New York, New Doors for Lions

Reading Time: 7 minutes

Confession: post-blizzard Manhattan is a useful teacher.

For starters, I learned the value of a good coat check. Inefficient ones create traffic patterns that look suspiciously like the 405 at rush hour. Thankfully, Wall Street moves faster. Hot coffee and pocket-warming packets are also must-haves.

But what really got my morning going? Energetic LMU students asking thoughtful questions that made seasoned executives pause and rethink their usual answers.

That happened more than once.

What I’ll remember from our week in New York isn’t the weather. It’s how powerfully LMU showed up—in boardrooms, newsrooms, rehearsal halls, and on the trading floor. Our alumni showed up. Our students showed up. And the LMU team behind the scenes made the entire week feel effortless.

This was not just your standard LMU Career Trek, and they’re already impressive.

It was a week in which Lions stepped into rooms where real decisions are made. It was also a week in which CBA Dean Dayle Smith led a New York chapter of the LMU College of Business Administration’s centennial celebration—culminating in a visit to the New York Stock Exchange, a tour of the trading floor, an executive-led fireside chat, and a CBA birthday cake that somehow felt perfectly at home on Wall Street.

And while we were celebrating 100 years of Business for Good, we also hosted a terrific “Hope, Made Here” gathering at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, where parents, prospective students, alumni, faculty, staff, and students came together in one very LMU room at NBCUniversal.

A quick word of thanks to the many LMU teams who made the week possible. Thank you to our Enrollment Management team, to Career and Professional Development, to our Alumni team, and to University Advancement for bringing the broader LMU community together in New York in such a meaningful way.

LMU now connects students with 2,000+ internships each year. 93% complete one before graduation, and 98% of the Class of 2024 launched into work, graduate school, or service within six months.

Many of the alumni opening doors for our students once walked through those same doors themselves. Some even participated in Career Treks themselves. Now they are the hosts, sponsors, and mentors.

That’s the Lion network—Lions putting themselves out there for Lions.

As an LMU alum, I’m excited how much Career and Professional Development has grown since my student days. Thanks to Dr. Maureen Weatherall for leading these teams to such impressive outcomes that support the success of our LMU Lions.

Thank you to President Thomas Poon for again leading us by example all week. One of the special things about LMU is that our president, regents, alumni, and campus leaders don’t cheer from a safe distance. They show up. They walk beside students. They model what leadership in service of others actually looks like.

Not every university can say that. LMU can.

Thank you as well to Emma Carrasco ’82, LMU Regent and senior vice president of corporate affairs for NBCUniversal News Group; Revi-ruth Enriquez-Cohen ’02, LMU Regent and vice president of legal affairs at BMI; Jacob G. Padrón ’04, artistic director of Long Wharf Theatre; and Kedric Dines ’86, LMU Regent and managing director in derivatives risk solutions at Mizuho.

And yes—special thanks to Kedric for proving that Wall Street can, in fact, make room for an AI-inspired LMU rap.

At the NBCUniversal reception, Koko Leong ’28, a finance major and student speaker, was a standout. Koko is one of those wonderfully entrepreneurial and creative Lions who makes the rest of us sit up a little straighter when he speaks. When students like Koko step to the microphone and represent LMU with that kind of confidence, preparation, and authenticity, you are reminded very quickly why programs like Career Treks matter.

It was also fun to see LMU shining brightly in Times Square, thanks to Bernie Paine, vice president for Marketing and Brand Management, and our marketing and brand team.

Thanks as well to Victoria Gerken, vice president for Communications and Public Relations for leading the social and creative teams who joined us, captured the week so beautifully, and made sure these moments were shared with the broader LMU community.

And one of my favorite New York moments? Running into LMU alumni on the subway and on the street—little reminders that the Lion network travels well.

And because every New York trip deserves one good trivia moment, thank you to NYSE curator Anna Melo for bringing the building’s history to life.

The quick version: Alexander Hamilton didn’t technically establish the New York Stock Exchange. But his plan to stabilize the young nation’s finances after the Revolutionary War helped create the early securities markets that eventually led to the 1792 Buttonwood Agreement, when brokers began organizing what would become the NYSE. History—like a good market—is better when the details are right.

From Broadway to Broad Street, this week was a reminder that LMU doesn’t just prepare students for what comes next in life.

We show up for them. We show up with them. We open doors.

And when those doors open, Lions hold them for the next Lion walking through.

That is Career Trek at its best.

That is CBA at 100.

That is Hope, Made Here.

That is LMU’s New York State of Mind.

—John

P.S. One final confession: this post doesn’t come close to capturing everything that happened during the week.

New York moves fast—and our schedule moved almost as fast as one of Dean Smith’s rapid-fire ideation sessions.

In addition to the moments above, our students also visited JPMorgan, Mizuho, The New York Times, BMI, America Media, Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater, and other organizations across finance, media, and the arts. Each stop brought new conversations, new mentors, and another example of Lions opening doors for Lions.

The full story of the week—like New York itself—moves a little too fast and includes a few too many great moments to fit into one readable blog post.