Four College of Engineering seniors have been selected to receive the Dean’s Student Leadership Award for 2010. The recipients are Justine Bormann (AerE), Joseph Goering (ME), Brandon Kennedy (ME), and Jessica Tobelmann (CBE). Juniors and seniors are nominated for the award based on their exemplary leadership in one or more college, university, community, or professional organization. The awards will be presented at the February 8 Engineering Leadership Banquet, which also honors the presidents and outstanding members of engineering student clubs and organizations.
Bormann, a senior in aerospace engineering, will graduate in May and recently accepted a systems engineering position with Goodrich Corporation in Phoenix, Arizona. This past fall, she served as cochair of the College of Engineering 2009 career fair, which drew 4,000 students and 240 companies. In this role, she developed and managed a budget of $60,000, organized educational programs, and led a team of 40 ambassadors.
Bormann, who has studied abroad at Brunel University in London, England, and the Technical University of Delft in the Netherlands, has demonstrated her leadership skills in promoting international learning opportunities to her peers. She has given presentations about study abroad to hundreds of students over the past three years and has served as a student advisor in the Society of International Engineers.
Bormann’s other leadership activities have included seminar leader for Freshman Honors, outreach cochair for the Society of Women Engineers, student role model for the engineering outreach program of Women in Science and Engineering, member of The Engineering Ambassador and Mentor program, and cochair for the E-Week events committee.
Goering, who is a senior in mechanical engineering, has played an active leadership role since arriving on campus in 2006. He is president of the Engineering Student Council and previously served as secretary and as vice president of finance. An Engineering Leadership Program (ELP) scholar, Goering coordinated development of the Passing the Torch program, a leadership program for engineering student organizations designed to ease the transition of new officers into their administrative roles. He also served on the Engineers’ Week publicity committee and as an instructor for the first-year honors seminar.
Goering cofounded the College of Engineering’s Young Alumni Initiative, a program designed to create collaborations between recent graduates, current student leadership, and the College of Engineering. Within the mechanical engineering department, he has been a peer mentor for the Mechanical Engineering Learning Team and is a student representative on the ME department chair search committee.
After a summer experience in Mali, Africa, Goering will join John Deere, where he has interned for three summers.
Kennedy is a senior in mechanical engineering and is concurrently studying for his MBA in the College of Business, where he holds a graduate assistantship as an undergraduate advisor.
Kennedy’s leadership activities extend throughout campus and the Ames community. In 2007 he helped found the student-run Barista Café Company in Buchanan Hall and currently serves as vice president of operations. He has served as an ELP peer mentor program coordinator and as a senator on the Iowa State University Government of the Student Body. He is an active member of the Society of Automotive Engineers, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE), the Black Cultural Center Task Force, and the Black Student Alliance. Kennedy played a key role in the revitalization of the Black Cultural Center and also helped the NSBE chapter set up a Technical Outreach Community Help Center for Ames residents.
Following his graduation in May, Kennedy will join John Deere Power Systems in Waterloo, Iowa, in the Supply Management Development Program.
Tobelmann, a senior in chemical engineering, came to Iowa State as an ELP scholar in 2006 and has been active in ELP throughout her college career. She currently serves as ELP associate student director. Tobelmann founded and served as codirector of the Ada Hayden Scholars Program, which is a leadership program for women in the science, technology, engineering, and math fields. She has played a key role in organizations such as Women in Science and Engineering and the Society of Women Engineers with a special focus on activities aimed at attracting more women into the technical fields.
Engineers’ Week has been another special interest of Tobelmann’s. She has served on a variety of E-Week committees culminating in her role as E-Week general cochair in 2009. Tobelmann has also cochaired a variety of university-wide committees, including Homecoming’s gold division (non-Greek activities) committee and the VEISHEA recruitment committee.
Following her graduation in August, Tobelmann will join General Mills in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.