A New Chapter for MECOP - The Executive Director Listening Tour Continues

MECOP's newest chapter is off to a positive start with the completion of the onboarding process for our new Executive Director, Yuliya Dennis. Yuliya is thrilled to be working with the MECOP staff, Company Representatives, institutions, and students.

Recently, Yuliya completed the Company Representative listening tour, during which she reached out to all MECOP and CECOP representatives for personalized one-on-one meetings. In these meetings, Yuliya actively listened as each Company Representative explained their viewpoints as to what is going well and what could be improved upon when it comes to the MECOP program.

In an effort to increase the effectiveness of the tour, all Executive Sponsors were included as well, many of which expressed appreciation to get a dedicated time to voice their opinions as well as get to know Yuliya. Additionally, many Executive Sponsors expressed their admiration for MECOP, pinpointing that the program brings great potential future candidates to their companies who highly prioritize hiring exceptional talent.

“I have loved hearing about how passionate companies are towards the MECOP mission and creating work ready graduates,” Yuliya stated. "Many Company Reps went through the MECOP program as interns themselves and can clearly see the positive impact the program has had on their career success."

One of the primary takeaways from the listening tour was that a sizeable percentage of Company Representatives specifically expressed their desire and passion towards improving diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts, which is a top priority of the MECOP Board.

Yuliya’s next priority is a student listening tour. As a whole, MECOP is highly invested in elevating the student voice and "Student First" motto in an effort to ensure that every student is respected, valued, and heard.

We’re ultimately here to help students achieve career success during college and post college. Understanding their perspective improves our collective ability to help the next generation.

Yuliya will ask participating students the same three questions that were asked in the Company Representative listening tour:

1. Tell me a little bit about yourself.
2. What is going well?
3. What can be improved?

Through this approach, we ensure that each student is heard and has the opportunity to share their story.

With the information gathered from the Company Representative & Executive Sponsor listening tour, we were able to gather many innovative ideas that will be communicated to any appropriate committees, staff members, or MECOP Board Members who are responsible for overseeing their discussion and potential implementation, which will be the process for the information gathered from the Student listening tour as well.

Yuliya highly encourages everyone to keep sending ideas her way to ensure that she can stay up to date on the things that matter most. MECOP is a solid, collaborative program, and always demonstrating consistent improvement with our collaborating students, companies, and universities in mind.

We eagerly look forward to hearing from students and to a bright year ahead.