QUEST Seniors

QUEST SENIORS

Eighty-nine seniors graduated from QUEST this year, leaving incredible legacies at the University of Maryland and in QUEST. Our Senior Sendoff in April was held through Zoom, filled with laughter, tears, and an original song performance of “Thank U, QUEST.” Seniors got creative with their graduation celebrations at home, and we were so proud to

have three students chosen as Commencement Speakers for their colleges: Ankit Sheth (Fall 2019 - Robert H. Smith School of Business), David Rosenstein (Spring 2020 - Robert H. Smith School of Business), and Chad Simon (Spring 2020 - A. James Clark School of Engineering).

89 GRADUATING SENIORS

94% pursuing full-time jobs

39% accepted jobs with QUEST corporate partners

*Numbers total to more than 100% because some students are pursuing both

100% would “DO IT ALL AGAIN”

8% pursuing graduate studies

NOTABLE SENIOR AWARDS

QUEST Director’s Service AwardDavid Rosenstein (Cohort 29)

QUEST Outstanding Service Awards Hadas Elazar-Mittelman (Cohort 30) Brianna Ho (Cohort 29) Shivani Krishnamurthy (Cohort 30) Celine Moarkech (Cohort 29) Ariana Riske (Cohort 29) Adam Sarsony (Cohort 29) Mary Smith (Cohort 29) Jack Sturtevant (Cohort 29) Kelli Webber (Cohort 29) Regina Wingate (Cohort 30) Olivia Wolcott (Cohort 30)

Fischell Department of Bioengineering Outstanding Leadership Award: Erin Reilly (Cohort 29)

Clark School Undergraduate Honors and Awards

Materials Science and Engineering Chair Award: Shannon Donaldson (Cohort 29)

Mechanical Engineering Chairman’s Awards: Charles Grody (Cohort 29) and Mary Smith (Cohort 29)

Maryland Medallion Society Nikhil Modi (Cohort 30) Sally Sterling Byrd Award: Jacqueline Deprey (Cohort 30) Wilson H. Elkins Award: Doron Tadmor (Cohort 29)

NOTABLE SENIOR AWARDS

Smith School Undergraduate Awards

Dean’s Leadership Award: Alexandra Bergman (Cohort 30)

Outstanding Department Senior in Operations Management and Business Analytics: Ariana Riske (Cohort 29)

Outstanding Department Senior in Marketing: David Rosenstein (Cohort 29)

Outstanding Department Senior in International Business: Doron Tadmor (Cohort 29)

Philip Merrill Presidential Scholars Ariana Riske (Cohort 29) David Rosenstein (Cohort 29) Doron Tadmor (Cohort 29)

Pitch Dingman Competition Winners Charles Grody (Cohort 29) Roger Mao (Cohort 29) Tuvia Rappaport (Cohort 29) Jack Sturtevant (Cohort 29)

Clark School Alumni Cup WinnersShannon Donaldson (Cohort 29)Hadas Elazar-Mittelman (Cohort 30)

Spirit of Maryland AwardNikhil Modi (Cohort 30)

Mechanical Engineering Design Day’s First Place and Social and Environmental Design Impact Award

Cavan Morley (Cohort 29)

American Marketing Association Student Marketer of the Year

David Rosenstein (Cohort 29)

TOP COMPANIES TO HIRE 2020 QUEST GRADUATES

■ Deloitte

■ Accenture

■ Bain and Company

■ Capital One

■ Amazon

■ Appian

■ ExxonMobil

■ Google

■ Lockheed Martin

“The people in QUEST are unlike any others I’ve met at UMD. It feels so inspiring to be surrounded by so much perseverance and talent in every class I’m a part of.”

SENIOR QUOTES

“I enjoyed the immediate sense of community and support in QUEST. No matter what the topic at hand, I knew I could count on QUEST members to help, whether it was related to class or not. Members of the faculty and staff were always approachable and helped me through so much. I wouldn’t be where I am socially or professionally without QUEST.”

“I really enjoyed the opportunity and faith the students were given to work with real-world clients. As an undergraduate student, I found it surprising how little I was able to apply the very things I learned from my lectures into action. With QUEST, this was essentially a requirement and greatly improved my experience because I felt I was actually making a difference with my innovative ideas and solutions.”

“QUEST taught me so many skills I find myself using all of the time in my regular work. From presentation making to writing a statement of work for client engagements, I constantly find myself referencing QUEST materials and past projects.”

“QUEST allowed me to step outside of my comfort zone. QUEST truly gave me an advantage in the areas of public speaking, teamwork abilities, and networking capabilities that I otherwise would not have seen in mechanical engineering alone.”

“QUEST really jump started the professional mindset I now have and allowed me to think and carry myself in ways I didn’t before. I loved the creativity of it all and how it intersected with many of my other classes in the application of what I learned. It was hard for me not to talk about QUEST, whether to recruiters, incoming freshmen, or friends. Without QUEST, I don’t think I would have the tools to properly apply my computer science major in the real world.”

QUEST SENIOR SPOTLIGHTS

Alex Bergman, operations management and business analytics ‘20 (Cohort 30), remembers the day she visited the Smith School of Business as a prospective student. As an out-of-state student from Connecticut, she was attracted to the focus on community-building. After enrolling at Smith, she immediately joined SUSA, Smith Undergraduate Student Association, where she met older students, some of whom encouraged her to apply to QUEST. “I saw the benefits I was getting from their mentorship, and it drove me to have a passion for mentorship and growing community which I carried through the rest of college,” she said.

Bergman began to seek out mentorship roles, both formally and informally. She took on positions such as Honors 100 Section Leader, New Member Assistant for her sorority, President of TAMID, a student group focused on consulting for start-ups in Israel, and QUEST 190H mentor. She gushed about her experience as a QUEST 190H mentor, noting, “It’s rare to be able to see your mentees every week so I really enjoyed watching them grow so much over the semester.”

Informally, she joined up with four other Smith students, including two from QUEST, to form the Maryland Consulting Group, a Facebook group consisting of students going through the recruiting process and exchanging recruiting resources. After connecting with Bain through QUEST alumnus Ben Hsieh, operations management ‘16 (Cohort 22), Bergman committed to a coveted internship after months of networking, casing, and interviewing. She wanted to pay it forward to other students going through the same recruiting process.

QUEST taught Bergman the “step back approach” in her leadership roles. “It taught me when to slow down and take a step back versus when it’s okay to go, go go,” she said. Bergman used her QUEST experience working in diverse teams to assist TAMID as well. “We had traditionally only recruited from Smith, but as President, I encouraged the organization to put an emphasis on recruiting STEM students, and it worked. Being able to recruit a diverse class of 35 members before my presidency ended felt very impactful because I could see myself in them just two years before, and I knew how much they’d grow through the organization.”

Bergman will join Bain full-time next year as an Associate Consultant in Washington, D.C. Through all of her involvements at Smith, she earned the Dean’s Leadership Award this past May. As an alumna, she looks forward to making a big impact recruiting for Bain and mentoring students who want to go into consulting. “I went to so many helpful alumni panels throughout college and am excited to be able to do that now for QUEST and beyond,” she shared.

When Jacqueline Deprey, computer science and operations management and business analytics ‘20 (Cohort 30), found herself at the University of Maryland freshman year, she felt overwhelmed and intimidated by all of the opportunities at such a large school. But four years later, it was getting involved in so many of those opportunities that she says allowed her to find her people and her niche on campus. “I had always seen myself as a computer science student first, but joining QUEST and meeting so many business and engineering students gave me a new feeling of community and inclusion,” she shared.

In addition to being in QUEST and serving as a QUEST Mentor, Deprey got involved in the Gemstone Honors Program where she held roles such as Financial Liaison, Orientation Leader, Freshmen Mentor, and Teaching Assistant. As a senior, she was the Vice President of Omicron Delta Kappa National Leadership Honor Society, Professional Chair of Alpha Omega Epsilon Women in STEM Sorority, Group Tourist Committee Head for Maryland Images Campus Tour Guides, Founding Member of the Student Advisory Board for Diversity and Inclusion in the Department of Computer Science, and perhaps most excitingly, the Host for Maryland Survivor.

Deprey has been able to bring a student voice to the table for many important campus projects. One of her favorite projects involved working with the Department of Computer Science to tailor the curriculum to be more inclusive of people from all backgrounds. She focused on helping professors recognize subtle biases that may exist from growing up in American culture in order to help international students feel more welcomed in the classroom.

Being involved has helped Deprey learn much about herself. “Playing Maryland Survivor specifically allowed me to take risks in a low-stakes environment and do a lot of personal discovery. For example, how far was I willing to tilt my moral compass to get ahead? It allowed me to discover a sense of courage in myself, and I felt really fortunate to be able to create these opportunities for other people in my role as the Host.”

Deprey is moving to New York City after graduation to join Dropbox as a Software Engineer. She “had the time of [her] life” interning at Dropbox’s headquarters last summer and getting to know the people there. “They are all very involved people like myself and seem like people I’d genuinely be friends with if I’d met them outside of work. I love that they all have passions outside of their work and recognize that their work is not their life.”

Deprey hopes that through her campus involvement, she has been able to “create that sense of inclusion that other people had on me while I was a freshman. I hope I’ve been able to pay it forward and can continue to as a UMD and QUEST alumna.”

Jacqueline Deprey

Doron Tadmor, international business and operations management ‘20 (Cohort 29), has always had a passion for bettering the environment around him. This meant getting involved in UMD’s governing bodies from the start. As part of the Student Government Association, University Senate, Residence Hall Association, Smith Undergraduate Student Association, and University Student Judiciary, Tadmor has worked on many key projects, all aimed at improving the student experience on campus. Through QUEST, he gained a higher understanding of “how to incorporate strategy in executing project goals and use methods like DMAIC to understand if something is an actual problem before wasting resources.”

During freshman year, he worked with other students to encourage the Athletics Department to test the athletic fields for potential carcinogens. Sophomore year, he worked alongside the Department of Dining Services to increase international, vegan, and vegetarian food options. However, Tadmor cites the creation of the Emergency Meal Fund during his junior year as his most rewarding project.

“In 2018, the Counseling Center found that 20% of our campus was food insecure, meaning that over 8,000 students were struggling to get access to food. After speaking with impacted students and researchers from the Counseling Center, I realized that food insecurity is much more than not having access to food - it affects a students’ grades, mental health, and social life,” he explained. Recognizing an unmet need, Tadmor created the Emergency Meal Fund, which provided more than 2,400 meals for students who are food insecure. “I am proud that this fund will continue to live on past my time at UMD because all I hope to do is to leave this campus better than I found it,” he said.

Tadmor has not only made a lasting impact at UMD but has lived in four countries and contributed to projects in 31 countries throughout college. He looks forward to continuing to make a global impact while pursuing his Masters in International Management at Imperial College London next year. He shared, “My goal is to work towards increasing financial and economic inclusion of rural and indigenous populations in Latin America by bringing business to them. I specifically hope to work with international companies to tailor their products to local market tastes and local startups seeking to expand to new countries.”

From his first semester at UMD, Adith Thummalapalli, mechanical engineering ‘20 (Cohort 30), became an advocate for those not always willing to advocate for themselves. He saw friends in high school struggle with mental health and wanted to learn how to help. He joined the Help Center, UMD’s peer counseling and crisis intervention hotline, and volunteered there for the past four years. “It feels really awesome knowing that sometimes all you need to do is listen, and you can help somebody immensely,” he shared.

By junior year, he started advocating for his own challenges. Thummalapalli, who has a physical disability and uses a wheelchair, observed hundreds of inaccessible buildings and other obstacles across campus. Sparked by an elevator shutdown that prevented him from getting to class, he created a 24-page campus accessibility report and submitted it to the Student Government Association (SGA). With the help of SGA Vice President Doron Tadmor, whom he met through

opt-in, started putting a stairlift in South Campus Dining Hall, and fixed many of the curb cuts Thummalapalli had pointed out in his report. The President’s Commission on Disability Issues created a brand new student committee, appointing Thummalapalli as one of three chairpeople.

“I can’t believe that something I did created a momentum like this,” Thummalapalli said. “I didn’t do it for myself. I did it for all of the students who will come after me and run into these issues on a daily basis who might not want to speak out about it for whatever reason.”

These days, Thummalapalli finds himself speaking to many audiences on the topic of disability advocacy. In the spring semester, a professor of ethics in engineering who read the report, reached out to invite Thummalapalli to speak to her course. “I used to be hesitant about public speaking and would not have been comfortable talking to a class of 65 students, but I’m so much more comfortable because of QUEST. I’ve learned how to tell a compelling story to really engage the audience,” he shared.

Energy conservation is another passion for Thummalapalli, and he looks forward to beginning his career in building energy analysis for Mueller Associates. “I’m excited to take historic buildings and make them energy efficient using all of the new technology that exists today.” He also plans to stay involved in the President’s Commission on Disability Issues as an alumni member and attend future QUEST Conferences and presentations.