Brooke Ryan has been around the game of soccer her entire life. She started playing when she was 4, but before that she attended her two older brothers’ games.

Jerry Bayless, CE’59, MS CE’62, will probably never know just how much of an impact he has made on the lives of his students. It is not because of his administrative duties as department chair; it is not the numerous awards he has received from professional societies; it is not the many department committees he has served on. As important as all these may have been, what sets him apart is his involvement in student life and extracurricular activities. That is where Bayless has truly made a difference.

Six years before their Golden Alumni Reunion, a dozen members of the Class of 1942 started kicking around the idea about doing “something big” for their upcoming 50th anniversary in 1992.

In 1988, Young Liu came to the United States with $89 in his pocket and met the man who would change the course of his life: Ming Leu.

Ted Waldbart’s background isn’t in nonprofits. It’s in solving problems and managing projects for large American corporations like Coca Cola and Phillips Petroleum.

When you think of sports in Canada, you might think of hockey, a sport in which Canadians have excelled at the international level.

But the United States’ northern neighbor has a strong history in baseball as well. The list of major league standouts includes Ferguson Jenkins and Larry Walker and current stars like Justin Morneau, Jason Bay and Russell Martin.

Patrick Owen, CE’77, has spent the better part of the last 15 years in a theme park. It sounds like he’s competing for an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records, but he’s not. It’s all part of his job. Owen is vice president of design and engineering at SeaWorld in San Diego.

In every student’s educational journey, there’s at least one professor who forever alters the course of that student’s life. For Joe Rupp, MetE’72, there’s no question that person was the late Dr. Thomas O’Keefe, Curators’ Professor emeritus of metallurgical engineering at Missouri S&T.

Sophomore Bridget Williams is the easiest volleyball player to find on the floor. Just look for the player wearing a different-colored jersey.

What began as a casual hobby picking up rocks while visiting the western United States took retired Gen. Keith Wedge, GGph‘70, MS GGph‘71, PhD GGph‘73, from the Boy Scouts to the U.S. Army. In between, his fascination with rocks led him to Missouri S&T’s geology and geophysics program.

This fall, Perrin Roller, GeoE’80, became president of the Miner Alumni Association. Missouri S&T Magazine staff sat down with the vice president of well engineering for Devon Energy to get his perspective about the job.

Back in the early 1930s, when the men believed to be Missouri S&T’s oldest living brothers - Irvin and Elmer Spotte - played football for the MSM Miners, Jackling Field stood in what today is the middle of campus. Located just to the left of Jackling Gymnasium, which was torn down in the 1960s to make way for Curtis Laws Wilson Library, the field was the site of the 4-4 season of 1933.

As a guard and tackle on the Miner football team, Bob Keiser, EE’65, learned firsthand the importance of teamwork. The leadership lessons he gained from athletics stayed with him throughout his career, taking him all the way from the football field to the boardroom.

Going Greek has made a big difference in the lives of two young alumni who are giving back to Missouri S&T and encouraging other recent grads to do the same.

Beth (Eberle) Burka, ME’84, is helping businesses across the country save green by going green.

Burka founded her St. Louis-based company Energy Matters Inc. in June 2005 to help business owners save money by developing energy management programs.

In doing so, Burka took a huge risk leaving a stable position at a natural gas company, and all the benefits that went with it, to go into business for herself.

Garmin, a leader in GPS navigation and communication equipment, and the Kao Family Foundation are helping Missouri S&T students financially navigate through the university, thanks to a new scholarship program and training initiative.

The Kao Family Foundation will offer scholarships worth $5,000 per year to 20 Missouri S&T students. Established by Min H. Kao, co-founder and CEO of Garmin, the foundation launched the $10 million endowed initiative with eight universities in 2007 to encourage students to study the high-demand areas of electrical and computer engineering. Selected students also will be given first consideration for one of more than 75 annual paid internships with Garmin International.

Since she was a little girl, Kandi Wieberg dreamed of being a college softball player. Playing as second baseman for Missouri S&T’s softball team, she’s achieved her dream and much more.

Fred Bueler Jr., CE’79, got hooked on the home-remodeling business at age 14 when he began working summers for a contractor in his St. Louis hometown. Back in those days, he was digging footings and foundations by hand.

For Ray Betz, CE’66, and his wife, Susan, reputation is key – UMR’s reputation, that is.

By the time he graduated high school, industrial engineering senior David Hill already had his foot in the door of the business world. As a sophomore at Oakville Senior High in St. Louis, he and some friends started a web design company that was successful from the start, thanks to Hill’s ability to capitalize on specific customer needs.

From an early age, Stephen W. Rector, PetE’72, MS PetE’73, knew the value of education, though he was uncertain what path he would take.

UMR psychology student Brandon Landry knows a lot about success. As a varsity football and basketball player, Landry broke every school record at Salesian High School in Fairfield, Calif., and was known as one of the top athletes in Northern California.

To glimpse the future of social networking, don’t look to MySpace or Facebook. Turn on your cell phone instead. That’s the platform Ben Roodman is using to help on-the-go hipsters gather the latest information about concerts, movies and other forms of entertainment in their communities.

Roodman, who graduates this May with a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering, is the CEO of ImThere, a social networking service that connects subscribers to information about events – such as concerts, CD launch parties or indie film festivals – via text messages over their cell phones.

For years, one of the main philosophical goals of the leaders at UMR has been to create an environment where students have a real stake in the research that is going on at the university. In that way, UMR is similar to one of its largest corporate partners – Nucor Corp.

Walk into the Gale Bullman Multi-Purpose Building on any given day and you will probably find Nicole Dierking, all by herself with a basketball, taking shot after shot after shot. It is a work ethic that paid dividends for the senior guard on the UMR women’s basketball team.

Dierking reached a personal milestone as the 2007 calendar year began. She became the 12th player in school history to reach the 1,000-point mark – and first UMR player to do so in five years – and recently completed her career as the sixth-leading scorer in school history with 1,169 points.

Whether he says it in Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, French or Arabic, Perrin Roller, GeoE’80, is ready to tell anyone who will listen why he loves UMR.

“Going to a technically oriented school like UMR is so different than going to a comprehensive university because it is so specialized,” Roller explains. “You’re immersed with people you’re going to work with the rest of your career, you make a lot of life-long friends.”

The alarm goes off at 5:30 a.m. and Wendy Moore, a senior in architectural engineering, is already getting out of bed to start her day with one of two daily practices.

Moore says it’s her teammates that get her going when most other students are sound asleep. “It’s tough to force yourself to get up and run at 6 a.m. However, knowing someone expects you to show up motivates you,” she says.

When it comes to the future of energy production, Chevron Corp. sees college graduates – particularly UMR graduates – as one of its most valuable resources.

This summer, Chevron donated $1.5 million to UMR to establish an educational and research partnership that will help meet the needs of the energy industry.

Michael Haas, AE’87, has always understood the importance of hard work and doing the best he can at whatever task he’s involved with. These days that task is chasing the wind.

Haas, who lives in Oakland, Calif., with his wife and three kids, is president and founder of Orion Energy, a wind energy company.

“I didn’t go to college expecting to teach,” says Ralph Flori, PetE’79, MS PetE’81 and PhD PetE’87. “I wanted to be an engineer. My passion growing up was working with tools, building and creating things, and taking things apart.” Flori took his interest in how things work, his experience working in his dad’s heating and air conditioning business, and came to UMR. Today he is assistant dean of engineering for pre-college and undergraduate programs for the UMR School of Engineering, providing statewide leadership for Project Lead the Way. He also continues to teach as an associate professor of interdisciplinary engineering.

Travis Stensby was swimming for the University of Minnesota when he discovered a blood clot in his shoulder three years ago. That medical condition forced him to quit the team, and he thought his collegiate swimming career might be over.

In today’s global economy, many companies outsource their service departments to countries where labor is cheap to be more cost-effective.“Since the world is getting smaller with all of the latest high-tech developments in communication technology, it is not hard to have a company work for you a thousand miles away to make you more competitive in the world market,” says entrepreneur Tuncay Akbas, CSci’98.

UMR titles:

1. Vice provost for undergraduate and graduate studies


2. Professor of chemistry


3. Director of the UMR Institute for Environmental Excellence


4. Former associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences


5. Former chair of chemistry

Unofficial UMR title: Champion of the Opportunities for Undergraduate Research Experiences program

Rodrick McDonald, a senior in mechanical engineering, has loved the thrill of competition since his Deer Park High School days in Pasadena, Texas, where he competed in multiple sports. Returning to Texas for football’s Whataburger Cactus Bowl in January and the NCAA Division II Track and Field Championships last spring only managed to increase his competitive fever.

“Entrepreneurs need to stay focused on what is important,” says entrepreneur John Haake, EE’86, MS EE’88, co-founder of Nuvonyx Inc., the United States’ only manufacturer of high-power industrial laser systems. And Haake has stayed focused on his business goals with laser-like precision.

For as long as she can remember, Jessica (Marshall) Crouch, EMgt’99, MS EMgt’00, has been helping other people get organized. In 2003, she decided to put her passion to work and founded Organized for You, which she operates out of her home in Waterloo, Iowa. Her field is a new one, but Crouch is confident that in a few years the organization business will be booming. “In five years, I plan to have a stable business with a well-established reputation. Hopefully, my industry will be more readily accepted and understood.” Knowing Crouch, she’s already planning to be one of the leaders in this field.

The minimum requirement for portraying St. Pat is the ability to grow a beard. But Jeremiah King, UMR’s 2004 St. Pat, has a lot more than facial hair going for him.

California native Phil Shin, a senior in biological sciences, stays busy with pre-medicine classes and daily practices for the UMR football team, but it can still be hard living such a long distance from his family on the West Coast.

That isn’t a major problem for Shin, however, who says he has found a family in the Miner football team. “During the season, we practice three hours a day,” he says. “Since my real family is all the way back in California, the team is all I have here. As a senior, my role is to set an example for the new transfer and freshman players.”