Insurance program ensured cyber student’s job prospects

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first in a series of stories about students’ career journeys, with the articles leading up to the opening ceremony for the T.W. Lewis Career Center this fall.

Crime shows? Grand Canyon University alumna Novella Gardner loves them.

“Law and Order,” “CSI,” “Criminal Minds”?

She soaks them all up. But she didn’t imagine herself as the lead investigator hunting down suspects.

“I was very into the person behind the computer and seeing what they would do,” said Gardner. “I said, ‘I want to do that someday.' I wanted to do cybersecurity. As a kid, I was learning how to code and learning to do these different kinds of scripts, and as time went on, I was able to assist a class in Java.

“After that, I thought, ‘Yeah, I definitely want to go into cybersecurity.’”

Gardner dove into GCU’s cybersecurity program and graduated in the spring with a bachelor’s degree in cybersecurity and a minor in forensic psychology.

Steeped in those crime shows, Gardner couldn’t have imagined where her path would lead her.

Just a few months after graduation, she is fighting those cyber bad guys and preventing cybercrime for MedPro, the nation's oldest and largest medical malpractice insurance group.

Gardner works remotely from her hometown of Charlotte, North Carolina, as a cybersecurity analyst.

And she might never have discovered that pathway if not for the internship and career opportunities at GCU and the groundwork laid by its colleges and Career Services department, which is gearing up for the grand opening ceremony of the T.W. Lewis Career Center in November on the first floor of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

“Insurance tends to be one of those careers people land in vs. aspire to go into,” said Lionel Williams, GCU employer relations director, who himself got his start in insurance and is amazed by the program Gardner invested herself in when she was a GCU student.

The university is one of only a half dozen in the country that the MedPro Group has chosen to work with through its Foundations of Insurance program, which is offered at the university through the Colangelo College of Business. Senior Associate Dean Dr. Allison Mason and Provost Dr. Randy Gibb, the college’s former dean, worked with MedPro to bring the opportunity to students at GCU.

“The whole idea is to really help students recognize this untapped pathway into the insurance world,” Williams said. “… There are so many different avenues, so many different pathways that would lead into insurance, and there’s a lot of upward mobility in that career field, but students aren’t aware of it.”

Randy Walker, MedPro Group’s Inclusion and Engagement leader, said the FOI program was designed to increase the pipeline of talent into the insurance industry.

Students from multiple colleges are accepted into the program, whose other focus is to foster diversity and inclusion in the company. After the program was launched in 2021, MedPro partnered with several Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Hispanic Serving Institutions around the country to launch FOI on their campuses.

GCU built a relationship with MedPro when it was developing the program’s curriculum. The company leaned on the university after Walker heard about GCU’s expertise in instructional design.

“Along that journey, Randy (Gibb) shared that if we ever decided to extend the program into another school outside of our HBCU and HIS set of schools, he’d love to see if GCU could be added," Walker said. "… GCU was an obvious choice for us.”

Walker was the one who recruited Gardner into the program.

“She’s really bright, energetic and driven – those traits, plus the fact she’s a great communicator and extremely humble,” Walker said.

Gardner, the only woman on her cybersecurity team, added that the FOI program changed the landscape by giving everyone a chance to show their different talents.

The program, she said, “gave me more courage to take the job. I wanted to get into the field, be successful and inspire more women to join.”

During her time at GCU, Gardner jumped at the chance to be a part of the Multicultural Office, serving on the marketing and social media team.

The Multicultural Office helped her build leadership skills, she said, as did one of her other experiences at GCU. Gardner supported employees with her tech savvy as a student worker on the IT Help Desk.

“It was my favorite job while I was at GCU, for sure,” she said. “MedPro actually talked about it a lot – ‘Oh, she worked on the Help Desk.’ It was a great stepping stone for me,” as was the FOI program.

Students who are accepted into the program hear from insurance professionals through a speaker series. They’re also paired with a coach who can give them one-on-one mentorship.

Students also spend an all-expenses-paid immersion weekend at MedPro’s home office in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It’s where more insurance professionals visit with students.

“For example, there’s one insurance CEO who came out. His insurance covers concert venues and celebrities,” Williams said. “He’s met so many celebrities – all these cool things – that students aren’t aware that insurance really taps into."

Gardner also was selected to be a student ambassador for the program and had the chance to work for MedPro during an IT internship over the summer.

“I graduated (from GCU), then a couple of weeks later, drove up to Indiana to start my internship,” Gardner said.

During her three months in Indiana as an intern, she immersed herself in completing a phishing email project, which generates automatic emails to employees who might have been a victim of a phishing test or scam.

After completing the Foundations of Insurance program and an internship, Gardner was hired at the end of the summer and started her full-time position in September.

“I actually never thought I would end up doing cybersecurity for a medical insurance company,” Gardner said.. “When people think of cybersecurity, they think of working for a government agency or a big tech company. But in reality, everyone needs cybersecurity.”

Williams said, “Novella, she went through the entire process, from being a cohort student here to … now a cybersecurity specialist with MedPro. I think what’s really unique is, she’s cybersecurity – she’s a tech person – and what would make a tech person think about the insurance industry? … It’s just showing that even in the tech industry, there’s opportunity in an insurance company.”

Also interesting, Williams added, is that her role with the company was never meant to be remote.

“But because she was liked so much, they went ahead and allowed her to stay in Charlotte, where she lives. It’s a remote cybersecurity position they created just for her because she was so impressive to the organization.”

For MedPro’s Randy Walker, Gardner and other GCU students have all shared a common thread when it comes to impressing employers: They’re strong communicators, humble and grounded in their faith.

“Each has had their own unique talents,” he has said of GCU’s FOI students, “but it’s been great to see the consistent core strengths from GCU’s students.”

Manager of Internal Communications Lana Sweeten-Shults can be reached at [email protected] or at 602-639-7901.

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