Life Member Wins Personalized Tile at Alumni Center

By Lynn Freehill in Association, Special, TXEX on September 7, 2011 at 10:01 am | No Comments

Need a warm-fuzzy hit of Texas in your day?

Read the story of Kimberly Wiethorn, BS ’00, who won a $500 tile with her name on it by explaining beautifully why she’s a Life Member of the Texas Exes.

Wiethorn has been transplanted to California (where she works for Overbrook Entertainment, Will Smith’s production company), but living away from Texas has only multiplied her appreciation for the UT alumni network.

“The Texas Exes is more than an organization,” she wrote. “It’s more than a sticker on your car (those of us out of state know the joy of spotting those stickers randomly in traffic far from home and flashing the Hook ’em sign to a stranger). It’s more than that key tag to get you into the Alumni Center on gameday. I like to call it your safety net. Wherever you go in the world, there they are. The Exes for me has lead to world travel, lifelong friends, and helping build my life and career on both coasts. It was instrumental in my getting settled and established in both places. It’s a family unrivaled by other institutions.”

Wiethorn went on to talk about how her involvement in the Texas Exes had taken her as far away as Great Britain, where she once delivered a prized tape of the 2001 Texas/OU game from New York to the London Chapter.

Recently, she was chosen the grand prize winner for that entry in the contest, titled “Texas Changes People, We Change the World—Why I’m a Life Member.”

Wiethorn was beyond excited to hear she won her own tile, which she called “the perfect prize for a diehard Longhorn.”

“I had actually wanted one ever since I graduated, and that was the motivating factor for me to enter the contest,” she says. “To me, the tile means I now have a physical, permanent reminder of my love for the University, and I think it’s so incredibly cool that it will always be there for me or my family members to show each other, friends, and future generations of our family of Longhorns.”

The tile will be installed next spring, and since Wiethorn typically returns to Texas from the holidays, she may not see it for awhile. No matter—her siblings Kelli, BS ’03, Life Member, and current students Bree and Tanner plan to go scope it out and send her photos in the meantime.

Tags: Kimberly Wiethorn, tile contest, Why I'm a Life Member