10/01/2016
UMass Lowell students travel the globe on study abroad programs, and gain professional experience in internships and co-ops in the region, and beyond.
Cool Stuff with Robots
While working at iRobot this summer, mechanical engineering junior Qiana Curcuru helped design robots, made parts she designed, used a laser cutter and performed tests with robots. Curcuru was joined at the Bedford company by computer science junior Tyler Puleo, who spent his co-op working as a software engineer.
Play Ball
Not many summer internships have you drop candy from a helicopter, but that’s one of the things junior business administration major Daniel Schmith got to do as a marketing and promotions associate for the Lowell Spinners, the Single-A affiliate of the Boston Red Sox who play their home games at the university’s LeLacheur Park. “I learned so much about all the administrative and operational functions of a minor league baseball team,” says Schmith, who still found time to train for his upcoming cross-country season despite the long work weeks.
An Enterprising View
Manning School of Business junior Carina Marquez spent eight months as an enterprise architect intern at MFS Investment Management in Boston. “I was basically the middleman for software coming into the company,” says Marquez, who enjoyed the fact that MFS chairman Robert Manning ’84 is also the namesake of her business school.
Sneaker Man
It was the final week of Matt Macioci’s six-month co-op with the Manufacturing Innovation Team at New Balance in Lawrence, but it seemed as if the mechanical engineering major from Fitchburg had been with the athletic shoe company for years.
As Macioci prepared to feed a sheet of sneaker mesh through a dye-sublimation printer, which uses heat to turn special ink into a gas state that can then permeate the fiber of the material, a senior engineer pulled him aside to ask for his input on a separate project. Macioci quickly reviewed several PDFs and offered his thoughts.
“If someone had told me when I was a freshman that I’d be working at New Balance in two years, I wouldn’t have believed it,” says Macioci. “To come here and interact with these people—and actually put what we’re talking about on paper—it’s amazing what I’ve experienced.”
Space Roadshow in Haiti
In June, a team of students and faculty took their “Astronomy Roadshow” to an elementary school in Les Cayes, Haiti. Part of the challenge, says junior math major Thomas Heywoszwas, was that they had to overcome more than just the language barrier and lack of supplies—they also had to figure out how to introduce a hands-on approach to learning.
Heywosz, who is participating in the UTeach program—which prepares STEM majors for teaching careers—helped the Haitian students build telescopes, generate electricity with solar panels and create a crystal radio.
“It took the students a while to open up but then they were so enthusiastic,” he says. “The experience of teaching the Haitian students is something that I will never forget.”
Taking Care of Business
Asad Elmi did two important things following his six-month sales and marketing co-op job at Putnam Investments in Andover: The sophomore declared his major (business administration with concentrations in marketing and finance) and asked if he could stay on at Putnam in a part-time role. “After the six months I realized that this is exactly what I want to do. This is the career path,” says Elmi, who has now been with the Boston-based global investment firm for two years and is on track to earn his degree this fall. “I found a home here and I haven’t left since.”
Helping Flood Victims in the South
Chelsie Hebert and Rahman Sarwar were part of a group of Manning School of Business students who volunteered in Andrews, S.C., this summer through lecturer Olga Tines’ course “Organizational Behavior in Action.” The team helped rebuild homes for flood victims impacted by Hurricane Joaquin in October 2015.
Teaching Students in Lowell
This summer, Graduate School of Education student Alex Eden worked as a teaching assistant at Lowell High School. “I was told that summer school students would be very difficult to engage, but they all respected me and the instructor, and worked hard enough to complete the course,” he says. “The experience has made me more confident in the fact that I want to be a teacher. I am now more excited than ever to continue on that path.”