Friend of the College Award
C. Michelle Panovich
Palm Coast, Fla.
A 40-year veteran of the real estate business, Michelle Panovich of MichDon Properties generously shares her hard-won expertise with Marquette students preparing to work in her field. “This business requires you to think on your feet, to reach out to others for information and advice and to be creative,” she says, adding that she especially enjoys mentoring people just entering the field.
Michelle is a member of the Real Estate Advisory Board at Marquette and serves as an advisor for REAP, an applied-learning program that gives a select group of real estate students the chance to gain real world experience in aspects of real estate including investment sourcing, underwriting, closing, management and investor reporting.
She offers this amusing story about the REAP program. The Real Estate Advisory Board met for dinner at a Milwaukee hotel one night and had arranged to meet the REAP students after dinner in the lobby bar. “When we walked into the bar area all the students stood up and walked over to talk to me,” Michelle recalls. “As we were leaving, a patron at the bar reached over and asked me, ‘Are you someone famous?’ It was a very funny moment.”
This award came as a “huge surprise” to Michelle “given that I am not an alumna of Marquette. I feel like what I do for the university is incredibly rewarding to me, so I am humbled by this acknowledgement.”
Fun Facts:
Name someone (past or present) with whom you'd like to have dinner.
I would love to have dinner with Sheila and Perry Vieth. They are successful, inspiring, entertaining and easy to talk to — the best dinner combination!
Name a Marquette faculty or staff member who had an impact on you, and how.
Andy Hunt. I have watched him mature through his two terms at Marquette. He has great discipline, stamina and determination. He never fails to look for the positive, he never gives up, and he always supports those around him. He is incredibly giving of his time, and I consider him a great friend.