College of Science, Engineering and Technology

University development manager Sarah Wade is a GCU graduate and is working on her doctorate. Her daughter went to GCU and now teaches at a Southern California high school that has several other GCU connections. “I feel like I can’t go anywhere without somebody knowing somebody who is on campus at GCU,” Wade said.

National Cybersecurity Career Awareness Week is designed to introduce students to careers in the field. One event GCU students could attend this week was a Provost Speaker Series talk on Wednesday by GCE’s Chief Information Security Officer Mike Manrod. He spoke about what students could really expect from a career in cybersecurity. “He is what students want to be. They want to be Mike,” said Technology Project Manager Katherine Urrutia. “We thought it would be great for him to come in and talk to our students.”

“Glorious Frequencies: Music, Physics and Engineering” “Lazy or Lupus? Is My Tiredness Pathological?” and “The Robots are Coming!” were just some of the topics high school juniors and seniors, as well as community college students, explored at the annual Health Sciences, Engineering and Technology Day on Thursday. More than 1,100 high school and community college students RSVP’d to attend HSET Day, when students not only toured DNA, engineering, cadaver and nursing labs but sat in on talks by professionals in the field and visited with GCU STEM students. The event was presented by the Marketing Department’s ground event planning team.

GCU News Bureau GCU computer science student Jamie Graham recently attended the Grace Hopper Celebration conference in Orlando, Fla. The event is the world’s largest gathering of women technologists and is produced by AnitaB.org and presented in partnership with the Association in Computing Machinery. Graham said she was “excited for this educational opportunity” and hoped to build strong connections with other software engineers. She was able to attend the conference after winning an all-expenses-paid scholarship from Checkr, a background check company using artificial intelligence and machine learning. Her essay and application propelled her past more than 300 other applicants for the scholarship.

Three nursing students in the College of Nursing and Health Care Professions took time out of their busy schedules last week to speak with prenursing students in Dr. Mark Wireman’s pathophysiology class. Many of the students, who have just been accepted into nursing school, are excited about the next step in their academic careers but also are a little nervous, too, about the rigor that lies ahead. So Wireman asked the students to speak to the class, which also welcomed Dr. Maria Quimba, Associate Dean of the CONHCP, who told the class: “What we’re trying to get you to do is, that whole point of you being here today is refocusing your energy … it’s a mindset.”

Saturday was a day of celebration as Grand Canyon University’s Alpha Chi chapter inducted 1,212 new members into the prestigious honors society. Only students within the top 10% of their graduating class in each of their individual colleges are eligible. “GCU does attract a lot of exceptional learners,” Honors College Associate Dean Breanna Naegeli said.

It’s easy to see why Will Primack of the College of Science, Engineering and Technology is considered an outstanding faculty member at GCU. He provides some memorable thoughts about his teaching style and puts the onus on himself when he says, “Educators today need to give students a reason to not just show up to class, but to want to WANT to show up for class.”

Powered by midnight pizza and enthusiasm, GCU computer programming seniors Trevor Moore, Carter Rice and Jordan Riley emerged victorious at the PayPal Opportunity Hack last weekend, a marathon hacking event that spanned 18 hours over two days. The team designed an email gathering and management system for a small nonprofit called Zuri’s Circle, which helps the homeless, elderly and those in need. Judges awarded the team first place, which comes with a $1,000 award. That initial award will be followed by an additional $5,000 after the system is uploaded at the nonprofit before January deadline date. Two other GCU teams took home third- and fifth-place wins. “The PayPal engineers continue to be impressed with GCU students year after year,” said Dr. Isac Artzi, the college’s computer science faculty lead.

The Association of Christian Schools International’s first international job fair at GCU brought representatives from 28 countries to campus Tuesday. “We have a variety of job fairs and career fairs, but mostly they’re local and national. This is opening up the door in a large way to the number of professions in that international sphere,” said Dr. Tacy Ashby, Senior Vice President of K12 Educational Development. “The College of Education is really excited about this because it affords incredible ministry opportunities while allowing their students the opportunity to serve in Christian schools abroad.”

Dr. Mark Wireman, Associate Professor in the College of Science, Engineering and Technology, has done a lot of impressive things in his career. He was a chiropractor for 10 years. He went on a medical mission trip to Nepal. But the key to his classroom teaching is the ability to relate those experiences to his students, and he does so with a sense of humor.