Most college students arrive with dreams of making a difference in fields they are passionate about. Ivy Tech Community College provides students with opportunities to gain an education close to home, while also striving to achieve ambitious goals. Jennifer Ortiz, Dean of Advanced Manufacturing, Engineering, and Applied Science at Ivy Tech Valparaiso, is impressed by the dedication she sees in the students. This gives her confidence in the educational institution’s continued success.
“We have programs in engineering, manufacturing, welding, HVAC, industrial technology, robotics, machine tools, design and more,” Ortiz explained. “All of those programs are within our engineering technology department. We also work closely with industry sponsors. We meet with them to review our curriculum and our equipment to make sure we’re meeting the needs of their future employees. This allows us to create a job pipeline for our students.”
Ivy Tech is committed to giving students the best chance to hone their skills and reach their full potential through these programs.
“It’s very important that our students receive not only the technical skills, but also what it looks like spending a day in the life of their specific program,” Ortiz said. “It creates a seamless approach for getting the students more involved in their careers. Our Career Link department is staffed to help students find jobs. They bring internships to us, and employers who are looking to teach classes in these areas.”
One student who found her job through the Career Link is Alana Gorski, an engineering student and supplemental instructor. She attended a spring 2024 Career Fair and was recommended to apply for a position. Gorski also serves as the captain and co-founder of a student organization at Ivy Tech that is developing an electric car for the Shell Eco-Marathon Americas 2025 competition. This event brings over 100 schools in North America together to participate in the ultimate test of energy efficiency. Teams design, build, and test-drive their vehicles while contributing to a cleaner energy future.
“We’re called Team Ivy for the competition,” Gorski said. “Both Ivy Tech and Team Ivy helped me land a co-op position as a project manager with SMS group, which is a steel industry company. Ivy Tech offers a solution to make our biggest passions come true. Our team faculty advisor for the Shell Eco-Marathon team has several years of industry experience.” The team includes students from a range of STEM disciplines to complete the project.
This will be Ivy Tech’s first participation in the Shell Eco-Marathon Americas.
“We’ve learned things like technical certificates in computer-aided design software and manufacturing skills,” Gorski said. “We have students and faculty from every program in the college of advanced manufacturing. It also takes members of the engineering and applied sciences programs to bring this together. It’s nice because everyone plays a different role. Since this is a school that focuses on renewable energy, an electric car seemed like the best option for us. This was created to increase the ability of branching out at Ivy Tech and showing people that just because we’re a community college, that doesn’t mean we can’t accomplish national level feats.”
While this national experience has been a boon for Gorski and Team Ivy, she is thankful for the staff and students who have shaped her career path through courses and student organizations.
“All of our professors at Ivy Tech are incredibly approachable,” Gorski added. “Our student organizations are critical as well, especially the one that I work with. A lot of our students are working for sponsors right now, and we’re able to connect with people in a workshop with Autodesk from Canada.”
Ivy Tech focuses on directing students toward employment once they graduate. The university anticipates continuing its impressive success rate and expanding student opportunities for years to come.
“We have a pretty high success rate for our graduates obtaining employment when they leave here,” Ortiz noted. “They’re ready to get into the workforce and make an impact. It’s important for us to fuel our workforce throughout Indiana. A lot of students are getting their tuition taken care of with a technical certificate for free because of the need for manufacturing work in the state. One in every five workers in this state comes from a manufacturing background. This allows us to get more graduates into the field, and we couldn’t be happier to see the impact this has on the students.”
