Kathy Fyda-Turner,
Immed. Past Pres
Club Directors
Ellen Crowley
Lynn Damitz
Mike Flintosh
Laura Horrigan
Sam Leonardo
Jim Morrissey
Eric Ruch
Greg Sley
Katherine Sloan
Club Dues Reminder
Thanks to many of you who have paid your 2011 dues! All dues paid now will be valid
through Dec 2011, so if you have not yet sent them in, this is a good time to do so!
Your club dues make you eligible to apply for football tickets through our club, receive
price breaks on some of our club events, and you help support club functions including
the Hesburgh Lecture and Student Sendoff Picnic,
You can access the 2011 Dues Questionnaire on our web site at:
http://eastnc.undclub.org/s/1210/clubs-interior.aspx?sid=1210&gid=349&pgid=2182
Page 4 of 4
January 2011
Club members show up to see ND Women win 3rd NCAA
Soccer Championship Dec 5th, Cary NC
Local alumni showed up at WakeMed
Stadium in Cary, NC to cheer on the Irish
and see the Notre Dame Women’s soccer
team defeat top-ranked Stanford 1-0 in the
NCAA College Cup Championship game,
rd
winning their 3 title! After the game, the
club hosted the team for dinner in Raleigh.
Go Irish!
Upcoming Events
First Friday Luncheon – Friday, January 7th!
12:15pm at the Radisson Governor’s Inn in RTP
Guests welcome! Contact Phil Carter for info: [email protected]
InterFaith Food Shuttle – Saturday, January 8th!
8:30 – 10:30am New volunteers welcome!
For more information about the food shuttle and directions to the facility,
check out their web site at http://www.foodshuttle.org/ or contact Bill
Cunningham at [email protected] or Tom Rhodes at
[email protected]
Tax Assistance Program (TAP) is coming soon!
later in the month.
Stay tuned for more information