Northeastern's newest “Hunt­ington 100,” a group of extra­or­di­nary stu­dents selected for their impres­sive achieve­ments and impact both on campus and around the world, was hon­ored last week at a recep­tion with uni­ver­sity leaders, fac­ulty, and staff.

The honor, now in its second year, rec­og­nizes seniors and under­classmen who have excelled in their respec­tive areas—from research and entre­pre­neur­ship to expe­ri­en­tial learning and ath­letics. This year's newest “100” mem­bers were joined at the recep­tion by under­classmen who received the dis­tinc­tion last year.

“We're very proud of your accom­plish­ments,” Aoun said. “You were chosen because you are role models, and you've had a great impact on the uni­ver­sity, stu­dents, fac­ulty, staff, and society.”

Many grad­u­ating seniors are set to begin exciting careers or pres­ti­gious grad­uate pro­grams. Aoun urged soon-​​to-​​be-​​graduates to remain con­nected with North­eastern as alumni and net­work with fellow alums across the globe. “Your job is just begin­ning,” he said. “No matter where you go, you will be a North­eastern grad­uate and a leader. Take a piece of North­eastern with you.”

Lead­er­ship was a common char­ac­ter­istic among the group, which included Stu­dent Gov­ern­ment Asso­ci­a­tion Pres­i­dent Nick Naraghi, CIS'15; women's soccer cap­tain Hanna Terry, SSH'14; Max Kaye, DMSB'14, CEO of IDEA, Northeastern's student-​​run ven­ture accel­er­ator; Stanislas Phanord, SSH'14, who recently received the esteemed Rangel Fel­low­ship and Ful­bright Schol­ar­ship; and Laura Marelic, AMD'15, who has spear­headed the cre­ation of the new stu­dent design agency SCOUT.

Many “Hunt­ington 100” stu­dents have also had dynamic co-​​op expe­ri­ences. Nate Bessa, CIS'14, devel­oped a soft­ware pro­gram that mon­i­tors a physi­cian pro­duc­tivity incen­tive pro­gram at Brigham and Women's Hos­pital. Rachael Tompa, E'14, worked at NASA's Jet Propul­sion Lab­o­ra­tory on the Thermal Tech­nology and Fluid Sys­tems group. Klevis Xharda and Laura Mueller-​​Soppart, both SSH'14, were selected to com­plete expe­ri­en­tial learning oppor­tu­ni­ties at the White House.

Stu­dents hailed co-​​op as both a pri­mary factor in their choosing North­eastern and their pro­fes­sional growth during their time here. Kevin Rath­burn, E'14, com­pleted three co-​​ops at CDM Smith, a Cam­bridge, Mass.-based con­sulting, engi­neering, con­struc­tion, and oper­a­tions firm. On his third co-​​op, he was tasked with leading a sewer system reha­bil­i­ta­tion project.

In addi­tion to his work on co-​​op, he's a member of Northeastern's chapter of Engi­neers Without Bor­ders, which has brought clean water to fam­i­lies in Hon­duras and Bbanda, Uganda since its founding in 2005. This spring, he accepted a full-​​time posi­tion as an envi­ron­mental engi­neer at Envi­ron­mental Part­ners Group in Quincy, Mass. “The on-​​the-​​job training was so valu­able for me, just learning the day-​​to-​​day oper­a­tions,” he said.

Michele Bellini, DMSB'14, was part of the stu­dent lead­er­ship team that orga­nized the university's inau­gural Global Summit on the 2008 finan­cial crisis held on campus ear­lier this month. The Italy-​​native is also in the D'Amore-McKim School of Busi­ness' BSIB pro­gram and chapter of Net Impact, an inter­na­tional non­profit orga­ni­za­tion whose mis­sion is to make a pos­i­tive impact on society by growing and strength­ening a com­mu­nity of leaders who use busi­ness to improve the world.

“I've expanded my hori­zons here,” he said. “North­eastern really works hard to empower its students.”