Local Internship Builds Skill Set
Laura Billingsley '04
August 18, 2015
In many ways, Aaron Eiseler ’15 is a great example of a student of the liberal arts. A physics major with a math minor, he cites the skills he developed in problem solving and working with people from various backgrounds as key things he learned while at Central. He’s had an internship with a major manufacturing company, was a student representative on the board of trustees and was also the quarterback for Central’s football team.
Eiseler visited Pompei, Italy, with Central’s football team this summer.
Eiseler came to Central from Mesa, Ariz., drawn by a conversation with a football coach. He found his physics and math classes to be great places to learn about people from different backgrounds. “I came from a big city, the Phoenix metro area, and at Central I was able to learn to work with people from a variety of backgrounds,” he says. “As physics majors, we had many people in our classes who were majoring in other areas, not necessarily just physics, so we needed to learn how to communicate with them effectively as well.”
Those communication skills benefited Eiseler in his job as an intern at PPI (Precision Pulley & Idler) in Pella. “In a manufacturing environment you have people with entirely different backgrounds and expertise that you have to communicate with regularly,” he says. “Not everybody will understand all the same things as you do, so you’ve got to be able to communicate across different barriers.”
A Central connection made Eiseler aware of the opportunity at PPI. “Jeff Bollard ’89, one of the assistant football coaches, is an IT manager at PPI. I was asking around to see if any company locally was looking for interns, and Jeff let me know about the possibility of applying at PPI.”
Through the internship, Eiseler has learned how the manufacturing process works from a variety of angles. In addition to seeing how products are designed, he’s experienced how the company operates day-to-day, from the factory floor to quality control.
This experience will be useful to Eiseler in his ultimate career goal of working as a mechanical engineer. “One great thing about Pella, especially for STEM majors, is that there are three big manufacturing companies in town that are always looking for interns,” he says.