ITS senior Kobasuk found an academic home — and got a job offer — with support from faculty

Since early in the fall semester, senior information telecommunications systems (ITS) major Katie Kobasuk has been feeling pretty relaxed. She credits the lack of stress to her professors in OHIO’s J. Warren McClure School of Emerging Communication Technologies who connected her with the post-grad job she’s had lined up since September.

“The professors here have just been amazing to me, providing me with so many opportunities,” Kobasuk said. “The professors want to connect you and want to help you. All you have to do is just accept the help.”

Kobasuk said McClure School director Julio Arauz arranged for students to meet with an alumnus who works at Progressive Insurance. After a series of interviews, the company hired Kobasuk as a system engineer, starting after graduation.

"Katie has always been an exceptional student, not only participating and contributing in class but also volunteering to help us with our Advisory Board events," Arauz said.

Kobasuk said she didn’t expect the initial conversations with Progressive to lead to a job offer, and was pleasantly surprised with the result.

“It was really just from my professor telling me to talk to someone and then from there, me just reaching out,” she said. “Our professors are great about telling us there's a position here, or that there's a career fair or someone from the industry talking at an event.”

When Kobasuk first applied to OHIO, she wasn’t sure what she wanted to study. After considering a few options, she landed on ITS even though she wasn’t “very techie.” Once she started classes, she quickly learned she had made the right choice.

“We started out in learning communities and I found everything interesting,” she said. “Even my first ITS class was with a professor, Brandon Saunders, and I've had classes with him to this day. He's even my advisor now. It's just such a tight-knit community.”

As she made her way through the degree program, faculty members continued to connect Kobasuk with opportunities across the McClure School and the Scripps College of Communication.

She has worked in the Game Research and Immersive Design (GRID) Lab since her sophomore year, learning to demonstrate the virtual reality technologies used in the lab. Her supervisor in the GRID Lab is Matt Love.

“Without fail, Katie has been exceptional,” Love said. “More often than not, she would have little to no experience with the tasks I would assign her, but that never mattered. With minimal guidance she would excel at the task and have a great attitude while doing it. While I know her future is bright, I’ll also be sad to see her go. She’ll be leaving very big shoes to fill here at the GRID Lab and we wish her all the best.”

Kobasuk also served on the Scripps Diversity Committee and had an internship last summer with the Great American Insurance Company. She said those and other opportunities have helped her develop into the kind of student she wouldn’t have imagined becoming four years ago.

“I used to kind of be someone that would just sit back and wait for the other person in the class to ask a question,” she said.

She learned to take a more active role when COVID-19 forced all of her courses to move online.

Her advice to future OHIO students is to take that lesson from her: don’t be afraid to ask questions and reach out to your professors.

“Even if you think it's a dumb question, your professors like that you are willing to reach out and that you want to better yourself,” she said.

Kobasuk is grateful for the support she’s found in the McClure School, and excited for the next chapter.

“I’m so glad I chose this program,” she said. “It has just paid off incredibly.”