Rising Alumni

Cynthia Czapla

Cynthia Czapla grew up taking apart things she shouldn’t and dissecting the deer her father hunted, a childhood that has led to a biomedical engineering major and a post as president of the University’s chapter of the Society of Women Engineers.

So to counteract the notion that “girls just play house and don’t really have spatial reasoning or mechanical abilities,” one that she says schools seem to encourage, Czapla last year organized engineering activities on campus to help Girl Scouts earn badges.

“Because I am a female and a minority in the field, to be an example for these girls just really got me more passionate about continuing with engineering,” she says.

“Cynthia is refreshingly curious about the world around her,” says Lisa Norwood, assistant dean in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. Two years ago, Norwood accompanied Czapla to a Society of Women Engineers regional conference, where she discovered that Czapla “has a wicked sense of humor and is a natural leader among her peers.” That conference is also where Czapla became “obsessed,” as Norwood puts it, with encouraging more members of the society to attend both regional and national conferences. This year she spearheaded a fundraising campaign to help 10 members attend the national conference in Nashville.

In fall 2007, Czapla of Grand Island, N.Y., was appointed as the University’s MentorNet Student Coordinator. In that role, she uses a national, nonprofit e-mail-based mentoring program to connect female students and professionals—mostly female—in engineering, science, and mathematics.

With a minor in Spanish, Czapla studied abroad in Spain her junior year. This fall she plans to begin work toward a master’s degree in biomedical engineering.