Stevens Institute of Technology: Admissions Blog

The Diverse Pursuits of a Stevens Student

What do aviation, beekeeping, writing and engineering have in common? James Clague (BE, ’12) is passionate about each of these diverse interests and hopes to incorporate them all as he moves forward in his studies and career.

Drawn to Stevens for many reasons, James has always enjoyed writing, but wanted to follow in his family’s footsteps and study engineering. Stevens’ Engineering Management program seemed like a perfect fusion of technology and communication, and that, coupled with our co-op program, sealed the deal for him. With two co-op semesters at UPS and CB Richard Ellis behind him, James is thankful for Stevens’ ideal location, accessible to many well-known organizations. On-campus James is the president of the Stevens Investment Group, in addition to being a member of Sigma Phi Epsilon and Formula SAE, and participating in intramural sports.

Off-campus, James is just as active. More than six years ago, he and a close family friend discovered bees in a chimney, and after contacting a local beekeeper, decided to start a hive of their own. Over the next couple years, they met other beekeepers, learned how to buy bees, process honey, keep the bees alive during the winter months and introduce a Queen. They have expanded that one hive and now James is a partner in a success honey company called Blue Grass Honey. James is charged with selling the honey their bees produce, and coordinates many of these sales in the tri-state area. He has been integral in determining how to package and label the honey, and how to market it to local businesses and through their website.

This experience has been important for James. He said: “It’s been great learning how to take care of and manage the bees. It actually helped me in my co-op assignment at CBRE as I had to take care of buildings and manage projects.”

Not only has he been involved in beekeeping for many years, but James has also been pursuing aviation. At 15, he attended ground school, and at 17, James received his pilot’s license for small aircraft. His family has a history in aviation: his father is a commercial pilot and his grandfather built his own plane. Currently James has logged 70 hours of flight time and is working with his father and his brother to build their own plane.

James is hoping that his diverse interests will converge after graduation. He would like to work in the aviation field, and one day pursue a Master’s degree in Engineering Management or an MBA. In the meantime, he’s looking forward to another co-op semester and discovering all that lies ahead at Stevens and beyond.

Mickey, Minnie and Erik Solan

When most kids visit Disney, they immediately love it – the rides, the characters, the energy, the atmosphere. But when Erik Solan (BE, ’11) first visited Disney, he didn’t just love it, he wanted to be a part of it.

Erik’s dream of working for Disney Imagineering is one of the reasons he came to Stevens, where he is majoring in Civil Engineering and minoring in Art & Technology. He says: “My goal is to be in structural design, which is a great way to combine my passion for art and my passion for building.” Another key factor for Erik’s decision to attend Stevens was the Co-op program. After attending an open interview session that Disney was holding in the area, Erik worked with the co-op office and soon became the first Stevens Disney co-op student.

During his first co-op semester, in spring 2008, Erik worked as a Monorail pilot at Walt Disney World. While there, he took classes with Disney engineers and was able to secure a professional internship through the relationships he built. Erik plans to return to Disney next month, where he will work as a structural engineer through January 2010, assessing and performing maintenance on the rides in the park. His experiences have led him to be named the Disney representative for Stevens, helping other students who are looking for internships with Disney.

In addition to his role as Disney rep, and his participation in co-op (his second co-op term, in fall 2008, was with Boswell Engineering), Erik is a member of the Verge Art Exhibition board for Art & Tech students, on the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade crew, and a columnist for The Stute. Recently, Erik received an Engineering Excellence Award from the American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC).

“Stevens is allowing me the opportunity to pursue my dreams,” Erik says. “Everyone here is so supportive. My professors and the faculty, plus the co-op office and the rest of the staff, all want the students to succeed here. They help us the entire way.”

Mike Munley's Journey to Job Success

I knew when I decided to attend Stevens (way back in spring of 2004, mind you) that I’d be getting a first-class engineering education, which would set me up for obtaining a great job post-college.  What I didn’t know is that everything I did from that point on would affect my future job hunt.  Bear with me as I explain my college experience; you’ll soon understand what I’m doing.

Coming into Stevens I knew I wanted to study Engineering Management (EM).  I liked the combination of core, broad-based engineering peppered with business, economics, and project management.  Beyond that, I was clueless.  Ask me what I wanted to do with a degree in EM, and I’d give you an “Umm, I dunno... business maybe?  Maybe construction management?”  Clueless.

Freshman year at Stevens I did about a thousand different activities outside of class: Stevens Political Awareness Club, Dramatic Society, Ambassadors’ Club, Entertainment Committee, American Society for Engineering Management.  In the spring, I utilized the NYU/Stevens relationship and took Elementary Japanese 2 at NYU’s College of Arts & Sciences (I was fortunate enough to place into EJ2 thanks to four years of high school Japanese).  Over that summer, I did a construction management internship with the Port Authority, where I had the opportunity to go to the top of the George Washington Bridge and down into the pit of the World Trade Center Site.  Without a doubt, it was the most exciting of any of my jobs to date, though it did make me realize one thing... I wasn’t much a fan of construction management. 

And so sophomore year began with me being just as clueless as ever with what I wanted to do post-grad.  I stayed involved with the Dramatic Society, including a position on the e-board, and the Entertainment Committee, and I decided to join a social fraternity.  I knew a bunch of guys who, rather coincidentally, all happened to be in Sigma Phi Epsilon and after hanging out there a lot in the fall, I soon became a brother and quickly became the Balanced Man Scholarship Chairman.  I also did my first co-op at Ethicon, Inc., a Johnson & Johnson company.

My third year was basically a repeat of my second year.  My next co-op, however, was at GlaxoSmithKline where I developed various operational excellence experiments to see how we could save money on the packaging lines of Aquafresh and Sensodyne.  Yep, lots and lots of toothpaste.

After my third year, I decided to forgo a co-op term to study abroad in Japan during the summer of 2007.  I studied Intermediate Japanese at KCP Language Institute in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan.  At this particular school, they refuse to speak in English in the classroom.  Everything is conducted in Japanese; just ask my buddy Marc who studied there the next summer and knew no Japanese before going!   I lived in a dorm about an hour train ride away with only four other Americans and a ton of Japanese college students.  I took the Shinkansen (bullet train) down to Kyoto, the ancient capital, and I went on a school trip to Yamagata, which is essentially the boondocks of Japan.  And I even got credits transferred for use as a humanities course at Stevens.  The food is strange, the culture is different, but all of it was incredibly amazing and awesome!

My fourth year I was elected as president of Tau Beta Pi, the engineering honor society.  We hold various community service events, such as Tau Beta “Pie”, where we pie professors in the face and the annual Pi Mile Run.  The spring was spent mostly on my final co-op at Medco Health Solutions.  It was about as far away from engineering as a job could be, as I did business analysis the majority of my time there.  And would you believe it… I LOVED IT.

And so came my final year, and the job hunt.  By now, I knew what I actually enjoyed and wanted in a career: business analysis, travel, a leadership/management role, and problem solving.  After working with Career Development, attending the career fairs, and sending my resume to everyone and their mother, I lined up a bunch of interviews with consulting companies and leadership development programs.  It felt as if every other day I was in my suit.  And I had to balance all this with school.  Yes, it’s tough, but if there’s one thing that stands out about Stevens, EVERYONE is in the same boat.  And even with all that, I still found time to hang out and make it to trivia night at my favorite bar (I am over 21 after all).

In my interviews, I noticed I’d get the same questions over and over again:

Q: Name a difficult team experience.  What did you do about it?  A: “At Ethicon, most team members were in different countries and had different priorities and cultures, and I had to impress upon them the importance of quickly doing what I had asked...”  (Side note: remember this was my first co-op job... and can you believe they actually listened?!?!)
Q: Name a time when you had to innovate.  A: “At Medco, I developed a user-friendly self-populating spreadsheet that automatically generated monthly metrics for 12 very different groups with 12 very different sets of metrics...”
Q: What’s your proudest achievement?  A: “Managing a team that organized a 100-person regional conference for Tau Beta Pi, the engineering honor society...”
Q: Describe a situation when you challenged authority.  A: “When I was the scholarship chairman of my fraternity...” and I’d speak of the time I had a dispute with some of my fraternity brothers on how to manage our scholarship.
Q: Speak about a time when you had to take the lead and learn something new to get a goal accomplished?  A: “In my freshman design lab we had to program a robot, and no one on my team had any clue how to program a robot...”
Q: What’s your best leadership quality? A: “Well, if there’s anything that going to Japan taught me, it’d be adaptation...” and then we’d chat about sushi for 5 or 10 minutes.
Q: What’s your passion outside of class?  A:  “Well, that’d be acting and singing,” and I’d go on and on about all the fun times with the dramatic society.

I think you see where I’m going.  If I didn’t do all that I did while at Stevens, I’d be answerless.

In the end, I had five sets of second round interviews (including one which was an all-expense trip to Fairfax, VA... while it’s not a very touristy city, it was still pretty cool to take the Acela train, stay at a hotel, and eat at no cost to me).  I got the “I’ve got some very good news for you” call from Johnson & Johnson’s Information Technology Leadership Development Program around mid November, and with that call, the weight of the world was released from Atlas’s hands.  I signed, sealed, and delivered my offer acceptance on December 1st, and I’m slated to start my position with Consumer Products (think Band-Aids, Johnson’s Baby Powder & Shampoo, Aveeno) on June 15th.  In my time between school and work, I plan to take a quick jaunt to Scotland to visit some relatives I haven’t seen in more than a decade (with banked co-op cash!) and to road trip out to Wisconsin for my buddy Gus’s graduation party (he’s already got his job lined up with UPS).

And as for this semester, I’ve got Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays off, and with the exception of Senior Design, not a care in the world and no longer clueless.

- Michael Munley, ‘09

Student Profile: David Barker, B.S. Computer Science ‘08

Profile By Nicole Moldovan ‘08 (Stevens News Service)

Dave Barker is a 5/5 senior, a term used by many students at Stevens Institute of Technology, denoting participation in the cooperative education program. Dave chose to do a five-year college plan, alternating semesters of study with real-world paid work experience. Roughly 600 students are currently enrolled in Stevens’ co-op program, meaning about 40 percent of the undergraduate student body opt to do this five year combination of classes and corporate experience, with 150 employers to choose from.

“It’s really the co-op program that brought me here to Stevens, even more so than its academic reputation,” says Dave. It was the overall strength in career development that caught his attention as a high school senior and that of his guidance counselors at Roselle Catholic in Roselle, N.J. Five years later, Dave feels he got what he expected – a well established program that has “really, really strong ties with many industries that makes the process easy for students.”

Click to continue profile (Stevens News Service) >>

Stephen Yanczura, '10, Receives Space, Land and Sea Systems (SLS) Achievement Award

Stephen Yanczura, class of 2010 at Stevens Institute of Technology, has received a Space, Land and Sea Systems (SLS) Achievement Award from Hamilton Sundstrand. Yanczura, who is majoring in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in Engineering Management, recently completed a Project Engineering Co-op for Hamilton Sundstrand, as part of Stevens’ Cooperative Education Program.

Click to continue article.

Applying to Stevens: Frequently Asked Questions

What criteria does Stevens Institute of Technology consider when reviewing applications?
The admissions committee considers your high school grades, standardized test scores (SAT and/or ACT), your personal statement, the admissions interview, and teacher and guidance counselor recommendations. Also, your participation in extra-curricular activities (such as athletics, the arts, school clubs and organizations, et cetera), community service, or work experience is considered.

When do I schedule my interview; before I apply or after?  You can schedule your interview before OR after you apply to Stevens.  If you already know a day and time that you would like to visit our campus and conduct your interview but you have not sent in your application yet, that is fine.  Simply call our office at 800-458-5323 to schedule the day and time that you are planning.  Otherwise, if you have not completed your interview at the time that you decide to submit your application, we will assign an interview day and time for you.  If that day and time does not work for you, please call us to reschedule. 

Does Stevens require the SAT II?
The SAT II is not required for admission, but we recommend that all students take the SAT II to show their strength in English, math, and a science of their choice. Accelerated pre-med AND pre-dentistry must take the SAT I as well as two SAT II exams in Math Level I or II, and Biology or Chemistry. Accelerated Law applicants must take two SAT II exams of their choice.

Do all Stevens students get a laptop?
Yes, Stevens’ Mobile Computing Program provides incoming undergraduates with a notebook computer configured with hardware and software required for their academic programs.

Does Stevens guarantee housing? What type of housing is offered?
Every Stevens undergraduate student is guaranteed housing for four years and 90 percent of our students live on-campus. Student housing comes in many styles: singles, doubles, quads, apatment style, on-campus, or just a few blocks off-campus in Hoboken.

Does Stevens give college credit for AP exams?
Yes, to view a full list of the AP exams and scores Stevens gives credit for, visit www.stevens.edu/undergrad/advancedplacement.

How do I apply for Stevens scholarships?
Your Stevens application for admission serves as your scholarship application. All applicants are considered for scholarship awards. To learn more about other scholarship opportunities, visit Fastweb.com.   If you are involved in the Performing Arts, you should consider applying for our DeBaun Performing Arts Scholarship.  This is the only Stevens scholarship that requires an application.  You can view and download the application at:  http://www.stevens.edu/undergrad/fin_aid.html

How do I get involved in the Cooperative Education (Co-op) Program? Where will I work?
Stevens freshmen may apply for the Co-op program during their freshman year, as long as they have a 2.2 GPA or above. To learn more about some recent Co-op assignments, visit www.stevens.edu/undergrad/coop_ed.

How do I apply for the Accelerated Programs in Medicine and Dentistry?
To be considered for accelerated programs, applicants are required to have four years of English; four years of college prep mathematics; three years of science (biology, chemistry and physics). We encourage you to pursue AP Biology and AP Chemistry, if possible. In addition, SAT I and SAT II examinations in Mathematics Level I or Level II, and Biology or Chemistry are required. To be considered for the Accelerated Medicine Program, you must have at least a combined score of 1400 on the SAT I (critical reading and mathematics sections). The Accelerated Dentistry Program requires at least a combined score of 1300 on the SAT I (critical reading and mathematics sections). You may take these tests in your junior or senior year. All tests should be completed by January of your senior year so that we have time to evaluate your scores.

How do I contact my Admissions Counselor?
Applicants are able to find their admissions representatives by visiting the Find Your Counselor  or Contact links located on the admissions homepage. Feel free to e-mail or call your counselor with any questions about the application process or about Stevens in general. 

If I choose to switch my application from Regular Decision to Early Decision, what additional materials need to be submitted and who do I need to notify?
Candidates wishing to switch their application status from Regular to Early will need to send their admissions counselor an e-mail in order to officially have their application changed.  In addition, ED candidates need to submit the "Early Decision Agreement Form," as well as the "Financial Aid Form for Early Decision" if they intend to qualify for need-based aid. Both forms can be found at  http://www.stevens.edu/undergrad/ED.html. 

How many Clubs/Organizations are offered at Stevens?
There are currently over 120+ clubs/organizations on campus; feel free to check out the growing list of organizations at the Student Life Web site, http://www.stevens.edu/student_life/. If you find that a particular club is missing from the list, Stevens is a place where it is quite easy to start your own!!

View other FAQs posted on this blog.