Penn State Berks alumna Allison Baver competes this week in the 2006 Olympic Games in Torino, Italy. Baver, '03, business, will compete in the women's short track speed skating competition this week in the 500-meter, 1,500-meter, and 3,000-meter relay.
Baver began skating on traditional quad skates in the fourth grade, progressing to in-line skating and eventually competing on the national level. At the same time that she was a Penn State Berks first-year student, she began skating short track.
Baver spent 1998-2000 as a traditional Penn State Berks student. It was as her skating career began to take off that her scholastic and short track lives began to merge, providing a challenge for both. She would graduate with a bachelor's degree in business in the fall of 2003.
Since graduating from Penn State Berks, Baver has gone on to be named the 2003-2004 U.S. World Cup Trials champion, she set the U.S. record in the 1,000 meters in 2005, and she moved from sixth- to third-place in the world in short track between 2005 and 2006.