Newark College of Engineering

When NJIT holds its 103rd Commencement May 21, more than 100 Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) seniors will officially move on from their undergraduate study to begin the next chapter in their lives. While their plans after EOP may differ, the four years they’ve shared in the program provided them all with a uniquely supportive and familial environment. Here, we take a look at where just a few are going. Gloria Brewster Although Gloria Brewster is saying goodbye to EOP at NJIT, she’s not bidding adieu to the university. This fall, the computer engineering technology/medical...

On his first day of college, Stephen DePalma ’72 and his classmates received blunt words about their daunting engineering curriculum from then-President Robert Van Houten, clearly intended as a form of “no nonsense” motivation: “Look to your left and look to your right – one of those people will not be there at graduation.” “Sink or swim – that was the standard then,” recounts De Palma. He decidedly swam, going on after graduation to help build Schoor DePalma Inc., an engineering firm that reshaped – yes, literally – the New Jersey landscape. He attributes his success in navigating those...

When Angelo Del Russo ’82 says that he “always wanted to be a builder,” he is not exaggerating. By his early teens, the young enthusiast of masonry, concrete, roofing and carpentry already had a toehold in the industry, regularly working after school and on weekends with local home remodelers in the construction business. “It was mostly laborious work – raking gravel, pushing wheelbarrows full of concrete – but I loved it. To see the end product – that completed patio or set of stairs – was always so satisfying,” he recounts. “And as a teenager, I was making money.” But his parents,...

“We saw when you came in as freshmen, and you thought you knew it all. Then you realized after the first week of the summer program, do I really know anything?” reminisced Crystal Smith, interim director of NJIT’s Educational Opportunity Program (EOP), while addressing EOP graduating seniors, their parents and university staff and faculty. “And then you made it through to this awards ceremony for us to celebrate you.” And celebrated they were at EOP’s 47th annual gathering to commend students for their academic accomplishments. The class of 2019 includes 110 graduates representing a range...