Student of the Year Recipients Recognized at Annual Conference Luncheon
PennACE recognized the achievements and contributions made by four undergraduate students enrolled at member institutions who have completed an internship or co-op assignment with the JoAnne Day Student of Year Awards at the May 2019 conference luncheon at Toftrees Resort, State College , PA. Four awards were presented in these categories: Associates, Liberal Arts, STEM and Business. Recipients were presented with plaques and checks by their respective career services center in April 2019.
Associates: Courtney Stump, Physical Therapist Assistant, The Pennsylvania State University Mont Alto Student Physical Therapist, Innovative Rehab Associates
Courtney interned at Innovative Rehab Associates as a physical therapist. Throughout this experience, she set her own personal goals: grow more confident as a clinician, apply my knowledge from my program to actual situations, improve my clinical critical-thinking ability, and gain patient-clinician relationships. She desired to help clients regain a better quality of life than they once thought was not possible. By the end of her internship, she was documenting concise and accurate patient charts in a timely manner; could handle a case load of 10-15 patients a day with little supervision from her clinical instructor; and was able to explain several diagnoses to patients for his/her better understanding.
During her time at the clinic, she was introduced to a paraplegic patient for whom she performed wound care to self-care of the patient. She went above and beyond the therapy session by purchasing a portable dishwasher for that patient. She also affected the life of another patient by rearranging her schedule so she could continue treatment of the patient after completion of her rotation because she wanted to see the patient from evaluation to discharge. Her internship supervisor, Dr. Sherry Rickman, Physical Therapist, stated: “Courtney made a large impression on the patients in our clinic. They continue to ask about her and how she is doing. Many made comments about her professionalism, knowledge, and ability to educate them in a way they could grasp and understand. I learned after the internship that she was also active with the college volleyball team and working on a fundraiser, working a part-time job, taking online classes as well as coaching young ladies. WOW!! If anyone deserves an award for imitative, time management, continuing to further her education while taking on community challenges and being a role model for young ladies, she definitely gets my vote.”
Liberal Arts: S. Devon Farmer, Communication: Digital Media, Clarion University
Media Intern, CU Center for Career and Professional Development
During his internship, Devon created a series of “freshman advice” videos along with maintaining the office YouTube channel. He also produced success stories of students at job fairs, short form videos as commercials, and a parody video for the CUMentor program. Even though some of these projects had a short time frame, his work surpassed all expectations. “He was always up for a new challenge and was always problem solving” stated his internship site supervisor, Erin Lewis, Assistant Director, Center for Career and Professional Development. “Devon spent the months of his internship interviewing (and filming) numerous students for success story videos, countless hours of editing and a lot of back-and-forth between our office staff for feedback and perspective. The quality of his work is really that of a professional videographer. As a result of his high-quality work, he has been asked to complete a number of projects for the main university social media outlets, recruitment videos and university promotional photography shoots beyond the work he is doing in career development.”
Devon has been a major asset to Eagle Media Productions for the last four years. His creativity and enthusiasm have brought a new edge to our productions. These productions act as a service to our local community and Clarion University network as a whole. We stream our coverage of Clarion University Sports for Athletics which allows Devon's work to be seen by anyone watching Clarion Eagle Vision. Dr. Fulton, Internship Supervisor, stated “Devon's internship allowed him to work for clients with a unique set of expectations. He worked with me for years and learned what I was looking for in a production. The internship experience provided him the opportunity to work with a diverse office with different expectations, much like he will be doing when he is employed after graduation.”
STEM: Taylor Baum, Electrical Engineering and Biology (Neuroscience Option), The Pennsylvania State University, Undergraduate Researcher, the Neuroscience Statistics Research Laboratory at MIT
Taylor’s project was to develop a real-time display of EEG activity. She implemented a highly flexible Graphical User Interface (GUI) that not only displays the raw EEG and its spectrogram in real time, but also has several features that allow an anesthesiologist to use the tools in a meaningful way. The most important of these features is the ability to select and magnify any section of the raw EEG recording or its spectrogram since the start of the administration of general anesthesia.
Taylor quickly gained an understanding of spectral analysis and then went on to produce in MATLAB a highly functional software architecture, which has proven extremely useful to the members of my group. Following completion of the prototype, Taylor and her co-worker wrote a 30-page functional specification document describing the GUI. In carrying out this project, Taylor clearly demonstrated her ability to master new topics and to apply her new knowledge in a timely manner. A clinical trial testing the benefits of using this new monitor will be started this fall at MGH. According to her Internship supervisor, Dr. Emery N. Brown, Professor, MIT, “Taylor is in the top 1% of undergraduate students I have mentored to date.”
Business: Marshall Tuten, Economics and Professional Spanish, Slippery Rock University
Sales and Marketing Intern, Creminelli Fine Meats, LLC, Salt Lake City, Utah
It was no surprise to his site supervisor that he received this award because of his willingness to work, his optimism, and his ability to accomplish each project that he was given timely and efficiently. Marshall witnessed first-hand the efforts of executives and HR directors to motivate, strengthen, and inspire their employees, and encountered the difficulties and decision making strategies involved in pricing decisions, new product development, and business forecasting. He devoted the majority of time to working on four main projects:
Responsible for the development of a Standard of Procedure (SOP) to address inefficiencies and confusion surrounding the development, approval, and archiving of new product labels; which has since been approved by various departments and is currently in use.
Researched and developed a strategy to apply for domestic food awards, and since the process has been in place CFM has won a total of 11 awards.
Outlined avenues for expansion and brand activation in event and sponsorship opportunities; and assisted in the creation, filming, and editing of videography media content for CFM’s media outlets.
Finally, he played a crucial role in establishing a relationship with a community organization, SPICE Kitchen Incubator, who sponsor the development and eventual independence of food entrepreneurs. Allowing him to understand that the integration of purposeful and impactful causes into a sound business plan augments growth, brand loyalty, and a sense of community.
“Each project presented its own challenges, said Antonio Niccoli, Senior Brand Manager, Creminelli Fine Meats, LLC. These were real problems and the deliverables required hard work, clever thinking and determination. Marshall’s impact was real – which is evident in his deliverables. He left big shoes to fill for any future interns. “
Many thanks to the 2018-19 Selection Committee:
Associates Team:
Debbie Smith, Career Advisor, Career Development Center, East Stroudsburg University
Heather Balas, Director of Career & Academic Development, Hiram College
Katie Buyers, Mock Interview & Etiquette Dinner Coordinator, Indiana University of Pennsylvania
Business Team:
Patty Gochenauer, Career Counselor, Penn State Mon Alto
Sara Bartz, Associate Director of Career Development, Lebanon Valley College
Kristin Fike, Internship Coordinator, Central Penn College
Liberal Arts Team:
Diana Brush, Associate Director, Career & Professional Development Center, Clarion University
Nick Praedin, Associate Director, Experiential Education, Lehigh University
Cara Fulton, Director of Career Development, Geneva College
STEM Team:
Kolleen Woodcock, Career Advisor/Outreach Coordinator, Gannon University
Joshua Domitrovich, Coordinator Mentoring and Internships, Clarion University
Anne Landon, Career Advisor, Lycoming College
Committee membership is open to any PennACE member in good standing. The 2019-20 application process and selection criteria are found at https://www.pennace.info/joanne-day-award. For more information, email pennace.org@gmail.com.