2017 Award Winners

Lindsey Gilson is a Senior at the University of Connecticut. She is pursuing a dual degree at UCONN in Management and Engineering for Manufacturing, enrolling her in both the School of Engineering and the School of Business. Aside from her studies Lindsey is an avid member in the Greek community, a selected student to speak at Open Houses, as well as the Vice President of the MEM Society. During her internship with Unilever, Lindsey managed inventory and supply for million dollar business as well as participating in and leading projects/initiatives. Her biggest achievement was designing an automated inventory ordering system that managed 12% national business with a customer; improving out of stock percentages by 900 basis points. She was able to hone her skills of thinking on her toes as well as collaboration. During her time at Unilever she was also able to experience a global supply chain, end to end. She will continue her work with Unilever upon graduation in their Supply Chain, Unilever Future Leaders Program in July 2017.

Kendra LaVallee is a chemical engineering student at the University of Pittsburgh and completed her yearlong co-op at Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc. (J&J). The University’s Swanson School of Engineering selected her as the Co-op Student of the Year for all of her accomplishments as a Technical Operations Co-op at J&J. LaVallee worked on several projects, including the international launch of a major GI product, with estimated annual sales of $40 million and led the continuous improvement process for an alternative analytical procedure for the company’s highest selling product with a yearly projected savings of $375,000. She was also the Professional Development Chair of the Intern Co-op Association; she planned presentations and networking events for over 30 co-op students. She is involved in several clubs, including: The Honors Chemical Engineering Society, Omega Chi Epsilon, the Service & Fundraising Committee Member of Phi Sigma Rho, and the Women’s Engineering Conference Publicity Chair for the Society of Women Engineers. She will graduate in fall 2017.

Courtney Mogavero received her BS in Organizational and Community Leadership from the University of Delaware in 2012. After graduation, she started working in human resources and began to focus on technical recruiting. Courtney has worked at Google for three and a half years as a member of the University Programs team. As part of her role, Courtney oversees event programming and outreach for various universities across the northeast. She is committed to helping university students prepare for opportunities in the tech industry and creating programming that is unique to each specific university.

Deanna R. Dunn is the Director of Engineering Coop and Placement at the University of Akron. She began her career at the University of Akron in 1977 as an Administrative Assistant in the Coop office. Deanna was promoted to Assistant Director in 1985 and Director in 1989. During those 39 years, she says, “I have had the pleasure of living one of the best chapters of life with the exception of my three beautiful children and two (soon to be three) grandchildren. Helping young professionals with their career paths and placement has been so rewarding. I very much enjoyed being a member of ASEE/CEED as well as Ohio Cooperative Education Association (OCEA) and NACE. Serving on Boards for OCEA and ASEE/CEED has been a privilege.”