How internships are benefiting College of DuPage students

College of DuPage engineering students Herven Barham of Aurora and Tanmay Chaklasiya of Hanover Park are exploring their field and gaining invaluable skills and experience this summer through internships with Eaton Automotive in Marshall, Michigan.

During the internship, Barham is working with Eaton's Vehicle Group Center of Excellence Teams, assisting in developing material and inventory control methodologies and best practices.

Chaklasiya, meanwhile, is spending his summer at Eaton working in the supercharger division performing tasks related to quality control and testing for future supercharger parts.

"This is my first exposure to the working world and I'm looking forward to gaining some experience," Barham said. "Eaton has many people who have been there for more than 20 years and these individuals have lots of knowledge and experience that I can learn from and add to my own knowledge to make me a better engineer."

Having completed the Engineering Pathways program at COD this spring, Barham will transfer to the engineering program at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign for the fall semester. Inspired as a child by the television series "NOVA," which covered space and the universe, Barham's passion for both math and science directed him to pursue engineering to merge both disciplines. After receiving his bachelor's degree, Barham hopes to pursue his master's in Aerospace Engineering and dreams of starting his own firm creating reusable rockets.

He said his experiences during the internship will benefit him in his future education and career.

"Working at Eaton helps me expand the things I know so that in the future I can pull on the valuable things I learned here to make important decisions; whether they be career or education oriented," Barham said.

For Chaklasiya, working in the supercharger division is a dream situation in that he's able to help problem-solve in real-life situations.

"Every day is different and an adventure where I learn something new," he said. "The fact that I get to work on real projects and contribute to solving engineering issues while gaining hands-on experience is everything I would have imagined as an engineer."

Fueled by a fascination with the way things worked since childhood, Chaklasiya enrolled in the engineering program at COD in 2016. Having recently received his associate in science degree in engineering this spring, Chaklasiya will transfer to the University of Illinois at Chicago this fall to pursue a bachelor's in mechanical engineering with a minor in industrial engineering.

"College classes tend to be primarily focused on the theory of a subject rather than its practical application," he said. "This internship helps to apply those subjects in real world examples and provide experience working in a professional engineering environment. This internship is also great for my resume, enabling me to differentiate myself from other students who have never had hands-on experience in the engineering field."

Eaton Automotive Lab Manager Mark Farone said the internship opportunity grew from conversations with COD physics professor Tom Carter and engineering professor David Smith while he worked at the college as an adjunct professor of physics.

"In the early years of my tenure at COD, we discussed the opportunities to further enrich the engineering program with ways to link the students to the industry and provide students with hands-on application of core and engineering curriculum," he said. "A few years down the road, I was very excited to be asked by the COD administration to explore those opportunities on behalf of COD. Eaton corporation has an extensive internship program and with their willingness, we were able to place our first COD student at Eaton's Automotive Proving Ground last summer."

He said the internship provides a variety of benefits to the participating students.

"Industry work experience provides students the opportunity to apply engineering and scientific core curriculum and principles in a real-world setting," Farone said. "Without an opportunity like this, students' exposure is usually limited to lab-based experiments in an academic setting."