Welcome John Albertson ( 2016 )
When John Albertson was starting his doctoral studies at UC-Davis in 1993, his advisor, Professor Marc Parlange, recommended he read two books to get a firm foundation in hydrology, fluid mechanics,...
Meet Robin Ploss, CEE M.Eng. Class of '93
Career position and path:
I am currently the Supply Chain Planning Manager for Corning’s Emerging Innovations Group, responsible for tactical and strategic planning for a portfolio of ~25 new products/projects that are coming out of our research park in Painted Post, New York. We do a lot of work with internal (Corning-owned) manufacturing entities, as well as external contract manufacturers around the world, depending on the locations of suppliers and customers, and other factors in our supply chain network design. Other key highlights in my career include being the Division Supply Chain Manager for Corning Glass Technologies when we introduced Gorilla™ glass for handheld IT devices in 2008, Supply Chain Strategy Manager for Corning Display Technologies during the 2004 – 2007 LCD television boom, and working in a variety of industrial engineering roles in our corporate engineering group from 1998 – 2004.
Educational Background:
Prior to returning to graduate school in 1992, I was working as a program planner for a space systems manufacturing company in Ithaca. My undergraduate degree in Physical Science (Geology) proved limiting from a career advancement perspective, and my boss at the time recommended I look into an engineering degree. I contacted Cornell, and was referred to the Civil Engineering school. At the time, the MEng manufacturing option was in its early stages, and was attractive to me, since my background was in project management and manufacturing. I ended up taking several ORIE classes as part of the manufacturing option track, including doing a class project in dispatch rule optimization for an MRP (Material & Resource Planning) system at a company in Cortland, NY. That formalized my entry into supply chain management, with a strong technical background in industrial engineering.
Advice to Students:
My advice to current undergraduates would be to be open to new experiences. Focus on your technical studies, but participate in any internship or project activities that give you exposure to industrial application of what you’re learning, and look for ways to uniquely bring your knowledge, training and expertise to bear on problems that interest you.
Advice on Entering the Workforce:
For graduating students entering the workforce, my advice would be to recognize that your technical background is only part of what you bring to the table – how you relate to other people in the organization you will be potentially joining, and how successful you will be, ultimately depends more on your ability to influence how other people think about a solution than on the technical merits of the solution itself. A manager who interviews or hires you assumes you know how to do the job technically, based on your credentials. To be truly successful, that manager will be looking for how you are able to build consensus through your interpersonal interactions with the other people in his or her organization.
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Welcome David Kammer ( 2016 )
David Kammer, Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Cornell, studies what happens at the interface where two materials slide against each other. For such a common phenomenon,...
O’Rourke awarded EERI George W. Housner Medal
Professor Thomas O’Rourke of the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering will be presented with the George W. Housner Medal at the 2016 Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) Annual...
Meghan Furton
Senior Environmental Engineering major Meghan Furton did not know she wanted to spend a semester abroad until she sat to speak with an academic advisor named Melissa Bazley, of the Cornell Engineering...
- Hometown: [empty string]
- Civil and Environmental Engineering
Addie Lederman
What inspired you to pursue a degree in engineering? I chose to go into engineering because throughout high school, I enjoyed finding practical applications of the math and science I was learning....
- Hometown: Yorktown, NY
- Civil Engineering
Valerie Shao
During the summer between my sophomore and junior year, I interned at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio. My research focused on engineering an alternative combustion process within the...
- Hometown: Celeveland, OH
- Environmental Engineering
Kimberly Bernstein
After my junior year at Cornell, I had the privilege to spend the summer as an intern for Turner Construction Company in New York City. I was assigned to work with the team on the World Trade Center...
- Hometown: Englewood, NJ
- Civil Engineering
Inshera Abedin
What inspired you to pursue a degree in engineering and what drew you to Cornell CEE? During high school, I was always drawn to higher level math and physics. Even my choices in extracurriculars...
- Hometown: Reading, PA
- Civil Engineering
Kristin Chu
I interned at HNTB Corp. in the New York office for my sophomore and junior summers. I was fortunate to have been given a variety of work, including editing drawings, contracts, and calculations, for...
- Hometown: Chappaqua, NY
- Environmental Engineering
Morgan Mills
Last summer, I interned as a Management Consultant in the Water Division of ARCADIS US. This internship gave me the opportunity to apply the problem solving skills I learned in my core classes here at...
- Hometown: Cleveland, OH
- Civil Engineering