‘Aerospace Jam’ event with Milwaukee Bucks to connect top STEM students with aerospace industry
Students from 28 colleges and universities from around the state will have an opportunity to meet with leading companies to learn about career opportunities.
On October 21, 2017, WSGC will co-host the inaugural Aerospace Jam with the Milwaukee Bucks, Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation, and Wisconsin Aerospace Partners at the BMO Harris Bradley Center in Milwaukee. This half-day student event will feature many of the 300+ aerospace industry companies in the state of Wisconsin and many of the WSGC Academic Institutions. College and high school students will have an opportunity to:
NETWORK with aerospace industry leaders
DISCOVER available careers from some of the 300+ Wisconsin companies in the aerospace industry
EXPLORE academic programs
We invite you to attend. The first 300 students (and chaperones) to register will receive a FREE ticket to the Buck’s game, along with a $10 Concession voucher. Register at BUCKS.COM/JAM.
1:00pm - 2:30pm: College and Aerospace Industry Career Fair
2:30pm - 3:15pm: Panel Discussion
3:15pm - 3:30pm: Bucks Rim Rockers Performance
3:30pm - 4:00pm: Keynote Address by Buckley Brinkman, Wisconsin Center for Manufacturing & Productivity
4:00pm: End of Aerospace Jam
6:00pm: Arena opens
7:30pm: Tip-off Bucks vs. Trail Blazers!
We encourage our academic and industry partners to register for a vendor booth at the Aerospace Jam. Industry folks will have an opportunity to chat with and potentially recruit Wisconsin’s top STEM students, wile our universities and colleges can recruit high school students for next fall. Booths can be reserved for $250 (industry) and $100 (academic) through BUCKS.COM/JAM.
Meet the Featured Guest Speaker
Buckley Brinkman, Executive Director & CEO
Wisconsin Center for Manufacturing & Productivity
Leading the organization since June 2011, Brinkman brought more than 25 years of transformational manufacturing leadership to Wisconsin Center for Manufacturing & Productivity, with a breadth of experience in helping companies drive growth, world-class competitiveness and performance excellence. Experienced in Lean, Six Sigma, supply chain management and turnaround planning, he led efforts to save dozens of operations in the U.S. by finding new ways for them to compete.
Throughout his career, Brinkman provided executive leadership to companies ranging from $5 million to more than $4 billion in sales. He revived the North American operations of the world’s largest playing card company, led the turnaround of a prominent trade bindery, and catalyzed the profitable turnaround of a recycled paperboard mill. Brinkman is an industry thought leader who has authored several white papers on innovation, corporate culture, business strategy and other topics.
Brinkman served as president and chief operating officer of U.S. Music Corp., an Illinois-based musical instrument manufacturer; as chief operating officer of Minneapolis-based Manchester Companies, where he received the Turnaround of the Year award for his work with a medical device manufacturer; and as president of Vallon, LLC, a Minneapolis-based interim executive placement firm. Most recently, he served as executive director and CEO of the Wisconsin Manufacturing Extension Partnership (WMEP).
A Wisconsin native, Brinkman holds a Business degree from the University of Wisconsin and an MBA from the Harvard Business School.
Meet the Panelists
Peter Chien, Chief Scientist and Board Member
SmartUQ
In addition to his role at SmartUQ, Peter is a professor in the Department of Statistics and the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research has been primarily focused on uncertainty quantification, design of experiments, and big data analytics. He has served on the editorial boards of Annals of Statistics and SIAM/ASA Journal of Uncertainty Quantification. He has also received a National Science Foundation Career Award and an IBM Faculty Award.
SmartUQ offers unique analytics solutions for simulations, testing, and complex systems.
Jeff Leismer, CEO and Founder
VibeTech, Inc.
Dr. Jeff Leismer has been developing non-invasive medical equipment to reduce atrophy of the body during times of disuse since 2000. He is Founder and CEO of VibeTech, Inc. (Sheboygan, WI), a NASA Spinoff company aimed at restoring physical function and reducing pain in patients recovering from injury and surgery and those with weakness and mobility impairments. He is inventor of VibeTech’s core technology and has 13 issued and pending patents in the US and abroad. Dr. Leismer is guiding the future of VibeTech and placing an emphasis on the customer experience by engaging the patient and supporting the outcomes and profitability of physical therapy providers through system enhancement.
Dr. Leismer has received research grants and business awards from federal, state and local government, universities, and private foundations. He has also been an invited proposal review panelist for the National Science Foundation (NSF) since 2004 and has been an invited speaker at scientific, medical, and entrepreneurial events across the country. He is an active board member and Director of Technology and Innovation at Spaceport Sheboygan and a serial sponsor of senior design projects within the University of Wisconsin system. Prior to commencing full-time operations with VibeTech, Dr. Leismer was adjunct faculty member at the University of Wisconsin (Stout and Sheboygan campuses), patent consultant to aspiring entrepreneurs and established companies, R&D lead for Kohler Co.’s consumer experience lab, research assistant working on projects for NASA, and lead teaching assistant for design and manufacturing / robotics labs. He received his Ph.D. in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering from the University of Florida and BS and Masters of Engineering degrees in Biomedical Engineering / Biomechanics from Michigan Technological University.
Kevin Crosby, Director
Wisconsin Space Grant Foundation, Carthage College
Professor Kevin M. Crosby teaches in the Physics and Astronomy Department and Computer Science Department at Carthage College, and has chaired both departments. He is currently involved in a variety of undergraduate space science research initiatives, including microgravity studies of lunar regolith, and near space exploration using sounding rockets and high altitude balloons.
Prof. Crosby and his students have been selected by NASA to participate in NASA’s Systems Engineering Educational Discovery Program every year since 2008. The team travels to the Johnson Space Center in Houston, where they conduct research aboard NASA’s microgravity aircraft, the Weightless Wonder.
Crosby’s space sciences students also participate in the RockSat program, a program that provides students with the opportunity to develop payload experiments for NASA’s Sounding Rocket program. Through RockSat, student teams design and build flight experiments and integrate them into Terrier-Orion two stage suborbital rockets. These rockets are launched and recovered from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, VA.
Madeline Kothe, Student Intern
Sierra Nevada Corporation
University of Wisconsin - Madison
Madeline (Maddie) Kothe is a fifth year student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with this being her final year of her undergraduate degree. She is studying engineering mechanics with an option in astronautics to allow her to explore her interest in space. One of her favorite classes is satellite dynamics and she is looking forward to the challenges and triumphs that accompany the two semesters of senior design this year. Beyond the classroom, she is involved in many unique activities. These include working at Sierra Nevada and keeping up with NASA and astronaut’s stories on a daily basis through social media. The activity she is most passionate about outside of academics is water skiing for the Mad-City Ski Team. This allows her to not only improve on her own skiing skills, but also to take on a leadership role as the captain of the ballet line. Maddie is excited for the opportunity to have been awarded this scholarship and plans to put it towards her tuition- specifically she will be taking a class at UW-Madison to receive her pilot’s license. This is a great opportunity to understand concepts in her classes such as aerodynamics in a hands-on experience.
