Abby Waxler ’19
The following article appeared in the Colgate Maroon News, August 29, 2018.
Hailing from Wyomissing, Pennsylvania, senior Abby Waxler arrived in Hamilton three years ago with an open mind and an eagerness to get involved on campus.
An active member of the Colgate community, Waxler is a member of Link Staff and serves as the Chief of Staff for the Student Government Association. Last semester, she studied abroad in Dublin, Ireland.
Waxler is a computer science major who has applied her coding knowledge toward her work as the Director of Operations for Gipper, a startup founded through Colgate’s Thought Into Action entrepreneurship program. Gipper is an athletic communications platform that works with private schools to create media content featuring athletic highlights.
Waxler says that computer science was not always her master plan.
“I took a lot of computer science classes in high school but had zero intention of majoring in it here. That is, until I was placed in COSC 101 [Introduction for Computing I] my first semester, loved it and completely changed my mind.”
Waxler fuels her intellectual curiosity by taking classes outside of her major.
“My favorite class that I’ve taken here was the American School,” she said. “I’m a science person and took it strictly for the distribution requirements, but loved the class and recommend to all.”
In addition to her academic and extracurricular commitments during the school year, Waxler has developed professional skills during her summers. This past summer, she worked at Tinder in Los Angeles as a software engineer in the iOS engineering department.
“I loved working for a small company with a huge impact because I had real responsibilities as a software engineering intern. The work was pretty difficult but it was overall a fun experience,” Waxler said.
Preparing for life after Colgate, Waxler will miss the free gym membership, Byrne Dairy pumpkin pie ice cream and most of all, the people.
Waxler made sure to advise first-years to take advantage of relationships with faculty and small class sizes.
“Go to office hours! The professors at Colgate are great and have so much to teach you if you just ask. Also, take COSC 101 before you leave Colgate – you won’t regret it,” she said.
Although she is unsure where her path will lead next, she is considering working in software engineering in Manhattan or joining the Navy to do intelligence work.
But for now, don’t be a stranger when you see Waxler on the fifth floor of Case-Geyer library. “I love to be interrupted,” she said.
Contact Haley Fuller at hfuller@colgate.edu.