Ten years ago, the College of Engineering sought to reinvent how first-year engineering students lived and studied, hoping to be part of the solution for Michigan’s booming need for more engineering and technical talent.
The Cornerstone & Residential Experience, known as CoRe, sought corporate sponsors to bring real-world expertise and challenges into entry level classroom and learning experiences—exposure that would excite freshman students about the possibilities in engineering careers from their first days on campus.
Consumers Energy was the first official partner, helping to develop the program from the ground up and supporting it with an initial $200,000 grant from the company’s foundation which has been renewed for $250,00 every three years since 2010.
It’s been a game changer for the company, says Carolyn Bloodworth, secretary/treasurer of the Consumers Energy Foundation.
“Michigan State really opened our eyes to see that partnerships like this are critical to getting students excited about working in our industry,” she says. “CoRe allows us to build longterm relationships with students and to play a meaningful role in supporting and encouraging them to persevere in a difficult field.”
Consumers Energy led the way for others to invest, including BOSCH, General Electric and Tenneco. Today, the CoRe program serves more than 1,800 entering engineering students at MSU, many of whom are women and other minority-represented groups in engineering.
The partnerships are turning college experiences, relationships and network access into serious career opportunities. For Consumers Energy that has included placing about 30 MSU students into internships each year.
“The goal of our internship program is to attract the most innovative, creative and diverse group of talent to Consumers Energy to help drive our company’s mission,” says Kolby Bogan, University & Internship program lead at Consumers Energy. “The CoRe program is strongly passionate about the success of first-year engineering students, which helps to set the positive tone for the duration of their college careers and prepare engineering students for the workforce. We take great pride as a company in building relationships with strong talent and participating in networking opportunities to expand our engagement through programs like CoRe.”
The success of the Consumers Energy/CoRe partnership can be seen in the 425 MSU alumni currently employed at Consumers Energy.
Molly McClorey, a 2019 mechanical engineering graduate, considers it extreme good fortune to have participated in CoRe, which led to an internship at Consumers Energy after her second year.
“This was an incredible opportunity and I have felt welcome in the Consumers Energy family ever since,” she says. “I continued in the Gas Engineering Intern Program for three different rotations, eventually landing my current job within the company’s Engineering Entry Program, a two-year program consisting of four different six-month rotations. I am currently in my second rotation and loving every second of the program!”
Alumna Alyse Way completed her civil engineering degree in 2016, and today serves as a Consumers Energy transmission pipeline engineer in the metro-Detroit area.
“My goal as a student was to graduate and to work for an organization where I could make a difference,” she says. “Consumers Energy provided me an opportunity to learn about the energy industry and to ‘leave things better than I found them’ both at work and in my community. I work to ensure that heat gets to the homes of millions of Michigan residents by enhancing the deliverability and integrity of our natural gas pipelines.”
Alyse’s involvement with CoRe has come full circle. She now volunteers to work with MSU students whenever she can.
“I once walked in the students’ shoes so now I can give back through sharing my story,” she says.
The Consumers Energy Foundation is the philanthropic arm of Consumers Energy, Michigan’s largest utility. Consumers Energy provides natural gas and electricity to 6.7 million of the state’s 10 million residents in all 68 Lower Peninsula counties.
LEARN MORE about corporate support for the College of Engineering by contacting Corporate Development Director Jennifer Jennings at jjenning@msu.edu or by calling (517) 432-6573.