Tag Archives: academics

Spartans at Work: At The Walt Disney Family Museum, I’m “Inspired to Keep Pursuing My Own Goals”

By Sarah Kyo, Web Communications Specialist

(This summer, SJSU Today hits the road, visiting students and recent grads on the job across the country and around the world. Our Spartans at Work series continues with animation/illustration major Alex Turner.)

Where will an SJSU degree take you? How about to a place that celebrates one of the most influential people in your field? Alex Turner, ’14, Animation/Illustration major is an education intern at The Walt Disney Family Museum in the Presidio of San Francisco.

From the outside, the museum’s building matches the surrounding red-brick structures not far from the Golden Gate Bridge. Inside, it contains historic artifacts from Disney’s life and the classic Disney animations, films and television programs.

Turner said he feels inspired to come to work, drawing in his sketchbook as he commutes on the Caltrain every weekday. At the museum, he helps inspire a younger generation’s creativity and imagination at the museum’s Disney Discovery Summer Camp. Each week-long session revolves around a different topic, such as animation, comics books and designing theme park rides.

Once camp wraps up in early August, Turner will apply his skills in helping the museum redesign its website. The SJSU animation/illustration program gave him a great foundation for his internship.

“I feel like I have pretty strong fundamentals in art and animation,” he said, “and what we’re doing at the camp at The Walt Disney Family Museum, I’ve been able to apply a lot of those skills like either design or painting, you know, or just being organized.”

Spartans at Work: At Crown Worldwide, I’ve Learned SJSU’s Diversity “Really Prepares You” to Go Anywhere

Female student in brown sweater is sitting in front of a PC labtop working and reading notes from a person journal.

Diane Pham, '12 business management and global studies, is a global alliance intern at Crown Worldwide Group, where she is standardizing the process the company employs to build relationships with business partners (Diane Pham photo).

By Amanda Holst, Public Affairs Assistant

(This summer, SJSU Today hits the road, visiting students and recent grads on the job across the country and around the world. Our Spartans at Work series continues with the Class of 2012’s Diane Pham.)

Improving business operations in Hong Kong and auditing in South Africa are just some of the unique opportunities available through the Thompson Global Internship Program. The SJSU program sends students abroad to complete projects for Crown Worldwide Group, founded by Jim Thompson, ’62 aeronautical engineering.

Diane Pham, ’12 business management and global studies, is just wrapping up work as a global alliance intern at Crown Worldwide. This summer, she is in London, standardizing the process the company employs to build relationships with global service partners and to create an accreditation program for future partnerships.

“Up until this point, the service partners have not been very consistent, so we’re building and making proposals for an identity that will create a mutually beneficial relationship,” Pham said.

Located in more than 50 countries and serving 200 locations, Crown Worldwide is the largest group of international moving companies, leading the way in relocation, records management, logistics and storage services. The company is credited with moving the Mona Lisa and two giant pandas.

In addition to learning about culture abroad, Pham says she’s getting a “big view on a global company and what it takes to manage one.”

She also says being a student at SJSU helped prepared her for work in a multinational business.

“I think the diversity that you are exposed to at SJSU just really prepares you to go to any new location and just take advantage of it,” Pham said.

Spartans at Work: At Cisco, “I am Finding There are No Limits to What I Can Achieve”

Female Cisco student dressed in a black jacket and turquiose shirt is standing with arms opened in front of a giant Cisco sign

Tanya D’Silva, a business major with a concentration in Management Information Systems, works on a team that helps businesses’ IT departments implement Cisco’s Operating Model framework (Peter Caravalho photo).

By Amanda Holst, Public Affairs Assistant

(This summer, SJSU Today hits the road, visiting students and recent grads on the job across the country and around the world. Our Spartans at Work series continues with the Class of 2013’s Tanya D’Silva.)

After giving her resume to Cisco at a SJSU job fair and applying for an internship position through Sparta Jobs, Tanya D’Silva, a business major with a concentration in Management Information Systems, wasn’t sure that her five years of restaurant experience was enough to land an internship at the prestigious company. What seemed like a long shot turned out to be the opportunity of a lifetime.

“They took a leap of faith in me, trusting that I would do well in this environment,” D’Silva said. “If you are active around campus, and prove that you are well-rounded and are eager to learn, you have as good of a shot as anyone else.”

D’Silva is an IT analyst intern, working in Cisco’s Enterprise Release Management Organization within Connected IT Services.  She works on a team that helps businesses’ IT departments implement Cisco’s Operating Model framework in order to move information from data center to data center.

Getting the Most Out of Her Internship

Cisco, one of the largest employers in Silicon Valley, is a multinational leader in designing, manufacturing and selling networking equipment. The corporation was founded in 1984 in San Francisco but is now based in San Jose.

D’Silva says her two-month internship is teaching her the “ins and outs” of a corporation and helping her figure out her future goals.

“Since I am contemplating management positions or becoming a project manager, the team I am working on is helping me to see how the business operates and the various functions of a company,” D’Silva said.

D’Silva says she wishes she found out earlier that being a 4.0 student isn’t the only way to achieve a good job. According to her, what she’s learning in the classroom and what she takes with her into the work world is what counts.

“I am finding there are no limits to what I can achieve. My internship is what I make of it. If I choose to stay immersed in intern activities and take on more projects then I will get more out of my internship experience,” D’Silva said.

SJSU Organizes Journalism Skills Academy for Afghan Professors

SJSU Organizes Journalism Skills Academy for Afghan Professors

One of the most challenging aspects of the academy was teaching non-linear editing in just a couple of days. Adobe donated copies of it's new Creative Suite 6 to help our efforts, and Dubai's Higher College of Technology donated its classroom space (photo courtesy of Diane Guerrazzi).

By Diane Guerrazzi, Associate Professor of Journalism and Mass Communications

(Editor’s Note: Professor Guerrazzi sent the following from the Middle East, where she is helping establish college journalism programs. Her work is funded by the U.S. State Department.)

SJSU sweated it out in Dubai this July, organizing a two-week Journalism Skills Academy for professors from five different universities in Afghanistan: Kabul, Shaikh Zayed, Nangarhar, Balkh and Herat. Their homeland is too unpredictable for conducting training, as I saw first hand when I was abruptly evacuated from Herat last year, following coordinated suicide attacks.

Albeit hot, Dubai is orderly, with easy airport and Metro access for journalists to practice reporting. As part of their work in the academy, Afghan professors created television news stories.  The topics ranged from the burgeoning Indian population in Dubai to the technology behind the fountains near the “tallest man-made structure in the world,” the Burj Khalifa. One of the most challenging aspects of the academy was teaching non-linear editing in just a couple of days. Adobe donated copies of its new Creative Suite 6 to help our efforts, and Dubai’s Higher College of Technology donated its classroom space.

SJSU Organizes Journalism Skills Academy for Afghan Professors

SJSU organized the academy and sent four representatives to teach and assist: English instructor Kelly Robart, Assistant Professor Diane Guerrazzi, alumna/Afghan-American journalist Halima Kazem and contracts administrator Susan Mir (photo courtesy of Diane Guerrazzi).

The weeks were long, Afghan-style. In keeping with the school schedule in Afghanistan, our only days off were Fridays.  We managed to squeeze in a quick tour of Dubai and a “Desert Safari.” SJSU organized the academy and sent four representatives to teach and assist.

SJSU has two $1 million State Department grants to modernize journalism education at Afghan Universities; one of our grants is for Balkh University in the north, and the other is Herat, in western Afghanistan. We invited the other U.S. universities with grants to join us and help teach the Academy and they all took us up on the offer:  Ball State, University of Arizona and University of Nebraska, Omaha.

Our colleagues from Herat and Balkh Universities are scheduled to visit SJSU for 11 weeks each in the coming months. The first group will arrive in October. Having spent two weeks with them this summer, and seeing them on previous visits to Afghanistan, we’ll be introducing old friends to campus. The welcome will be warm, and the San Jose weather will be welcome, after the summer in Dubai.

Spartans at Work: At NASA Ames, “I’m Pursuing My Childhood Dream”

By Sarah Kyo, Web Communications Specialist

(This summer, SJSU Today hits the road, visiting students and recent grads on the job across the country and around the world. Our Spartans at Work series continues with aerospace engineering graduate Ali Guarneros Luna.)

Where will an SJSU degree take you? How about beyond the Earth’s atmosphere? While Ali Guarneros Luna, ’10, ’12 Aerospace Engineering, has her feet on the ground as a systems engineer for NASA Ames Research Center, she has been involved in projects that have made it to outer space.

Guarneros Luna lead an SJSU student team that worked on the cube satellite, TechEdSat, one of five cube satellites, or cubesats, being transported to the International Space Station. A transfer vehicle containing the cubesats, additional experiments and supplies launched from Japan at 7:06 p.m. PDT July 20. TechEdSat is the first NASA cube satellite that will orbit the earth after being launched from the International Space Station.

Becoming an aerospace engineer was a childhood dream for Guarneros Luna, who grew up in Mexico.

“I read something, I saw something on TV when I was probably five or seven years old, and it just impacted me,” she said.

She earned her current job after interning at NASA Ames during her last year of undergraduate studies, where she made connections with SJSU faculty members who also worked at that research center.

“I was just lucky enough that … San Jose State University gave me the opportunity to pursue the dream that I had when I was growing up,” she said.