Estimated 1600 to 1700 attendees at 2004 student career conference.

Judged resounding success by students, panelists, and the college community.

Click here to see the 2004 program.

Despite dismal weather, students from BCC, other community colleges, and several local high schools flocked to the BCC campus on Nov. 2, 2004 to attend the student career conference jointly planned by The Boeing Company and BCC. The conference was groundbreaking in its planning and scope. Our undying gratitude to the three managers from Boeing, Jerry Bunce, Dave Halverson and James Westfall, who worked alongside individuals from the Career Center, Student Services, Student Programs, Tech Prep, High School programs, the Science and Business Divisions to mount this ambitious conference. The mission of the conference was to motivate students to pursue careers in science, technology, and business.

The day was jumpstarted with a keynote address by Rick Stephens, Sr. VP and President of Shared Services of The Boeing Company. Rick leads 21,000 people in an $8 billion unit of Boeing. He is also a national workplace expert. His talk was a challenge to students and the college to "learn, unlearn, and relearn" what we need to ready ourselves for the new workplace.  Following this stimulating keynote, eight panels covered engineering, women, biotechnology, field science, diversity in business, local to global, computer science, and science intersections. The purpose of each panel was to show the diversity of the people who are successful in these areas and to give students an idea of the often circuitous path that people follow to achieve their career goals. The Boeing managers and panelists (who included national experts in their fields) volunteered their time to make this conference a success. We estimate the total value of this conference to be over $70,000 of which The Boeing Company donated over $30,000 in goods and services. Thanks to Tech Prep and Perkins (Paula Boyum) for their financial support as well as Student Programs (Faisal Jaswal and Peter Kirov) and the Campus Activities Board along with the ASG for the publicity, flat panel announcements, support and refreshments. Thanks to Microsoft and Jack Perry for their generous donation of prizes.

Engineering panel	Computer Science panel	Women panel
Diversity panel	Local to Global	Science Intersections

Many people worked long and hard to make this conference a success. First and foremost, thanks to the Career Center, in particular Teresa McClane who covered for every possible eventuality and coordinated everyone's efforts. Thanks to Cheryl Vermilyea for working on the Program Committee and the many people at the Career Center, including Fred Mitterndorfer who coordinated the online reservation system not to mention Amir Marzban and Nick Kawamoto who confirmed reservations and helped with other tasks. They managed the entire reservation and confirmation system that got the 1600 to 1700 students to the venues. Thanks to Chequita Williams-Cox (our online guru) who designed the reservation system and Juan Ulloa who made it happen.

Thanks to Donna Sharpe (Science Division Advisor) who worked on logistics and Amy MacNeill (High School Programs) who did much of the work in execution and who tallied up a survey on the spot. Marcella Stachurski and Joyce Carroll of Tech Prep worked hard to get the high school students at the event. Kaye Moreton assisted much on the day of the conference. Thanks to Tech Prep for their sponsorship.

Thanks to the moderators, Frank Lee, Judy Woo, Sylvia Unwin, Jim Ellinger, Melodye Gold, Rob Viens (who also arranged for the entire Field Science panel), Leslie Lum, and Judith Paquette, who made the panels run smoothly. Thanks to Adam Burke, Jay Strivey, and Roger Ewald for making the technology happen without (almost) a glitch. Rick Otte and his student crew are working on the broadcast version of the conference. We thank him for documenting this important event. Of course, our gratitude to Terri Halsey who managed all the room bookings and room set-ups plus Terrie Graham who problem-solved all the parking and traffic logistics.

Thanks for Janice Grayson (Business Division Advisor) who developed the website along with Adam Pflug and spearheaded the Home Base for the conference where students could get information and talk to representatives from the relevant BCC programs plus four-year institutions. Thanks for all the Business Division faculty and students who manned booths to give out information. Our appreciation to Steve McClaine of Food Services who arranged the refreshments.

The incredible twenty-eight student ambassadors (Mike Junor, Shan Zubair, Ted Marshall, Matt McGaffey, Nikoleta Kelchova, Luke Tracy, Brandi Church, Courtney Brown, Dennis Wang, Nick Kawamoto, Mike Wang, Mira Konzen, Cameron Ostaer, Daniel Done, Kim Sacha, Katherine Boles, Mark Hiester, Lisa Thacker, Dylan Thome, Amir Marzban, Joe Turner, Rae Kang, Joel Jester, Adam Major, Alisher Khussainov, Emily Griffitts, Marlon Torres, and Ryan Weh.) showed the campus and external community what great students we have. They managed the venues, ushered students, escorted panelists, managed the raffles, and generally kept the order at all the panels. Panelists rated them highly and enjoyed having the personal contact with our great ambassadors. Thanks to Judith Paquette who worked many hours to train and coordinate this huge job. It turned out to be one of the most satisfying parts of the conference to see our students ROCK!!