What’s next for the Class of 2025: Hope Boldizar

By: Abby Miles ’25

“What’s next for the Class of 2025” is a series that features Lafayette grads—where they’re headed, and the mentors, resources, and experiences that inspired their future path. Stay tuned for more stories throughout April and May.

Major: Neuroscience

Destination/future plans: Associate neurophysiologist with NuVasive Clinical Services, working at Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, Pa., using intraoperative neurophysiological monitoring with surgery patients, helping to reduce the chance of neurological damage.

Involvement on campus:

At her time at Lafayette, Hope Boldizar ’25 was a member of the varsity swim team and Alpha Phi sorority, serving as the vice president of marketing (2024) and chair of the Red Dress Gala philanthropy event (2025). She served as peer mentor to first-year student-athletes and was inducted in the Order of Omega Greek Honor Society. She became the psych lab assistant for an introductory psychology lab for two years.

Boldizar is a member of Pards Against Sexual Assault (PASA), and previously served on the executive board as the outreach chair.

In her work in the Neuroscience Department, Boldizar has been an active researcher. She worked as a Neuroscience Resource Team (NRT) member and conducted research with Tamara Stawicki on hair cell cillia in zebrafish. She worked closely with Stawicki, ranging from lab support in 2022-23, to Bergh Scholarship work in summer 2023, and in the publication of their findings as a first author in 2024.

Stawicki served as her adviser and research mentor, and helped her throughout her time at Lafayette. She is someone “who guided me through the neuroscience major, welcomed me into her lab, and gave me the opportunity to participate in published research.”

Mentors and experiences that mattered most:

When asked about her experiences at Lafayette, Boldizar remarks there was no single experience that mattered the most, but, instead, it was the culmination of all the little ones. She expresses gratitude toward all the people she got to meet, the classes she took, and all the various activities that each left a long-lasting impression. 

“As I prepare to leave Lafayette, it will be the people I miss most. The close-knit community here is so unique, and has impacted my time here for the better,” she says. 

Reflecting on her connection with professors across her time at Lafayette, Boldizar notes there was not a single professor who was not personally invested in her success. She remarks, “At a big school, it is easy to get lost in large classes, but at Lafayette, I always got to know my professors and they got to know me.” That close relationship with professors created a network of support. Boldizar says professors at Lafayette cared about her success not just in the classroom, but also in the world and in her future. 

She’s grateful for her swim coach, Jim Dailey. Boldizar reflects on her time on the team, knowing her coach congratulated and supported her academic success and accomplishments as well as athleticism. “He never made me feel like being a student had to come second to being an athlete,” Boldizar notes. This supportive environment created conditions that allowed her to succeed at the Division I level, as well as receive an exceptional education.