Class Reunion Agents: Establishing a tradition of giving

Bob Squatriglia, who retired in 2003 as Coastal’s vice president for Student Affairs, hasn’t slowed down much. A special consultant and emeritus faculty member, he is still singing the praises of this university, only now instead of talking to students, he’s addressing a different crowd: alumni.

He heads the Class Reunion Agents campaign, a new program designed to identify alumni who will act as a bridge between the university and their respective classes. So far, 20 Coastal alumni who were class leaders during their time on campus have been tapped for the role.“What we’re doing is establishing a class tradition,” says Squatriglia. So far, the agents have mailed out 2,200 letters seeking modest financial support in the name of “a favorite Coastal person who made a difference in your CCU experience.”

“This takes us beyond the concept of a class gift,” says Squatriglia, “such as the park benches and plaques around campus that were purchased by one class or another during their senior years. The Class Reunion agents were asked to help raise a class goal of $2,000 or more for the 50th anniversary gift. But, more importantly, they will help the university to build better alumni records.

Because of Coastal’s many years as part of the University of South Carolina system, there are gaps in CCU’s alumni records. “We’ve been plagued by old or out-of-date addresses. This program will help us develop better data.”

Squatriglia reports that of the nine classes represented so far by reunion agents, one class was over its goal, two more were close, four were more than halfway there and another was approaching the halfway mark. “I feel like I’m tending a garden here, planting seeds that will take root and grow. It’s all about nurturing.”

The class reunion agents are people like Mike Shepard of Dayton, Ohio, national sales manager for Reynolds & Reynolds, who graduated in 1989 with a degree in business with an emphasis in management. While at Coastal, Shepard was president of Sigma Phi Epsilon and the Society of Undersea World, a club for divers. He still loves to dive and has tested the waters in Hawaii, Cozumel and Key Largo. He’s married and has a 13-year-old son.

His years at Coastal, he says, were “the most enjoyable years of my life” in terms of friendships developed and lessons learned. “College is a do-it-yourself kit; you get out of it what you put into it. Back then, Coastal was a commuter campus. There were people who treated it like high school and just went to classes and back home. And then there were people who got involved in the Campus Union, in Greek Life, in sports; those were the people who got the most out of their experience.”

They’re people like Richard Zechhino (1994), who graduated from Coastal to pursue a law degree at Michigan State University, a LLN degree at New York University and an estate planning certificate at Temple University. He now practices law in Phillipsburg, N.J. While a student here in the early 1990s, Zechhino was president of Sigma Phi Epsilon and the Intra Greek Council, he played intramural sports (his fraternity team went on to the national flag football championship one year), he was in the play Mousetrap, and, oh yeah, he studied English and history. “I loved Coastal and my time there,” he says.

And they’re people like Brett Looker of London, England, who came to Coastal in 1990 as a scholarship soccer player. “I came to the U.S. as a 17-year-old with two suitcases and a plane ticket,” he says. Looker studied business management, worked a campus job (in marketing communications) and was a member of Omicron Delta Kappa and the International Club, in addition to his time on the soccer field.

“Intercollegiate sports gave me the opportunity to travel all over the U.S. and make lifelong friends,” says Looker, who now works in Columbia as manager of membership at Blue Cross. He lives in Lexington with wife Shay (’92) and their two sons: Gavin, 6, and Cade, 2.

They’re also people like Tiffany Crawford, class of 1999, now an environmental scientist in the Water Protection Division of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Philadelphia, where she once interned as a Coastal student. She is one of the founding members of Coastal African American Alumni Professionals (CAP).

“Through my academics and participation in student activities at Coastal, I benefitted so much as an individual,” says Crawford, another student leader who was involved in nearly every aspect of campus life. “What can I say, other than those were truly some of the best years of my life.”

The class reunion agents also include: Robert Cannon Jr. (1964), Robert Cook (1964), Irby Koon (1969), Dixie Hinson (1969), Charlie Frye Jr. (1974), Larry Dickerson (1974), Juli Powers (1979), Derek Blanton (1979), Vonna Gengo (1984), Stephen and Jean Ann Brakefield (1984), Timothy Meacham (1984), Mark Porter (1989) and Treda Smith (1999).

Back to top.