2014 Award Winners

Roy T. Gregg, Jr. currently serves as the Director of Cooperative Education and Professional Practice Program at The University of Alabama. Since 1978 Roy has worked in the field of Cooperative Education at The University of Alabama. During his 36 years in the field of Cooperative Education, he has held numerous elected/appointed positions with state, regional, and national professional organizations. In addition, Roy has been instrumental in serving as a consultant to colleges, employers, the US Department of Education, and the US Office of Personnel Management. From 1982-1995 Roy was the Project Director for The Southeast Training Center for Cooperative Education. Funded by the US Department of Education and one of four training centers for Cooperative Education, he trained college and employer representatives from Texas to DC to Puerto Rico. Throughout his career, he has placed thousands of UA co-op students in positions nationwide, expanded The University of Alabama’s Co-op Office to include the Professional Practice option, and mentored numerous professionals to pursue careers in Cooperative Education. He has contributed significantly to growth of Cooperative Education in engineering and technology.

Haotian “Howard” Wang hails from China and attending the University of Pittsburgh was his first US experience. Howard spent four co-op rotations with Lubrizol, located in Wickliffe, Ohio. His first term was spent in operations where he ran experiment-scale trials to perform various facts of pilot plant operation. During Howard’s second term, he was a focusing team leader working on new specialty chemical development with a cross functional team. The team successfully produced the material for their customer’s field trial. During the third term, Howard was a manufacturing co-op in Deer Park, Texas and worked solely on a project that resulted in reduced capital expenditures of three million dollars. His fourth term was in supply chain. During that rotation, Howard made a significant impact on scheduling man hour input reductions. In addition to his outstanding work performance at Lubrizol, Howard received an Honors Research Assistantship for developing a model experimental system to study wrinkling phenomena. Howard is a two-time Foundation Scholarship Recipient, a recipient of the Won Chiang Scholarship, and also winner of the Lubrizol Scholarship in 2013. His volunteer efforts include serving as a peer advisor for the Freshman Leadership Team, student mentor at La Porte, Texas Elementary School, and gardener for Painesville, Ohio local food banks. He is a member of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers and a member of Tau Beta Pi. Howard is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and plays the violin, viola and Chinese flute. He also enjoys basketball, travelling and golf. Howard graduated summa cum laude in December, 2013, with a GPA of 3.884. He earned a B.S. in chemical engineering and minor in chemistry and economics.

Kimberly J. Demko is currently the Campus Relations Manager for GE Aviation encompassing over 1200 students from 45+ universities working at 30+ sites throughout the US. Previously with Toyota Engineering & Manufacturing North America for 8 years where she managed the college relations and new college graduate programs. Prior to Toyota she was the Recruitment Manager with Convergys Corporation for 8 years and a Technical recruiter in Syracuse, New York. Kim’s focus has been on building strategic relationships with key universities. She has restructured co-op programs to ensure that students have excellent diverse experiences and have a high probability of a full time position when they graduate. She has a Masters of Education degree majoring in Human Resource Development from Xavier University in Cincinnati, OH and previously studied at Syracuse University.  Kim resides in Northern Kentucky, with her husband and 5 year old twin boys. She has also coached high school cheerleading for the past 20 years.

Louise T. Carrese is Senior Associate Director of Employer Relations at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) Office of Career Services and Cooperative Education, where she is responsible for managing the development, delivery, and assessment of all office employer relations activities. She established and manages the office Employer Advisory Board and oversees all aspects of the biannual meetings. She began her career in higher education at RIT in 1979 as a Research Associate assisting in the administration of the inaugural Kellogg National Fellowship Program for the W. K. Kellogg Foundation. Positions of progressive responsibility at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID), RIT’s Office of Development and in the division of Enrollment Management and Career Services followed. Louise entered the field of Cooperative Education in 1988 as a co-op advisor for engineering students and now serves as the office liaison to the Kate Gleason College of Engineering (KGCOE) at RIT, managing the team of engineering co-op advisors for all 7 degree programs, in addition to personally advising students in the Chemical Engineering program. She is an instructor for the Co-op Preparation Course for engineering students, and has been an Adjunct Instructor for the Co-op Prep Course for students in the Information Technology programs. Louise served on the initial Advisory Board of the Women in Engineering (WE@RIT) program and is a member of the RIT Women’s Council where she served on the executive board and as Newsletter Editor for 15 years. Louise holds a BA in Education from Nazareth College of Rochester, an MS in Career and Human Resource Management and a Certificate in Executive Academic Leadership from RIT. She is a frequent presenter at university workshops on job search strategies and career-related topics and at regional and national conferences (NACE), where she has been recognized with awards for Best Session and Best Speaker.

Ken Porteous attended McGill University, earning a Bachelors degree in Chemical Engineering and pursued graduate studies at the University of Delaware, earning Masters and PhD degrees. On graduation, he joined Syncrude Canada Ltd where his career spanned 14 years and included management positions in research, corporate planning and information services.

Since 1985, Dr Porteous has been a Professor of Chemical Engineering and an Associate Dean in the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Alberta with responsibility for the Engineering Co-op program.

At that time, there were 150 students in Co-op. By 2012 the number had reached 1400. In this period, employer participation expanded from 50 organizations to over 300. The placement rates per work term have consistently been over 90% and frequently over 95% even during economically challenging times. This program has become the second largest engineering Co-op program in Canada. It undergoes an accreditation review every six years by the Canadian Association for Co-operative Education and has been accredited since 1987.

By Spring 2004, there was significant demand from employers and students to provide some form of employment service which would be open to all students.  The Faculty of Engineering Engineering Employment Centre was created as a unit within the Engineering Co-op Department to assist Co-op and non-Co-op undergraduates and graduate students in finding summer and permanent jobs. It opened in Fall 2004 and has been well received and utilized by all stakeholders.

In addition to his Co-op responsibilities, Dr Porteous manages the student services within the Faculty which involves admission and promotion decisions and student discipline. He is the co-author of a text book on engineering economics and has taught courses on this topic. For a two year period starting in 1989, he was seconded to manage the University’s administrative and academic computing services. He serves on a number of University and Faculty committees and served eight years as an elected member of the governing Council of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta.

For his contributions to cooperative education, CEED is proud to honor Ken Porteous with the 2013 Clement J. Freund Award.