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    Research Park Celebrates Interns During the 20th Annual Intern Awards Ceremony

    CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (July 24, 2026) – The University of Illinois Research Park marked two decades of celebrating student talent during its 20th annual Intern Awards Ceremony, held July 23, 2026. The event recognized outstanding interns from corporate innovation centers and startups across the UIRP. Executive Director Laura Appenzeller noted that while the companies, projects and technologies represented at Research Park have changed over 20 years, the purpose of the ceremony has not: celebrating interns who make a real impact and reminding them that their work matters. Hundreds of student interns worked across Research Park this summer, building professional connections, sharpening technical and business skills, and contributing to projects that moved their companies forward. Managers and supervisors submitted nominations, and a deliberation committee of industry and Research Park representatives selected this year’s finalists and winners. Among the notable projects showcased, one intern helped originate more than 130 customer leads on his own, contributing to roughly $5 million a year in potential business for his company. Another built a 24/7 monitoring system that reduced one data-error condition from 98% to zero, cutting a full day’s worth of manual work down to hours. Together, the finalists and winners reflected the range of talent moving through Research Park this summer and the impact an internship can have early in a career. Awards were given in the following categories: Peer Impact Award | Best Startup Intern | Best Technical Innovation | Best Business Innovation | Most Outstanding Undergraduate Intern | Most Outstanding Graduate Intern | Most Competent and Collaborative Team Peer Impact Award New this year, the Peer Impact Award recognizes an intern who goes beyond the typical duties of an internship to make a meaningful impact on peers and teammates through collaboration, support and leadership. Listowell Appiah | Electric Power Engineers According to interns who nominated him:“He was proactively helping those of us from other schools and states before the internship had even started, by helping find places to live and providing honest advice on location and transportation. Once the internship started, he naturally became the go-to guide. He never just focused on his own tasks; he constantly checked in on the rest of us.” Best Startup Intern Emma Robben | GigaCrop Shawn Carlson, Head of Plant Transformation at GigaCrop:“Emma’s work has directly enabled two major milestones in GigaCrop’s technical development plan, milestones central to our business strategy and investor narrative. Her images are now used in board materials and GigaCrop’s investor pitch deck, where they serve as compelling visual evidence of the company’s progress.” Finalists:Aryan Jalilian | NatrionNihar Jog | Erg Bio, Inc. Best Technical Innovation Josh George | Mondelēz International FutureLab Matt Tomlinson, Extended Reality & Metaverse Lead at the Mondelēz International FutureLab: “Josh solved three real business problems that had no prior solution, creating entirely new capabilities for consumer research, scientific visualization and marketing analytics. What stands out is that Josh did this across three unrelated technology areas, without hand-holding, and built solutions the organization will continue to use beyond the internship.” Finalists:Owen Siemons | EverfoxAditya Kamath | Rivian Best Business Innovation Cindy Zou | Dow Delivery Center Jen Quinlan, Site Director at the Dow Delivery Center:“Cindy solved a common time sink for Dow’s data and platform engineers: manually checking pipelines and errors every day. She turned that process into a 24/7 monitoring system that can detect problems, classify them, notify the right people and help determine the next step, an estimated fourfold improvement in efficiency.” Finalists:Son Nguyen Huynh | Mondelēz International Future LabIsabella Chou | Mondelēz International Future Lab Most Outstanding Undergraduate Intern This category drew such accomplished interns that judges selected four finalists. Ritvik Gupta | Rivian Kerry Chayka, Sr. Staff Electronic Design Engineer at Rivian:“Ritvik completed the workload we had set aside for an entire semester in about two weeks. His work helped inform a key decision to unblock the ramp of an R2 supply-chain component, and when a full-time firmware employee went on leave, Ritvik took over critical testing coverage for a vendor.” Finalists:Rishi Garhyan | Brunswick Boating Intelligence DesignLabCooper Sweet | EverfoxTommy Miller | Mondelēz International Future Lab Most Outstanding Graduate Intern Alexander Matveev | State Farm Betsy Podkowa, Lead Data Scientist at State Farm:“[Alexander] took ownership of his project from the start, performing project scoping and timeline creation himself. He has worked effectively without detailed instructions and dives deeply into various ideas and alternative solutions, using solid reason and decision making to push his project forward while maintaining the overall vision. He helped his fellow interns through technical and professional roadblocks, encouraging true understanding of various concepts, and made sure everyone felt included and welcome. Overall, Alexander has been an exemplary MAGNet intern and is seen as a role model for others.” Finalists:Ayush Thakkar | COUNTRY Financial DigitaLabAryan Jalilian | Natrion Most Competent and Collaborative Team Dow Delivery Center Jen Quinlan, Site Director at the Dow Delivery Center:“This team made critical data validation easier, faster and more accessible for business users. The team turned that problem into a guided, self-service workflow that lets business users participate directly in data quality work while reducing dependence on specialized engineering support.” Finalists:Brunswick Boating Intelligence DesignLabEpivara Table Tennis Tournament Research Park also recognized the winners of its annual Table Tennis Tournament, one of the summer’s most popular traditions for building community across companies. This year’s champions were the team from Rivian. The ceremony closed with a group photo of this year’s winners and finalists, capping off a summer of programming across Research Park.

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    Research Park Celebrates Interns During the 19th Annual Intern Awards Ceremony

    The 19th Annual Research Park Intern Awards Ceremony, which celebrates the contributions of outstanding student interns at Research Park corporate innovation centers and startups, took place on July 24, 2025. The awards ceremony brings together interns representing diverse skill sets and industry sectors, as well as their managers and colleagues. It reflects the overall depth and breadth of excellence of intern work that occurs daily at Research Park. Awards were given in the following categories: Best Startup Intern Best Technical Innovation Best Business Innovation Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Most Competent and Collaborative Team Among the notable projects showcased was an intern who developed an in-house model that once deployed saved their company $60,000 in expenses. Another standout project involved a group of interns who developed XR prototypes that have been deployed and utilized in tech centers across three different continents and did so an entire year ahead of the original schedule. The ceremony and nominations highlighted the incredible talent within the Research Park community and underscored the vital role that internships play in fostering the next generation of industry leaders. Best Startup Intern  Hrishikesh Sarda | Earthsense | Mechanical Engineering Intern | Master of Science in Technology Management | Gies College of Business “Hrishi has very quickly demonstrated his value to our team. He takes on responsibility with the trustworthiness of a full-time engineer. He works independently, gives valuable design feedback, and shows comfort in the unknown. He found an error in my calculation, researched the topic to correct it, and brings a level of attention to detail rare at his experience level.” Finalists: Dongjoon Jeong | Hinetics | Mechanical Engineering Intern | Mechanical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Daniel Ormsbee | Boston Bioprocess | Bioprocess Intern | Molecular Biology and Mechanical Engineering | Cedarville University Best Technical innovation Undergraduate winner: Om Mistry | Brunswick Boating Intelligence Design Lab | Data Engineering Intern | Industrial Engineering and Statistics | Grainger College of Engineering “During his internship, Om’s primary responsibility was to enhance our data ingestion pipelines across multiple projects. One of his most impactful contributions was improving our propeller recommendation tool, which helps customers select the right propeller for their boat and engine combination—reducing both customer and dealer stress and driving internal sales. He brought initiative, technical curiosity, and a structured mindset—researching machine learning, building a user-focused interface, and delivering high-quality code. His adaptability, collaboration, and impact on a high-visibility project stood out throughout his internship.” Graduate winner: Farid Ahmed | Rivian | Thermal Modeling Intern | Nuclear Plasma and Radiological Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering “In a context where mileage per watt is a key performance metric, Farid’s contributions are especially impactful. His initial studies indicated an 8–10% improvement in cooling efficiency compared to the current design. He is self-motivated, thoughtful, and collaborative. His technical rigor and clear communication have made him a valued team member influencing high-priority design decisions.” Best Business Innovation Shravani Bhupal | COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab | Project Manager/UI-UX Intern | Master of Science in Information Management  “Shravani led development of a Power BI dashboard for technology budget tracking, producing a tool now essential for strategic reporting. Her precision, innovation, and ability to bridge technical and business needs earned praise from leadership, who highlighted her fresh perspective and strong communication on complex financial data.” Finalists: Luke Peng | Synchrony Emerging Technology Center | Operations Analyst- Data Engineering Intern | Statistics Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Miguel Aenlle | PrairieLearn | Software Engineering Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering “As a freshman, he immediately led a full redesign of our navigation system—interviewing users, building an accessible UI, and engineering a staged rollout. His work is already in production. In 20 years of mentoring interns, Miguel is the best I’ve worked with. His impact has been extraordinary.” Finalists: Isabella Chou | Mondelēz International | XR Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Austin Carlen | Applied Pavement Technology | Engineering Technician Intern | Engineering Technology | Lake Land College Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Nanguan Lin | Boston Bioprocess  | Software Engineering Intern | Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering  “Nanguan has been instrumental in building a new Lab Information Management System from scratch. He rapidly grasped requirements, led stakeholder interviews, and delivered a robust dashboard that’s now a cornerstone of operations. He balances professionalism and approachability—equally comfortable leading technical discussions and bringing positive energy to everyday team interactions.” Finalists: Charlie Du | Brunswick Boating Intelligence Design Lab | Computer Graphics Software Developer Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Kinjal Parekh | COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab | Project Manager/Software Developer Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Most Competent and Collaborative Team Mondelēz International XR Team Isabella Chou | XR Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Josh Sutanto  | XR Intern | Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Roshni Dave  | XR Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering “The Mondelez XR team delivered both high-quality work and a remarkable number of prototypes, despite being new to XR. Their teamwork, adaptability, and dedication exceeded every brief—so much so, new ones had to be created. Their prototypes are now being deployed across three continents, with one fast-tracked for consumer research a year early. This accelerated timeline reflects the immediate business value of their work and is expected to drive faster ROI and greater digital adoption.” Finalists: Brunswick Boating Intelligence Design Lab Aashish Subramanian | Computer Graphics Software Developer Intern | Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Charlie Du | Computer Graphics Software Developer Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Jaden Ambrocio Alcantara | Computer Graphics Software Engineering Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Kaavya Vassa | Front End Development Intern | Computer Science and Bioengineering | Grainger College of Engineering Melody Breg | Mechanical Engineer Intern | Mechanical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Swathi Sureshmoorthy | Computer Graphic Software Developer Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering  Ameren Innovation Center Jason Liao | Data Science Intern | Computer Science | Grainger College of

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    Brunswick Student Interns Showcase Boating Tech at CES

    CHAMPAIGN — Earlier this month, the Brunswick Boating Intelligence Design Lab, based at the University of Illinois Research Park, made waves at the 2025 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. The lab, which focuses on integrating cutting-edge technology into the boating industry, showcased its latest advancements with the help of University of Illinois Research Park student interns. CES is a technology showcase that brings together innovations across the tech landscape. Brunswick used the event to highlight its ‘boating intelligence’ initiative to advance its ACES strategy—autonomous, connected, electrified, and shared—by incorporating artificial intelligence and modern technologies into its products. At the showcase, Brunswick featured a 200-degree virtual boat helm simulator and a Fliteboard simulator, which allowed visitors to experience riding the company’s electric hydrofoil and the latest developments in its autonomous docking system. These exhibits attracted significant attention, with many participants visiting to try the simulators firsthand. Brunswick’s Research Park site interns played a vital role in the event. They presented the simulations and explained the technologies behind them to attendees. Jeffery Reifsnyder, the Boating Intelligence Design Lab director, praised their contributions. “The interns that we brought with us did a phenomenal job,” Jeffrey Reifsnyder said in a News-Gazette article. “The Brunswick booth was perpetually busy, and the simulators that the students worked on had a significant chunk of the foot traffic stopping at their areas. The students handled themselves well through all of it.”

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    Research Park Honors Innovative Interns at 18th Annual Intern Awards Ceremony

    The 18th Annual Research Park Intern Awards Ceremony, which celebrates the contributions of exceptional student interns at Research Park corporate innovation centers and startups, took place on July 25, aptly coinciding with National Intern Day. The awards ceremony brings together interns representing diverse skill sets and industry sectors, as well as their managers and colleagues. It reflects the overall depth and breadth of excellence of intern work that occurs daily at Research Park. Awards were given in the following categories: Best Startup Intern Best Technical Innovation Best Business Innovation Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Most Competent and Collaborative Team Among the notable projects showcased was an intern who developed a prototype web software for Life Cycle Assessment calculations without prior experience in software development, improving company processes by approximately 90%. Another standout project involved a group of interns who developed an interactive, immersive boating simulator using a blend of computer graphic software development, UI/UX design, data integration, and hardware development. Shivani Birwadkar, who won the Best Technical Innovation award, expressed her gratitude for the recognition and reflected on how the opportunity to work on cutting-edge projects has significantly impacted her professional growth. “I am deeply honored to have been recognized with the Best Technical Innovation. My internship at ADM has been an incredible journey of learning and growth. From the groundbreaking projects that push the boundaries of innovation to the supportive and inspiring team that constantly motivates each other, this experience has truly been one of the most rewarding of my career,” said Birwadkar, a Work Process Automation Intern at ADM Science and Technology Center. The ceremony and nominations highlighted the incredible talent within the Research Park community and underscored the vital role that internships play in fostering the next generation of industry leaders. “Winning an award is a testament to the exceptional skills and dedication of our interns,” said Laura Bleill, director of external engagement at the Research Park. “It’s not just about individual accomplishments but also about how these young professionals are shaping the future through their innovative projects and collaborative spirit.” Just being nominated for these awards is an accomplishment, said Bryan Goode, the Research Park talent manager. The judging process is intense. “Managers nominate individual interns or entire teams, and each nomination comes with a detailed essay highlighting their skills and achievements,” Goode said. “These essays are then reviewed by a diverse panel of judges who bring different expertise to the table. They look at everything from technical skills to soft skills to ensure each nomination receives a fair and thorough evaluation.” Best Startup Intern  Zoey Zhang | Boston Bioprocess | Bioprocess Development Intern | Masters in Bioprocessing and Bioenergy | Illinois Professional Science Master’s “She has been an integral part of our pilot plant team, leveraging her graduateeducation and prior experience to execute fermentation projects. She quickly adapted to our fast-paced culture, showing immense grit and dedication. Zoey demonstrated exceptional leadership by volunteering for late hours and weekends to meet deadlines. Her proactive approach allowed us to delegate tasks such as sampling, reactor setup, and data analysis, significantly boosting our team’s efficiency. Zoey optimized shake flask volumes and benchmarked fermenters’ oxygen transfer rates, providing valuable insights. Her proactive approach to personal and professional growth, combined with her dedication, resilience, and willingness to go above and beyond, makes her highly deserving of this award.” Finalists: Thanushree Ambati | Helixon | Bio-Tech Research Intern | Master in Cell and Developmental Biology | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Luigi Passerotti | Hinetics | Mechanical Engineering Intern | Mechanical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Best Technical Innovation Shivani Birwadkar | ADM Science and Technology Center | Work Process Automation Intern | Masters in Information Management | School of Information Sciences “Shivani is an exceptional intern who demonstrated remarkable innovation by independently developing a web application for Life Cycle Assessment calculations using Python and JavaScript from scratch. Despite having no prior experience, her work improved process efficiency and reduced project execution time by approximately 90 percent, significantly streamlining operations. Shivani’s proactive approach and strong relationship-building earned the team’s trust, adding considerable value and enabling more simultaneous projects without compromising quality.” Finalists: Shubham More — Synchrony Emerging Technology Center — Emerging Technology Center Intern | Computer Science and Physics | Grainger College of Engineering Caleb Larson | AGCO Acceleration Center | Engineering Intern | Electrical & Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Best Business Innovation Yijin Wang | Synchrony Emerging Technology Center | Emerging Technology Center Intern | Master’s Concentration in Analytics-Statistics | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences “Yijin truly exemplifies what it means to be a team player, shifting her focus based on the team’s needs and leveraging her technical, analytical acumen across multiple projects. She developed a measurement framework for assessing the incremental dollar impact of our paid media acquisition campaigns and supported clients with campaign reporting using Adobe and SAS. Tracy also led reporting for personalization stakeholders, quickly learning tools like Dynamic Yield. Despite resource constraints, Yijin ensured our team met all deliverables. Her framework addressed enterprise-level gaps in measuring campaign efficacy, advancing our enterprise initiative.” Finalists: Khushboo Choudhary | Synchrony Emerging Technology Center | Emerging Technology Center Intern | Master’s in Predictive Analytics & Risk Management | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Gabrielle Wilki | State Farm | RDC Intern | Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Mayank Dubey | Rivian | Electrical Hardware Development Intern | Mechanical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering “Mayank’s summer project at Rivian was a masterstroke in accelerating mechanical design and development. He developed an innovative framework to automate PCB design exploration, previously a manual task, using self-learning Python scripts—this breakthrough streamlined the process, catalyzing rapid innovation. His scripts empower engineers to perform complex finite element analysis (FEA) models, significantly boosting efficiency and minimizing errors. Despite lacking direct automotive experience, Mayank quickly absorbed new information and applied it effectively, consistently delivering noteworthy results with minimal guidance. His resilience, adaptability, and commitment to advancing despite challenges underscore his exceptional work ethic and dedication.” Finalists:

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    2023 Intern Awards Showcase Talent at Research Park

    The Research Park celebrated the 17th annual Intern Awards Ceremony and Picnic to recognize the outstanding work done by the student interns across the Research Park’s 120+ companies. The ceremony was held on Tuesday, July 25, and recognized finalists and winners from a variety of disciplines, majors, and colleges from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. This is a wonderful representation of the cross-curricular work that takes place at Research Park.  There were six awards presented:  Award Categories: Best Startup Intern Best Technical Innovation Best Business Innovation Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Most Competent and Collaborative Team Best Startup Intern  Winner: Brisa McGrath – Natrion Inc. – Laboratory Assistant Undergraduate in Materials Science and Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering “This is the second summer that Brisa has interned at Natrion. Brisa’s role as a laboratory assistant within the R&D team primarily involves supporting efforts to prototype and test advanced solid-state Li-metal batteries. The components that Brisa assembled were subsequently used in prototype cells that have since demonstrated world-leading power and safety performance.  Most of Brisa’s contributions entailed process optimization. She standardized recipes, mixing procedures, quality control metrology, and other techniques that were later implemented team-wide. Her meticulousness and attention to detail made her one of the team’s two trusted cell builders.” Finalists: Nicholas Fazio – Boston Bioprocess – Bioprocessing Intern Masters in Bioprocessing and Bioenergy Yiming Zhao – Hinetics LLC – Electrical Engineering Intern Undergraduate in Electrical and Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Best Technical Innovation Winner: Ning Jiang – Aviatrix – Software Engineer Intern PhD in Math | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences “Ning’s primary project this summer was to work with the supporting team to move [a network anomaly detection] feature to the next level. Ning spent time evaluating different algorithms that provided better overall characteristics. For the various algorithms, she compared training/evaluation time, detection accuracy, seasonality, and adaptability. She worked with another intern to find sources of input data. Each set of conclusions were summarized clearly in a series of presentations. One example of Ning’s diligence comes from a meeting we had with an AWS engineer describing their framework for supporting random-cut forest models. The day before Ning had read up on random cut forests and ran her sample data through that algorithm. She was able to explain to me the details of how random cut forests work and how they differ from some other algorithms we were considering.” Finalists: Ganesh Prasad – John Deere – Data Science Intern Masters in Predictive Analytics and Risk Management | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Aniket Ajay Lad – Brunswick – Electrification Engineering Intern PhD in Mechanical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Best Business Innovation Winner: Suyash Nagumalli – AbbVie Innovation Center – VR Developer Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering  “Suyash’s project set out to create a virtual environment to simulate the patient screening process from the perspective [of] the Principal Investigator. To build out this project, Suyash illustrated initiative, leadership, and innovative thinking.  Suyash had never used AI within VR technology before, nor had he extensively written Python code. However, he worked tirelessly to build out the VR environment by learning on his own, leveraging others’ expertise, and through countless hours of trial and error.  Not once did he complain, not once did he say that he didn’t know how to do it – if he didn’t know something, he would spend time researching videos to teach himself the concept. Suyash is an exemplary team member and has more technical and business skills than a lot of people much further into their career. He is kind, easy to work with, and is such a team player in all the ways that exemplify an exceptional intern.” Finalists: Angeline Lewis – AGCO Acceleration Center + Graphic Design Intern Undergraduate in Industrial Design | College of Fine & Applied Arts Madelyn Heidtke – John Deere + Strategic Communications Intern Masters in Agricultural Leadership, Education and Communications | College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences Demi Apostolakos – Cargill Innovation Lab – Market Research & Communications Intern Undergraduate in Advertising | College of Media Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Co-winner Carlene English – Genective – Molecular Biology Intern Undergraduate in Environmental Sciences | College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences “Carlene’s outstanding work as an intern at Genective has exemplified her exceptional commitment to excellence. In her project, Carlene focused on refining crucial aspects of an assay. [She] diligently collected samples from numerous plants, ground the tissue samples, and performed luminescence protein expression assays. Carlene meticulously monitored the larvae feeding process and measured the amount of remaining leaf tissue each day. These refinements significantly contributed to the accuracy and reliability of the assay, furthering the team’s research objectives. Carlene’s dedication to her work extended beyond the lab. Despite having no prior experience with the R programming language, she eagerly embraced its use for data analysis. Through her proactive and enthusiastic approach, she quickly acquired the necessary skills and applied them proficiently.” Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Co-winner Charlie Du – Brunswick i-Jet – Computer Graphics Software Developer Intern Undergraduate in Computer Sciences | Grainger College of Engineering  “Charlie has been our CGI Engineering Intern at i-Jet for 2 years and has been instrumental in our CES showcase work and building out our Unreal engine pipeline. He designed and built the framework used for our boating simulations in Unreal and had collaborated in our CES project for 2 years now. In Jan 2023, he traveled to Las Vegas to help set up and facilitate the simulator when it ran in the show. This summer, he took on more leadership into his role when he led the CGI intern team for our CES 2024 project. He stepped up to the leadership responsibilities after our FTE manager had to step away due to another priority.” Finalists: Matt Straczek – Ameren – Innovation Intern: Application Development Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering   Asher Mai – Rivian – Machine Learning Intern Undergraduate in Electrical and Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering    Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Winner: Muhammad Talal Khalid – Electric Power Engineers Power Systems Intern PhD in Electrical Engineering | Grainger

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    Crain’s Chicago Business Shows How Cat and Deere Leverage UIUC, Research Park for Talent

    At the University of Illinois Research Park, it’s said (a bit tongue-in-cheek) that companies there receive every unfair recruiting advantage possible when it comes to access to the strong tech talent at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. John Pletz of Crain’s Chicago Business explores how this ecosystem is delivering computing talent to two Research Park companies, Caterpillar and John Deere. The premise? That a corporate presence in both Chicago and Champaign is keeping talent in the state. “Caterpillar and Deere are setting foot on campus more often and making jobs more appealing by setting up shop in Chicago. As a result, they’re having more success in meeting their own hiring needs while giving students with high-demand skills more reasons to stay in Illinois instead of leaving for the coasts,” Pletz writes. Companies are also going beyond the traditional mechanisms to engage with students, campus colleagues told Pletz. “While traditional recruiting strategies—such as attending career fairs or participating in hackathons—are great for keeping brands in front of the broad CS audience, we have noticed companies are also adding much more targeted activities to their recruiting arsenal,” says Cynthia Coleman, director of external relations for U of I’s computer-science department. Read the entire Crain’s Chicago Business story about Deere and Cat online HERE (access may be restricted by a paywall).

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    New Podcast: Finding Success as a Research Park Intern

    The most recent episode of the Innovations @ Research Park Podcast features interviews with two of the winners of the 2022 Research Park intern awards.  Tune in to hear from David An and Natalie Xiong, two winners of this year’s annual intern award program. They discuss their perceptions of RP, memorable moments, skills gained, and advice for students listening who are curious about what Research Park has to offer. An was a data science intern at Ameren when he won the “Outstanding Undergraduate” award. Xiong, who won the “Outstanding Graduate Student” award, continues working at Riverbed, where she is a Data Science intern. Listen to the conversation that host Tanmay Shaw had with David and Natalie in to the latest edition of the Innovations @ Research Park Podcast. To listen to the podcast, visit Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you prefer to download your podcasts. Is there something you want to know about Research Park? Do you have an idea for a guest for the show, or a story we should pursue? Contact Laura Bleill (lwbleill@illinois.edu).

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    Real Impact: Synchrony Culture Empowers Next-Gen Innovators

    The University of Illinois System profiles the success story of the Synchrony Emerging Technology Center at Research Park. The article covers the cornerstones of the internship experience at ETC: access to top leaders and mentors meaningful work that impacts the company corporate citizenship Here’s a snippet: “At Synchrony, we don’t just prepare students for how to do the work. We prepare them for whatever comes next in their career,” Mike Storiale said. He is Synchrony’s vice president of Innovation Development and University Partnerships. For example, summer 2022 featured the clear expectation that interns work in person. “Many of our 50 student interns envisioned working remotely. We wanted them to build connections by actually seeing what others are working on. We wanted them to have those casual conversations in the kitchen,” Dor Markovich said. “Before we knew it, they were getting together after work and on the weekends.” Read the full article HERE.

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    Excellence Recognized at 2022 Research Park Intern Awards

    The Research Park celebrated its 16th annual Intern Awards Ceremony and Picnic to honor and recognize the outstanding work done by the student interns across the Park’s 120+ companies. The ceremony was held on Thursday, July 28, National Intern Day, which gave us all the more reason to host a celebration for the 800+ interns working throughout Research Park. This was the first year the ceremony was held in person since 2019. The students recognized as finalists and winners are comprised of a variety of disciplines, majors, and colleges from across the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, representing the type of cross-curricular work that takes place at Research Park companies. These interns were able to make connections with their peers, co-workers, and supervisors that will last a lifetime, and they have sharpened skills that will aid them for years to come, in both their personal and professional lives. They have impacted the faces of our companies and the fabric of the Research Park through their hard work and innovation. Thank you to the managers and supervisors who nominated their interns, and an additional thank you to the panel of professionals who determined the honorees. This year, there were six awards presented.  Award Categories: Best Entrepreneurial Leadership in a Startup Best Technical Innovation Best Business Innovation Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Most Competent and Collaborative Team Best Entrepreneurial Leadership in a Startup Winner: Shivam Tailor – Natrion Laboratory Assistant Undergraduate in Material Science and Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering “Shivam has an eagerness to learn as much as possible and apply it towards the success of the company. Shivam was the only intern to have his own project, and not only did he take charge of every aspect of it, but he excelled rapidly. Within two months on the job, Shiv produced single-crystal NMC and artificial graphite tapes that are viable for commercial use, a process that is extremely long and arduous that requires painstaking optimization. Shivam is very meticulous. He has excellent attention to detail that was critical in his success in the project.” Finalists: Sarah Hashim – TipTek Engineering Intern Undergraduate in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Tianshu Wei – LifeFoundry Embedded Systems Intern Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering   Best Technical Innovation Winner: Teja Gupta – Corteva Agriscience Remote Sensing Scientist Graduate in Computer Engineering “Teja worked on cloud masking, an important and emerging technique that is a valuable addition to our organization and the global agriculture community. He created a classifier tool and later a software package inspired by the original cloud masks. This is an extraordinary feat considering the complexity of the situation. During this project, Teja demonstrated outstanding innovation, perseverance and humility resulting in a solution that addressed an existing problem. He also demonstrated a great deal of perseverance when creating a new dataset since it took a lot of trial and error to succeed in this task.” Finalists: Elizabeth Atkinson – Starfire Industries Electrical Engineering Intern Undergraduate in Electrical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Ved Shah – COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab Software Developer Intern Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Best Business Innovation Winner: Cindy Phung – Cargill UX/UI Design Intern Undergraduate in Graphic Design | College of Fine & Applied Arts “Cindy is the sole designer on a 3-person intern team that is working on a Cargill Protein North America project tied to our Factory of the Future Initiative, a tool that leverages data to make predictions about potential safety risks on the factory floor that day. Cindy’s role has been to discover, design and prototype the views of that data and the ways the various fabrication floor managers log the response they plan to take. Cindy has set the bar high given the thoroughness of her research, professionalism of her designs, technical acumen behind her designs also being feasible and communication skills to socialize and persuade others on her ideas.” Finalists: Eric Goff – ADM Modeling Intern Undergraduate in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Ethan Rasmussen – AbbVie Business Analyst Intern Undergraduate in Information Systems | Gies College of Business Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Winner: David An – Ameren Data Science Intern Undergraduate in Mathematics | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences “This summer, David was a key player in many initiatives on our data science team at the Ameren Innovation Center. David was Project Lead on their Electric Vehicle Analysis project where he took complex business needs and transformed them into actionable results. All summer, David was the first intern to show up at the office every day and he was laser-focused on his projects. He was hungry to gain experience leading people. He wanted to improve himself, both technically and as a leader. Seeing such humility and desire to grow out of an intern is impressive. Along with his drive and work ethic, he added so much to the in-person intern experience with his jokes and levity. David is such an outstanding intern that he makes me a better manager.” Finalists: Ben Avila – State Farm Actuarial Intern Undergraduate in Actuarial Science | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Madison Park – Cargill UX/UI Design Intern Undergraduate in Information Science | School of Information Sciences Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Winner: Natalie Xiong – Riverbed Data Science Intern Graduate in Psychology | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences “If Natalie has a goal in mind, she will absolutely accomplish it. Natalie is super collaborative – she listens to the opinions of others, and she is considerate and respectful to all colleagues around her. For her summer internship she essentially acted as a data science consultant where her work has helped improve a complex AI/ML product that aims to automatically find and fix IT problems for Riverbed’s customers, many of whom are fortune 500 companies. Natalie is very investigative, which ultimately led to her internship success because she learned technical concepts very quickly.” Finalists: Brendan Brasch – AbbVie Robotic Process Automation (RPA) Developer Intern Graduate in Bioengineering | Grainger College of Engineering Mengfei Lan – Corteva

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    Community Internships News Recognition & Awards Research Park

    2021 Intern Awards Recognize Top Talent Across Research Park

    The Research Park gathered to celebrate the most outstanding interns across its 120+ companies at the 15th annual Intern Awards, the longest-running event in the Research Park. Fittingly, the ceremony was held on Thursday, July 29, National Intern Day. The students honored as finalists and winners encompass a variety of disciplines, majors, and colleges from across the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, exemplifying the nature of interdisciplinary work that happens at Research Park companies. This summer intern program format has been like no other, with some students working on-site, some completely remote, and some working in a hybrid format. Regardless, these interns formed connections with peers and co-workers and made lasting impressions on their supervisors. These interns have impacted the Research Park and their employers through the countless projects they conceived, worked diligently on, and followed through to completion. Thank you to all the managers who took the time to nominate their students. Thank you to the panel of professionals who judged these awards. Award Categories: Entrepreneurial Leadership in a Startup Most Outstanding Undergraduate Intern Most Outstanding Graduate Intern Best Technical Innovation Award Best Non-Technical Innovation Award Most Competent and Collaborative Team Entrepreneurial Leadership in a Startup Olivia Rentz PSYONIC Mechatronics Intern Undergraduate in Biomedical Engineering “Olivia has demonstrated an extraordinary ability to manage multi-disciplinary tasks on our team. When she started in January 2021, she was tasked with several manufacturing & assembly projects which she quickly mastered. Several weeks into her internship, we were shocked to learn that she had no prior experience with any of the tools she was using to complete these tasks and had nonetheless learned to use them skillfully in a short period. Olivia has exhibited an absolute exemplary work ethic: always giving 100% on every task, eager to take on more responsibilities, and frequently staying late in the evenings to finish important projects or assist the rest of the team with crunch deadlines. She has driven for hours across the midwest to visit patients in person and help them install and troubleshoot their new prosthetic hand. Overall, she fully exemplifies the qualities of an incredible intern who goes above and beyond, and would be an extremely deserving recipient.” Finalists: Daniel Gealow, SimBioSys Computational Biologist Intern Undergraduate in Biomedical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Molly Izzi, Ascent Integrated Tech Graphic Design Intern Undergraduate in Graphic Design | College of Fine & Applied Arts   Most Outstanding Undergraduate Intern Daniel Polites, State Farm Actuarial & Modeling Intern Undergraduate in Actuarial Science | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences “Daniel has been taking on a project which will provide the ratemaking guidance from the farm and ranch line of business at State Farm, using a multivariate Generalized Linear Model, to help State Farm better match price to risk. Daniels sets as a great role model of continuously seeking ways of working more effectively and efficiently. The planning efforts of fun activities Daniel leads help shape the RDC philosophy of “the internship is not only about work but also having fun at work”, and to make the internship a very unique experience for our interns. Daniel is considered a strong technical lead on his projects” Finalists: Nicholas (Nico) Lavalle , Actuarial & Modeling Intern Undergraduate in Statistics | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Xi (Adam) Zhao, Corteva Data Science Intern  Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Neil Kaushikkar COUNTRY Financial Software Developer – Project Manager Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Most Outstanding Graduate Intern Eddie Chapman, AbbVie Library Information Specialist Graduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering “For the almost four years he has been with us, he has truly been a collaborator on these projects, and he takes full ownership of them, responsibility for them, and pride in them, as he should. Eddie will fix the bugs, meet deadlines, explain clearly why some can’t be met, support a release, and even present his work to customers – all this is true. His development work supporting SimpleTools lets users design or reuse the strategies they want using the power of ontologies, and then a bot can perform repetitive tasks of waiting for results and sending them to the customer on the back end. Another tool, LISToolkit, for which Eddie is responsible for most of the development, allows search team members to perform text and hedge manipulation at the click of a button that in the past had required an open notepad document and knowledge of regular expressions – very error-prone work for a human that Eddie’s tools make so much simpler and consistent.” Finalists: Aadish Naik, Brunswick Perception Engineering Intern Graduate in Electrical and Computer Engineering Anisha Jauhauri, Corteva Software Development Intern Graduate in Information Management Pranay Thangeda, Corteva Summer Research Intern Graduate in Aerospace Engineering   Best Technical Innovation Award Arif Syraj , EarthSense Data Science Intern Undergraduate in Mechanical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering “Arif has exemplified the top-notch go-getter attitude that a startup employee needs to have to be successful. He has shown great initiative, starting off as a volunteer, and quickly climbing the ranks to be paid intern, and now has a full-time offer from us. The algorithm developed and deployed by Arif has been extensively tested against manual measurements and it has shown a strong correlation. This is a very positive move since our customers typically went with our competition (drone companies) to do the measurement of the height trait, but now our data shows that we are more accurate and reliable than drone measurements.” Finalists: David Liu Yahoo Intern I, Technica Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering Aman Khinvasara, AARP Strategic Integration & Talent (ITS) Intern Undergraduate in Computer Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Gautham Krishnan, Corteva Contracted Student Researcher Graduate in Theoretical and Applied Mechanics Best Non-Technical Innovation Anna Chi, Brunswick i-Jet Industrial Design Intern Undergraduate in Industrial Design | College of Fine & Applied Arts “Anna has worked on a variety of really cool projects revolving

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