Marathon Petroleum

Cory Castle worked at Marathon Petroleum in the Fall of 2006.  This was her second co-op overall, but her first tour at Marathon Petroleum, Ohio Refining Division.  Cory is an Electrical Engineering major.   

In my last co-op I did nothing in the area of electrical engineering. My previous co-op was at a government facility that required a high level of security clearance. My focus was mostly in the area of cost benefit analysis. During that term, I received Six Sigma certification, as well as attended UK's Lean manufacturing boot camp. Things moved very slowly, and it became quite evident that it was not the place for me.

At my new co-op, things were quite different; it was a Fortune 500 company. Things were much faster paced with much greater freedoms. In this co-op I did a lot of work in the electrical engineering area. I was the first electrical engineering co-op in my department, so it was a learning experience for everyone.

The areas that I worked in varied greatly. I worked with substations down to instruments. Since this is a mid-sized refinery, people in the electrical department wear many hats. I was lucky enough to have a supervisor who allowed me to try many things in order to find out what I liked the most. When I return, I can then focus in those areas.

My projects varied greatly. Some of them included: creating design packages for construction, creating interactive databases, project management, formal presentations, confirming installations, creating engineering drawings, working with contractors, and providing support to many different areas. It is important for me to be able to work with many different departments to complete my projects.

In short, I feel that I have learned much more, much more quickly at this co-op than I did before. It was also very rewarding to see to fruits of my labor as a tangible object instead of a theoretical exercise. I feel that this is a great experience because my actions made a difference in the refinery. It is also nice to work somewhere small enough where most people know my name. I would highly recommend this co-op for someone who is interested in hands on work.