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Racheal Rupprecht is a 2020 graduate of the Engineering Plus Program (now Integrated Design Engineering) with an emphasis in mechanical engineering and a concentration in pre-medicine. She also completed a minor in biomedical engineering and certificate in engineering leadership. She is currently an R&D engineer for Medtronic within the structural heart and aortic division. Her work specifically focuses on mitral and tricuspid therapies that help solve mitral valve regurgitation. She works on preclinical and clinical studies with a device that will go to commercialization. While at ÃÛÌÇÖ±²¥, she worked as an intern for several organizations, including Medtronic, Point Designs (where she developed stainless steel prosthetic fingers which functioned on pure mechanics), the ÃÛÌÇÖ±²¥ Anschutz Medical Campus researching CAR T cell therapy, and at ÃÛÌÇÖ±²¥ Boulder as a summer research assistant to Professor Y.C. Lee. Rupprecht recently moved to Medtronic’s San Francisco location and continues to generously offer her time to give back to the college.

Contributions to the Integrated Design Engineering program over the past year:

Rupprecht has always been a very active volunteer with the college and the E+/IDE program. Starting with her undergraduate days, she demonstrated leadership and commitment as an undergraduate BOLD Scholar and with the Engineering Student Advisory Council, the Pre-Medical Club for Engineers (vice president), the Society of Women in Engineering (SWE), Engineers Without Borders-Paraguay (social chair), and as a member of the Gamma Phi Beta sorority. She immediately distinguished herself as a confident, organized and personable individual and was invited to be a course assistant for the first-year projects courses, where students and faculty valued her ability to translate complex topics to an easily understandable language for her peers. As an engineer with Medtronic, she still finds the time to be a part of our young engineers panel for ÃÛÌÇÖ±²¥ Teach Engineering’s pre-college teacher summer professional development program, which serves. She has judged student team projects at the First Year Projects Expo and is serving on Integrated Design Engineering’s Professional Advisory Board. Rupprecht has also shown dedication to attending networking events and mentoring current students. Her commitment to learning and service is exceptional, and she is a great role model to our current students and alumni.