PEY Co-op Program
Recognition Awards
Third Annual PEY Co-op Award Winners (2019-2020)
The Engineering Career Centre's PEY Co-op Awards was created to celebrate you — the industry partners and students who continue to make PEY Co-op a success. This year we received an overwhelming number of impressive nominations. Thank you to everyone who submitted entries to acknowledge the dedicated people who went above and beyond in 2019-2020. Although we won’t be able to celebrate everyone’s contributions in-person due to COVID-19, we are thrilled to share this year’s award recipients in the following categories: two (2) PEY Co-op Student of the Year awardees, one (1) PEY Co-op Mentor of the Year Award, one (1) PEY Co-op Employer of the Year, and two (2) PEY Co-op Ambassador of the Year awardees. We’ve personally reached out to this year’s award recipients and wish to acknowledge their contributions and success.
PEY Co-op Student of the Year
The PEY Co-op Student of the Year Award recognizes a PEY Co-op student that demonstrated excellence in the workplace as an outstanding member of the employer’s team. Employers nominate students for this award.
Alicia Hill-Turner
PEY Co-op Employer: Kellogg's Canada
Alicia Hill-Turner is a 4th year Chemical Engineering student pursuing a double minor in Biomedical Engineering and Business. Alicia completed her PEY Co-op term at Kellogg's Canada as a Packaging Development Intern. Alicia is so incredibly grateful to be recognized as a PEY Co-op Student of the Year, and wanted to take this opportunity to thank her manager, Usha Pathmasenan, for her constant support, guidance, and mentorship during her PEY Co-op term. From Alicia’s time at Kellogg's she took away numerous transferable skills, whether it be the knowledge she gained from end-to-end product design or how to communicate in a cross-functional team, this experience truly has equipped her to take on the world after graduation. Alicia would like to thank everyone at Kellogg's for inviting her into their work family from day one, and always making her feel part of the team!
Kathy Cheng
PEY Co-op Employer: Scotiabank
Kathy Cheng (Mech 2T0+PEY) completed her PEY Co-op term as a Trade Floor Technology Consultant at Scotiabank to learn more about user-acceptability with new technologies. The invaluable skills she gained as an engineering student allowed her to easily identify operational processes within Scotiabank that could be improved with innovative solutions. Kathy made the most out of her undergraduate experience, which involved winning three national titles with the UofT Varsity Blues Cheerleading Team, leading a multidisciplinary capstone team to design a human-powered water purification device for disaster-affected communities, and completing an undergraduate thesis that is the first to investigate team assemblies in a collaborative computer-aided design environment, supervised by Professor Alison Olechowski (MIE, ILead). This September, Kathy will be returning to UofT as a MASc candidate in Mechanical Engineering with Ready Lab, to continue her research in collaborative design. After graduation, she hopes to pursue a career in product design engineering.
PEY Co-op Employer of the Year
The PEY Co-op Employer of the Year Award recognizes an exceptional employer that hired from the PEY Co-op Program during the 2019-2020 work term. The recipient of this award provided a unique work experience and fostered a positive and supportive environment to a PEY Co-op student or students through enriching professional development opportunities. Because of the employer, the student or students came away from their PEY Co-op experience with enhanced knowledge, honed interests and a head start on developing as a professional.
Arup is a global consulting, design, and engineering firm that is the creative force at the heart of many of the world’s most prominent projects in the built environment.
Arup has more than 14,000 planners, designers, engineers and consultants delivering innovative projects across the world.
Founded in 1946 by philosopher engineer Ove Arup, the firm opened its first US office more than 30 years ago and is committed to delivering excellence, innovation and value to its clients while shaping a better world.
PEY Co-op Mentor of the Year
The PEY Co-op Mentor of the Year Award recognizes an exemplary individual and their commitment to excellence in mentoring. Through a range of professional development opportunities, this individual guided and supported a PEY Co-op student or students to enhance their skills and knowledge during the 2019-2020 work term.
Maryam Sadeghi
PEY Co-op Employer: Toronto Transit Commission (TTC)
Maryam Sadeghi is a structural engineer with the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC). As a Professional Engineer who holds a Master of Science degree in Structural Engineering with more than 17 years of progressive experience in various industries. Maryam started her career at the TTC more than 2 years ago, in Maintenance Engineering, Subway Infrastructure Department.
PEY Co-op Ambassador of the Year
The PEY Co-op Ambassador Award recognizes an exemplary alumnus of PEY Co-op, and their commitment to being a champion of the program during the 2018-2019 work term.
Coby Segall
PEY Co-op Employer: Zebra Technologies
Coby Segall leads the engineering team responsible for robotics and automation solutions at Zebra Technologies. As the director of engineering, Coby oversees a team responsible for hardware and software delivery including optics, sensors, firmware, platform software, autonomous navigation, CV and AI and DevOps. Coby’s automation team recently launched SmartSight, a Zebra-designed solution that delivers automated shelf insights in a retail environment.
Coby graduated from the University of Toronto’s ECE department in 2002 and is a PEY alumni. Coby joined Zebra in 2002 and has held various engineering roles in product development, advanced development and disruptive innovation. He leads PEY recruiting efforts for Zebra and has been a passionate advocate of the program since the early 2000’s. He was a finalist Tommy award winner for management excellence in 2020 and is a champion of inclusion and diversity within Zebra.
Coby is happily married and is the proud father of 3 kids. In his spare time, Coby is passionate about social action projects, health and wellness and community building.
John Ma
PEY Co-op Employer: Marvell Technology Group
John Ma is the Director of Analog Engineering at Marvell Technology Group. John graduated from the University of Toronto OT6+PEY, and have since worked at Marvell Technology Group. At Marvell, John is responsible for the development of high speed analog IC including SerDes and PLL.
John oversees the PEY Co-op program at Marvell, offering PEY Co-ops with the opportunity to gain hands-on professional experience within an innovative, global IC company.
Marvell is trusted as the world’s leading technology companies for 25 years. They move, store, process and secure the world’s data with semiconductor solutions designed for consumer needs and future ambitions. Through a process of deep collaboration and transparency, they're aiming to change the way tomorrow’s enterprise, cloud, automotive, and carrier markets transform—for the better.