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Session Description

Join this panel discussion sponsored by the ASEE Corporate Member Council to explore ways we can reimagine and design how we prepare students with both the technical and leadership skills needed for employability today and in the future. We will discuss trends fueling industry hiring demands and ways industry can collaborate with universities to address emerging areas for job opportunities, and better fill skills gaps through curriculum and co-curricular activities, capstone projects, and internships/co-ops to encourage and nurture the skills needed by students for the jobs of today and tomorrow.

For those interested in: Academia-Industry Connections and Broadening Participation in Engineering and Engineering Technology

Moderated by

1. Eva Mejia

Speakers

1. P.j. Boardman

   MathWorks

   P.J. Boardman is the Director of STEM Outreach and Workforce Development at MathWorks managing a team responsible for catalyzing, engaging, and inspiring the next generation of scientists and engineers to become our diverse workforce of tomorrow. PJ’s team identifies, initiates, and supports scalable programs to connect to students and educators with training, content, and technology to advance their STEM initiatives. She is the Chair-Elect of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) Corporate Membership Council and the liaison for the P12 Commission as well as a member of the Executive Committee for the Global Engineering Dean’s Council (GEDC). Prior to joining MathWorks in 2014, P.J. was a Vice President of Cengage Learning and Pearson Education. P.J. has a B.A. in Mathematics from the College of the Holy Cross and an MEd from the University of Massachusetts with a focus on Instructional Design and Online Learning. She is a Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholar where she attended the Universidad de Santiago, Santiago de Compostela, Spain.

2. Dr. Gregory E Triplett

   Saint Louis University

   Gregory E. Triplett Jr. has been selected to serve as the inaugural dean of the School of Science and Engineering at Saint Louis University, effective July 1. Dr. Triplett was the senior associate dean for academic affairs at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Engineering in Richmond. He joined the faculty at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2016 as a professor and associate dean for graduate studies. Dr. Triplett began his academic career in 2011 at the University of Missouri, where he was the James C. Dowell Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, director of the Compound Semiconductor Research Lab, and associate director of the university’s honors college. Dr. Triplett is a graduate of Florida A&M University. where he majored in electrical engineering. He earned a master’s degree in electrical engineering from Florida State University and a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

3. Cindy Cooper

   The Lemelson Foundation

   As a Senior Program Officer for The Lemelson Foundation, Cindy focuses on The Lemelson Foundation’s higher education efforts, including Invention Education, which supports equitable and inclusive efforts to equip students with inventive skillsets and mindsets, and Engineering for One Planet, an effort to equip tomorrow’s engineers with the skills, knowledge and understanding to protect and improve our planet and our lives.

   For more than 20 years, Cindy has fostered social and environmental impact through innovation, working across academic, philanthropic, business and entrepreneurship fields. She co-founded and led award-winning organizations and programs in higher education and international development, including the world’s first website for fair trade Spanish lessons through videoconferencing. Cindy received a 40 Under 40 Award in 2013, and her work has been featured in Fast Company magazine, Stanford Social Innovation Review and NPR.

   A Brazilian American, she speaks English, Portuguese and Spanish and holds a Global MBA from Thunderbird School of Global Management with distinction and a Psychology/Spanish BA summa cum laude from Claremont McKenna College.

4. Eva Mejia

   IDEO

   Eva Mejia has been crossing borders her whole life. She is proud to have been born and raised in Tijuana, Mexico, and has lived most of her life on the San Diego-Tijuana frontera where innovation and ingenio Mexicano make things happen. Dr. Mejia now serves as Executive Director of Learning at IDEO where her experience gives her a discerning eye for the intersection of equity x innovation. Designing with humans (instead of at them) and orchestrating collaborations make Eva burst with joy. As Executive Director of Learning, she is putting her full creative spirit into redesigning learning systems, organizations, and programs that uphold the dignity of all people.

   Prior to IDEO, Eva served as the Chief Program & Strategy Officer at Big Picture Learning, where she steered strategic thinking and programs for the network of innovative BPL schools dedicated to personalized, real-world learning. Before that, Dr. Mejia was Director of Networked Improvement Science for the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, leading and mentoring coaching teams in design thinking, improvement science, systems thinking, network development, and collaboration. She has served as a Curriculum Designer and Improvement Coach for the Data Wise Project at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE) and as an institutional effectiveness consultant helping community college and university teams use data to inform their student success programming.

   Dr. Mejia holds an Education Leadership Doctorate (Ed.L.D.) from HGSE, as well as a B.A. in psychology, and an M.A. in sociology from Stanford University. Her early experiences as a social worker and parent engagement coordinator and advocate were foundational to her strengths-based approach and commitment to bridging divides across systems and communities to support young people and their families.

   Eva has been described, even if only by one person, as uni-coastal, splitting her time across the Pacific coast between the Bay Area and the San Diego region. She is joined by her husband, copious amounts of multimedia and textile art supplies, and her two Boston Terriers on the long drives. But home is truly wherever her family, especially her niblings, play and eat together.

5. Mrs. Dora Smith

   Siemens Digital Industries Software

   Dora Smith directs the global education and startup strategies for Siemens Digital Industries Software. The strategic education initiative empowers lifelong learners to create a more innovative sustainable future through access to industrial strength software, industry-aligned learning resources, and an ecosystem of more than 1.5 million students at more than 4,000 institutions worldwide. The strategic startup program empowers entrepreneurs to make an impact on the world through cutting-edge tools and resources to take their innovations from digitalization to realization. Dora serves in academic-industry advisory roles, including chair of the American Society for Engineering Education’s Corporate Member Council and vice president for Diversity and Inclusion on the International Federation of Engineering Education Societies’ executive committee.

   She is an accredited business communicator with more than 25 years of experience in the engineering and manufacturing industry with leadership roles across disciplines. Previously, she held executive management positions at CAD Potential (now Tata Technologies), where she developed the company’s first academic and certification programs. Prior to that, she directed the Unigraphics Users Group (now Digital Enterprise Society) an independent, not-for-profit user advocacy organization supporting the engineering community. She also served as president on the board of directors of IABC St. Louis. Dora earned her bachelor’s degree in journalism from University of Missouri-Columbia and a master’s in business administration from Washington University.

   Siemens Digital Industries Software helps organizations of all sizes digitally transform using software, hardware and services from the Siemens Xcelerator business platform. Siemens' software and the comprehensive digital twin enable companies to optimize their design, engineering and manufacturing processes to turn today's ideas into the sustainable products of the future. From chips to entire systems, from product to process, across all industries, Siemens Digital Industries Software is where today meets tomorrow.