President Gora's celebration in Chicago

On Thursday night, I had a great opportunity to attend Ball State President Jo Ann Gora's retirement reception at the University Club of Chicago. I covered the reception for "The Ball State Daily News". In October 2013, Gora announced she would retire at the end of June of this year after serving 10 years as president. She is the first female to serve as president of a public university in Indiana.

Gora told me her and her husband love visiting Chicago, she thinks it's a vibrant and exciting city. She loves going to the museums including the Art Institute and walking down Michigan Avenue. She talked to all the alumni in the room and spoke about all the changes that have occurred during her tenure.

The reception proved to be an excellent networking event with alumni in the Chicago metropolitan area. Within the first few minutes of my arrival Julie Stroh, associate vice president of alumni programs, quickly introduced me to President Gora. After a few minutes of conversation, Gora then introduced me to Mike Smith who spoke to me about his career after graduating from the Department of Journalism. I also met Shawn Malayter who works with the Ball State alumni chapter in Chicago.

I saw a few familiar faces at the event as well. I talked to the former editor-in-chief of "The Ball State Daily News" Benjamin Dashley who I worked with the first semester of my freshmen year . He now works for the Associated Press in Chicago. I also ran into Joe Pavilonis, a friend from the Ball State Runners' Association who graduated from the College of Architecture and Planning earlier this month.

Check out more pictures!

Joe Pavilonis and I at the reception. 

The attendees during the presentation.