A group of six MSOE industrial engineering students attended the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE) North Central Regional Conference at the end of January. The conference featured guest speakers, networking, a case study challenge and more. The IISE is a nonprofit association that provides leadership for the application, education, training, research and development of industrial and systems engineering.

The case study competition portion of the conference challenged teams of students to utilize industrial engineering tools and approaches to develop solutions to a pseudo real-world problem. This year’s problem had a particular emphasis on sustainability, which was a recurring theme at the conference. Teams were comprised of a mix of students from different universities across the region. They were given 30 minutes to analyze and develop their solutions, followed by a presentation in front of the entire conference and a panel of judges.

MSOE sophomore Marie Diffley’s team earned second-place. The case study focused on a fictitious Wisconsin dairy producer that creates a wide range of dairy products and asked students to improve its efficiency, cost-effectiveness and overall competitiveness. Diffley’s team was the only team that attempted to use data to solve the problem, which was a source of pride for Dr. Douglas Grabenstetter, associate professor and IISE Chapter faculty advisor. 

Dr. Grabenstetter believes early exposure to industrial engineering topics gives MSOE students an advantage in competitions likes these. “For instance, Marie is a sophomore in industrial engineering. As a sophomore, she is taking my Applied Statistics course where the students are given real-world problems where they need to work in teams to collect accurate data from a process, run statistical analyses and make and present objective conclusions in a clear and concise manner that a prospective employer could quickly make use of to improve their operations.”

These skillsets position students for success in their coursework, as well as prepare them to hit the ground running after graduation.

The other students who attended the conference include Jakob Bar-Din, Emily Kushnerov, Anika Nemes, Cameron Pineres and Raul Reyes. Grabenstetter hopes to have a group of students attend the IISE North Central Regional Conference again next year, which will be held at Iowa State University.