FINALIST - 2005

Fidel Antonio Maltez

Undergraduate years are supposed to be the best of your life. This is the time to explore the world artistically, intellectually, and spiritually, to discover yourself and your passions. My past four years at Lafayette were spent doing exactly that, though not in the most common of ways.

I came to Lafayette as a bi-cultural individual eager to join an intellectual and socially active community. As a first-year student, I befriended motivated students and faculty who saw the importance in addressing social issues on campus and society at large—along with these friends I created Students for Social Justice. Our events range from discussions and petitions, to die-ins and speak-outs; my personal highlight of these activist days was the March 24, 2003 Anti-War Protest and Speak-Out held on campus. Needless to say, these were very stressful times; I found myself on the front line facing insults and rage from those disagreeing with our views. These interactions showed the need for common ground.

During my time at Lafayette, I began the search to use Lafayette’s assets towards the advancement of humanity. I attended various national conferences and discovered that Engineers without Borders provided a forum to use my civil engineering education, raise our department’s achievements, help students learn, and have fun along the way. The Honduras project proved more challenging than expected since this was the first time I applied my education to the real world with added pressure to succeed. Lafayette professors have stuck with us every step of the way; trailing through back roads in Honduras to sitting for hours fixing collected data. The project is succeeding due to efforts from a wide range of individuals and groups, the Lafayette and Honduras communities, and our financial supporters.

Other activities, like the Undesirable Elements play performed in Spring 2004, have also been growing experiences—all cases of students convening to create new stories of our Lafayette experience.

The Lafayette ideal is a combination of everything that makes up our community. Thus, no single person can embody all the members of our institution. In the last four years, I have aimed to create groups that bring these voices together. Lafayette opened my eyes to the real product of diversity: all of us working together toward a better world. Four years later, I leave Lafayette as a multi-cultural and receptive individual.

 

Major: Civil and Environmental Engineering

Achievements


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