Sending Off Our 2025 Graduates

They come to us from near and far, from big cities, small towns and places between. They bring their passions with them, match them to our programs and colleges, and blaze paths that prepare them to Think and Do beyond our campus and in their communities and careers. And when their time with us is over, they all don that glorious Wolfpack Red to celebrate what they’ve achieved, together.

Our 2025 graduating class includes future entrepreneurs and earthquake experts, sports marketers and pharmaceutical engineers, doctoral researchers and design thinkers. We spent time with a few of them so we could tell you about their NC State experiences and where they’re headed next.

This spring, as the Wolfpack waves farewell to our much-loved Chancellor Woodson, we’re also saying farewell to another group of outstanding graduates. But remember, it’s not goodbye — it’s go Pack!

---

Beth Liles: Never a Linear Path

• Major: Bioprocessing
• Hometown: Apex, North Carolina
• Advice for Students: Track your schedule — things will book up fast so start things early if you can and don’t forget to take breaks.

Shortly after transferring as a psychology major, Beth Liles discovered a new passion in bioprocessing, a major in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

Starting at NC State in a new major meant Liles had an unexpected extra year of school to complete. But then she received the Dr. Isadore and Cynthia Peppe Food, Bioprocessing and Nutrition Sciences Scholarship. The scholarship came at the right time: In addition to having the unexpected added cost of tuition, Liles’s family was also paying medical bills for her father’s cancer treatments.

“College is never a linear path,” said Liles. “I knew I needed more time, which meant more cost. And this scholarship eased me and my family’s financial stress.”

Despite being a commuter student, Liles has stayed involved at NC State, always trying new things, from being a research assistant to joining the Agricultural Communicators Program.

“Because of the program and my research work, I got to interact with a lot of people involved in the field locally,” said Liles. “That’s really shaped my outlook, because I got to meet with people from different backgrounds and perspectives.”

While Liles has conducted some food safety research, she’s been particularly interested in the biopharmaceutical process — and upon graduation, she’ll be officially starting her career with Holly Springs-based Fujifilm as a manufacturing support associate.

“I’ve learned a lot about local biopharmaceutical plants and companies through my program,” said Liles. “It’s really cool to see their process and how they create pharmaceuticals that are improving people’s lives every day.”

---

---

Emi Boldor: Finding Flexibility Within Structure

• Major: Civil engineering and international studies
• Hometown: Baton Rouge, Louisiana
• Fun Fact: While studying abroad in Spain, she competed in an ultimate frisbee national tournament.

Park Scholar Emi Boldor knows that the buildings suited to withstand major earthquakes are engineered to be flexible. She applied a similar wisdom to her time at NC State, finding ways to stretch her abilities by thinking globally and collaboratively.

Growing up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Boldor witnessed the devastation of hurricanes and floods and decided to study civil engineering. But at the College of Engineering, she was drawn toward earthquake research.

Her interest in structural engineering for earthquakes led her to the Seismic Design Competition — and an extracurricular community just as excited to design and build complex towers made of balsa wood that could withstand earthquake simulations.

The competition and her coursework helped Boldor understand the value of collaborative group work.

“Civil engineering has many different concentrations,” Boldor said. “When you work together, you might share overlapping knowledge, but you also get to learn from other people’s specific expertise.”

A Benjamin Franklin Scholar, she has combined engineering with social sciences and will get a second degree in international studies. Boldor spent summers in Romania growing up and has naturally developed an interest in global perspectives. She traveled to Qatar to explore the impact of the 2022 World Cup on its infrastructure and also studied in Spain, where she learned to embrace its different rhythm and culture.

Boldor loved volleyball on Spain’s beaches, but she knows how to shake things up. In the fall, she’ll enroll in an accelerated Ph.D. program in earthquake engineering at the University of Colorado, where she can go skiing.

“I’m looking forward to the snow!”

---

---

Josh Ott: Aiming Beyond His Reach

• Major: Physics and mathematics
• Hometown: Raleigh, North Carolina
• Fun Fact: Ott has worked at the only two places in the world with the capability to create quark-gluon plasma — Brookhaven National Laboratory in the U.S. and the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Switzerland.

Josh Ott has a track record of achieving goals he thought were beyond his reach. As a first-year student — with only one introductory physics course under his belt — he contacted Vladimir Skokov, an associate professor of physics, asking to be involved in his research.

“Sending that email was a bold move, but it paid off big time,” Ott said.

Ott’s work in Skokov’s lab involves exploring the properties of quark-gluon plasma, an extremely hot and dense soup of quarks and gluons that existed microseconds after the Big Bang. Quarks and gluons are the fundamental particles that make up protons and neutrons, the building blocks of atomic nuclei. Atoms, in turn, make up matter. The research has the potential to give scientists deeper insight into the early universe.

Ott’s undergraduate research led to new opportunities, including internships at Brookhaven National Laboratory and CERN.

“Going to CERN for a summer was the loftiest goal I had set for myself,” Ott said. “It’s because of my work here that I was able to go there.”

Accomplishing his most ambitious goal gave Ott the confidence to aim even higher. In 2024, he was named an Astronaut Scholar. The prestigious award is among the largest merit-based monetary scholarships given to undergraduate STEM students.

Ott has made a habit of pursuing present interests rather than future success, and encourages other students to do the same.

“I’ve focused on finding what was fun and motivating in the moment,” Ott said. “I also didn’t wait until I felt ready to do things — I just went for it. That’s extremely important. If you wait for a time when you feel ready, it won’t happen.”

---

---

Lexus Silver: Making Connections, Building a Brand

• Major: Business administration with a marketing concentration
• Hometown: Baltimore, Maryland
• Advice for Students: Tap into resources for career development and relationship-building, such as the Women’s Center and Career Development Center, and make time to hang out with friends on Hillsborough Street.

Lexus Silver built her undergraduate experience around relationships. It started when her first-year roommate encouraged her to consider the Poole College of Management. Silver soon found that the college’s people-focused courses in brand management and marketing were just what she was looking for.

“You engage with real clients and gain real-world experience,” she said. “You learn to understand and work with people, not just so you can sell your product, but so you can make deeper connections and build a brand.”

After first hesitating, Silver embraced guidance from faculty mentors, which led to success in the classroom, a job in the front office of Poole College and internships with NC State Athletics. She’s helped coordinate marketing and engagement strategies across multiple Wolfpack sports, including supporting women’s basketball during a campus visit from ESPN’s College GameDay.

“I’m getting great opportunities, including job interviews, just based on my internships,” she said. “NC State has a great network, and they’re getting me plugged in.”

Silver rounded out her undergraduate journey through membership and leadership in student organizations, including the Women in Business Club, the National Association of Black Accountants and Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority.

She believes the knowledge she’s earned and the relationships she’s formed have prepared her to chase her dream career — sports marketing, perhaps someday with her hometown NFL team, the Baltimore Ravens.

“Build those connections, with your professors and your classmates,” she said. “You never know which one might help you along the way.”

---

---

Xzavier Taylor: A Longer Road to Graduation

• Major: Industrial design
• Hometown: The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians’ Qualla Boundary
• Favorite Campus Spot: “The lawn in front of the 1911 Building. When you walk down through the buildings between our studio [at 111 Lampe Drive] and see the Court of North Carolina at golden hour, when the light is shining just right, it’s beautiful. And I love the historical feeling of it.”

For many NC State seniors, commencement represents the culmination of 17 or 18 straight years of school. Xzavier Taylor, 35, traveled a longer road to his bachelor’s degree from the College of Design.

Right after high school, Taylor briefly pursued graphic design at the Art Institute of Atlanta before leaving and returning home. The decade or so that followed — what he now terms his “rambunctious period” — included becoming a very young father.

“I was just trying to live my life, doing the best that I could,” Taylor said.

Eventually, he decided he needed to become a better role model for his two sons. He enrolled at Southwestern Community College, embraced sobriety and graduated magna cum laude in graphic design. Taylor then chose to fulfill his mother’s unrealized dream to attend NC State.

“It was such a big deal for me to come here,” he said. “I never thought I was good enough. But I was a late bloomer.”

A guest speaker in his freshman-year class on design thinking lit up his imagination by describing problem-solving in industrial design. Classmates and faculty buoyed his confidence, and a campus job plus critical scholarship support helped him secure food and housing.

Taylor is ready for a design career. He can also see himself as a professor someday, inspiring young people — especially those who might struggle to envision opportunity and success for themselves.

“Every single person that I’ve met here has made such a difference in my life,” he said. “I’m incredibly thankful.”

---