{"id":8810,"date":"2017-05-08T11:07:49","date_gmt":"2017-05-08T15:07:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/?p=8810"},"modified":"2023-04-05T14:59:18","modified_gmt":"2023-04-05T18:59:18","slug":"ccpdconnectiondinner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/ccpdconnectiondinner\/","title":{"rendered":"College\u2019s CCPD Dinner Connects Students to Fortune 500 Company"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-8811 size-full\" src=\"\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2017\/05\/StrykerDinnerMay20173.jpg\" alt=\"CCPD Dinner Connects Students to Stryker\" width=\"920\" height=\"247\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2017\/05\/StrykerDinnerMay20173.jpg 920w, https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2017\/05\/StrykerDinnerMay20173-150x40.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2017\/05\/StrykerDinnerMay20173-300x81.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2017\/05\/StrykerDinnerMay20173-600x161.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2017\/05\/StrykerDinnerMay20173-500x134.jpg 500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 920px) 100vw, 920px\" \/>In early May, 28 Kalamazoo College students had the opportunity to share a meal on campus with eight professionals who have at least two things in common\u2014the <em>K-Plan<\/em> and careers at the Stryker Corporation, a Kalamazoo-based Fortune 500 medical technologies firm.<\/p>\n<p>The alumni returned to campus at the invitation of the <strong>Center for Career and Professional Development<\/strong> to meet with students who could learn about career paths at Stryker and the relevance of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/k-plan\/\"><strong><em>K-Plan<\/em><\/strong><\/a> to those paths. At least 15 current Stryker employees got their undergraduate degrees at K, and both institutions are interested in strengthening the talent pipeline between the two.<\/p>\n<p>The event began with a welcome by <strong>S. Si Johnson \u201978<\/strong>, the retired group president of Stryker MedSurg Group and a current member of the College\u2019s board of trustees. Johnson shared the four core values of Stryker\u2014integrity, accountability, people, and performance\u2014and reflected on how the critical thinking and problem solving skills inherent in a K education are great preparation for a career at Stryker.<\/p>\n<p>After students and alumni enjoyed informal networking conversations over dinner, <strong>James N. Heath \u201978<\/strong>, the retired president of Stryker Instruments and a member of K\u2019s board of trustees, moderated an alumni panel that included <strong>Randy Rzeznik \u201908<\/strong>, director of customer excellence, Neuro, Spine, ENT and Navigation; <strong>Bryce Pearson \u201915<\/strong>, finance representative; <strong>Kevin Packard \u201905<\/strong>, clinical marketing manager, Neuro, Spine, ENT and Navigation; and <strong>Michael Weslosky \u201902<\/strong>, staff scientist.<\/p>\n<p>Panelists reflected on their trajectories from K to Stryker and talked about the qualities of the company they find most attractive. The panelists\u2019 K majors were varied\u2014chemistry, economics, biology, and business\u2014and each panelist cited the value of the work ethic instilled by the <em>K-Plan<\/em> and the 10-week term. They also stressed the importance of persistence in the pursuit of employment. Pearson, for example, shared the effort and time that was required before he secured a position at Stryker.<\/p>\n<p>Heath also invited one of the students in attendance, junior <strong>Alex White<\/strong>, to describe the extensive process he\u2019d gone through to secure an internship with Stryker for the upcoming summer.<\/p>\n<p>Other alumni attending the event included Legal Counsel <strong>Christopher DiVirgilio \u201904<\/strong> and Senior IS Business Analyst <strong>Russ Hankey \u201996<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Students and alumni agreed that the evening was a success and excellent preparation for the next step in the K\/Stryker relationship: a half-day immersion K-Trek for selected students to the company\u2019s headquarters in the fall.<\/p>\n<p><em>Text and photo by Joan Hawxhurst<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In early May, 28 Kalamazoo College students had the opportunity to share a meal on campus with eight professionals who have at least two things in common\u2014the K-Plan and careers at the Stryker Corporation, a Kalamazoo-based Fortune 500 medical technologies firm. The alumni returned to campus at the invitation of the Center for Career and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":8812,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[233,231],"tags":[31,93,92,38],"post_formats":[],"class_list":["post-8810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty-staff","category-students","tag-alumni","tag-career-development","tag-internships","tag-students"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\r\n<title>Dinner Links Students, Stryker - News and Events - Kalamazoo College<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Kalamazoo College students shared a meal with 8 professionals who have at least two things in common\u2014the K-Plan and careers at Stryker.\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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aria-label=\"archive of category Faculty &amp; Staff\" href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/category\/faculty-staff\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Faculty &amp; Staff<\/a><a aria-label=\"archive of category Students\" href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/category\/students\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Students<\/a>","tags_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/alumni\/\" rel=\"tag\">alumni<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/career-development\/\" rel=\"tag\">career development<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/internships\/\" rel=\"tag\">internships<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/students\/\" rel=\"tag\">students<\/a>","social_share_info":"<a data-share=\"facebook\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/ccpdconnectiondinner\/\" class=\"pl-facebook-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-facebook-f\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a><a data-share=\"twitter\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/ccpdconnectiondinner\/\" class=\"pl-twiiter-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-twitter\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a><a data-share=\"linkedin\" href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/shareArticle?url=https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/ccpdconnectiondinner\/\" class=\"pl-linkedin-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-linkedin-in\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a>","wordExcerpt_info":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignright wp-image-8811 size-full\" src=\"\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2017\/05\/StrykerDinnerMay20173.jpg\" alt=\"CCPD Dinner Connects Students to Stryker\" width=\"920\" height=\"247\" \/>In early May, 28 Kalamazoo College students had the opportunity to share a meal on campus with eight professionals who have at least two things in common\u2014the <em>K-Plan<\/em> and careers at the Stryker Corporation, a Kalamazoo-based Fortune 500 medical technologies firm.<\/p>\n<p>The alumni returned to campus at the invitation of the <strong>Center for Career and Professional Development<\/strong> to meet with students who could learn about career paths at Stryker and the relevance of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/k-plan\/\"><strong><em>K-Plan<\/em><\/strong><\/a> to those paths. At least 15 current Stryker employees got their undergraduate degrees at K, and both institutions are interested in strengthening the talent pipeline between the two.<\/p>\n<p>The event began with a welcome by <strong>S. Si Johnson \u201978<\/strong>, the retired group president of Stryker MedSurg Group and a current member of the College\u2019s board of trustees. Johnson shared the four core values of Stryker\u2014integrity, accountability, people, and performance\u2014and reflected on how the critical thinking and problem solving skills inherent in a K education are great preparation for a career at Stryker.<\/p>\n<p>After students and alumni enjoyed informal networking conversations over dinner, <strong>James N. Heath \u201978<\/strong>, the retired president of Stryker Instruments and a member of K\u2019s board of trustees, moderated an alumni panel that included <strong>Randy Rzeznik \u201908<\/strong>, director of customer excellence, Neuro, Spine, ENT and Navigation; <strong>Bryce Pearson \u201915<\/strong>, finance representative; <strong>Kevin Packard \u201905<\/strong>, clinical marketing manager, Neuro, Spine, ENT and Navigation; and <strong>Michael Weslosky \u201902<\/strong>, staff scientist.<\/p>\n<p>Panelists reflected on their trajectories from K to Stryker and talked about the qualities of the company they find most attractive. The panelists\u2019 K majors were varied\u2014chemistry, economics, biology, and business\u2014and each panelist cited the value of the work ethic instilled by the <em>K-Plan<\/em> and the 10-week term. They also stressed the importance of persistence in the pursuit of employment. Pearson, for example, shared the effort and time that was required before he secured a position at Stryker.<\/p>\n<p>Heath also invited one of the students in attendance, junior <strong>Alex White<\/strong>, to describe the extensive process he\u2019d gone through to secure an internship with Stryker for the upcoming summer.<\/p>\n<p>Other alumni attending the event included Legal Counsel <strong>Christopher DiVirgilio \u201904<\/strong> and Senior IS Business Analyst <strong>Russ Hankey \u201996<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Students and alumni agreed that the evening was a success and excellent preparation for the next step in the K\/Stryker relationship: a half-day immersion K-Trek for selected students to the company\u2019s headquarters in the fall.<\/p>\n<p><em>Text and photo by Joan Hawxhurst<\/em><\/p>\n","comment_info":"No Comments","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8810"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19522,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8810\/revisions\/19522"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8810"},{"taxonomy":"post_format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post_formats?post=8810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}