<\/p>\n
D<\/span>uring her<\/span><\/strong> inspiring investiture speech<\/strong>, Dr. McMahan spoke about <\/span>leading our university\u2019s students \u2014 both present and future\u2014 along a \u201cclear path to a bright future\u201d (our cover story on Page 16), it immediately brought to mind memories of my own journey to Eastern.<\/span><\/p>\n For me, that path wasn\u2019t all that clear. But, like so many other young people who end up at Eastern, I was at least hopeful that my future would be bright.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s not that I didn\u2019t think college was in my future. My mom especially had always urged me to take academics seriously. At Medical Lake High School, I had great teachers that pushed to bring out the best in me and my classmates. <\/span><\/p>\n As a serious athlete who worked hard to excel in both football and baseball, there were plenty of distractions. But with the urging and support of my family, I managed to do well in the classroom. By the time graduation rolled around, I felt ready for college \u2014 both academically and athletically \u2014 and I was hopeful of becoming a scholarship student\u00a0 <\/span>athlete playing football at EWU.<\/span><\/p>\n In fact, the scholarship offers came. Just not from Eastern. I considered signing with another school, but just couldn\u2019t see myself as anything other than an Eagle. So I put my college ambitions on hold, and instead signed a contract to play ball with the Kansas City Royals. <\/span><\/p>\n Playing AA baseball in the Royals\u2019 system was an experience I wouldn\u2019t trade for the world. But when a career in baseball didn\u2019t work out, I knew for sure that it was time to take the path leading back to Eastern. Many of you know my football story at EWU \u2014 a running back twice named to the All-Big Sky team and later honored as a member of the EWU\u2019s 2000-2009 All-Decade Team. You may not know that in the classroom, I had a professor and mentor, Stu Steiner, who believed that I had the right stuff to be an electrical engineer. With hard work, and his guidance, I made it happen, later adding a Master of Business Administration degree. Today, I work for Avista as a director in generation production and substation support. It\u2019s a job that I love.<\/span><\/p>\n As the new chair of the EWU Foundation Board, I feel like I\u2019ve come full circle: Back at Eastern and in a position to help a new generation of students find their own \u201cpath to a bright future,\u201d even if that path is as circuitous as my own.<\/span><\/p>\n Go Eags!<\/span><\/p>\n Alexis Alexander \u201908, \u201914<\/b><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" During her inspiring investiture speech, Dr. McMahan spoke about leading our university\u2019s students \u2014 both present and future\u2014 along a \u201cclear path to a bright future\u201d (our cover story on Page 16), it immediately brought to mind memories of my own journey to Eastern. For me, that path wasn\u2019t all that clear. But, like…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":484,"featured_media":2683,"menu_order":0,"template":"","class_list":["post-2681","stories","type-stories","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","stories_categories-alumni-profiles","stories_tags-fall-winter-2023-24"],"acf":{"subheading":"","featured_image_format":"cover","display_featured_image":true,"display_byline":false,"display_date_published":false,"featured_video":"","Links":false,"Resources":false,"page_hide_sidebar":false,"page_enable_page_nav":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/stories\/2681","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/stories"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/stories"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/484"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/stories\/2681\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2684,"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/stories\/2681\/revisions\/2684"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test-www.ewu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}