‘This School Really Means Business’
As a first-semester junior, Devon Burke ’25 studied in Greece. His memorable experience was one he didn’t expect to repeat so soon. But this fall, Burke finds himself abroad once again, this time completing an internship.
A bioengineering major, Burke is currently working in the Cork, Ireland, office of Stryker, an American medical technology company. There, he’s a member of the advanced operations team for orthopedics and trauma remediation, focusing on the instrument side of the business.
His role on the team involves taking technical drawings from the Research and Development (R&D) Department, finding suitable external suppliers for manufacturing, and ensuring that the processes are reproducible. Burke’s work contributes to Stryker’s mission of improving patient outcomes by providing high-quality instruments, such as tiny drill bits, drill guides, and depth gauges used to assist surgeons during procedures involving implants or fractures. In the process, he’s gaining valuable hands-on experience in managing the processes that bring these instruments to market, practical knowledge in problem-solving and project management, and exposure to development, prototyping, and testing, while gaining insight into the importance of collaboration.
Burke credits the College’s focus on career development through the Endicott Experiential Edge—referring to the brand name for the experiential learning program central to the Endicott student experience—and support from faculty and career services for encouraging students like him to seek out high-impact internships at top companies like Stryker.
“I’m learning about how important teamwork is,” Burke said. “There’s a quote I love that ‘engineering isn’t a silo,’ that you need to take input from everyone around you. Collaboration is everything. What I’ve learned about myself through this is how much I want to contribute to a team for the greater good.”
The idea of working with others and solving problems led Burke to pursue a degree in bioengineering. He followed his sister, Alivia Burke ’23 M’24 to Endicott after witnessing the positive culture and impressive statistics that showed a high percentage of Endicott students were employed immediately after graduation.
“I was like, ‘This school really means business,’” Burke said. “Right away, you get an internship coordinator and you have professors marketing different companies and offering networking opportunities for career readiness. They want to help you and they know the end goal is for you to walk out of Endicott with a career.”
Previous internships as a technician intern at a Mercedes-Benz dealership and as a field service intern repairing microscopes at Carl Zeiss Microscopy provided Burke with a well-rounded understanding of engineering as well as comfort with customer outcomes. When he returned to Endicott from Greece after his semester abroad, Burke met with Associate Dean of Science and Technology and Chair of Engineering and Computer Science Jessica Kaufman.
“She said there was an opportunity in Ireland, and they believed I’d be a great candidate,” Burke explained. “I can tell that a lot of effort, promotion, marketing, heart, and soul has been put into making these abroad programs possible for students. I was excited to go experience another culture while working at a global leader in an industry that interested me and having a hand in changing people’s lives.”
The option of working internationally appealed to Burke, who like many Endicott students has been encouraged to intern abroad to gain a global perspective and the aforementioned Experiential Edge in career readiness.
That idea was not lost on Burke, who recognized that Americans are often under the false impression that the world revolves around them, and need a jolt of reality to recognize that disconnect. At Stryker, Burke has been exposed to how operations are managed through the company’s offices in Ireland, Germany, Switzerland, and the U.S., so it has helped him understand those differences.
“We have so much going for us in America,” he said, “but seeing how other countries operate in the workplace has opened me up to understanding how other places go about work.”
Outside of the office, Burke has fallen in love with Ireland, and calls his home base of Cork “one of my favorite cities.” He has enjoyed immersing himself in the bustle of Cork and appreciates the Irish culture and the energy of the city. Although he’s the only Stryker intern from Endicott, Burke lives with a pair of Endicott students who studied abroad in Ireland last year and have returned as interns. Their apartment building is full of Endicott students and recent graduates, which has created a wonderful community abroad.
The ethos of Endicott also has spilled into Burke’s experience in Ireland through connections made between his work as a Stryker intern and what he’s learned in the classroom.
Burke referenced his favorite course at Endicott, Biomaterials, taught by Professor of Bioengineering Jason Nichol. In that class, Burke learned about U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) clearances and how they impact the industry.
The topic came up recently, when one of the Stryker product lines Burke is working on received 510(k) approval from the FDA, indicating pre-market clearance for the medical device company to legally sell a product.
“With my major being quite small, I’ve had the same professors year after year,” Burke said. “The relationships I’ve developed with them have helped me learn soft skills—from how to be an adult, how to act, how to respond to deadlines, and how to communicate—to the hard skills of what I’ve learned in class that I can apply to my future career. I’m grateful for the experiences I’ve had and for all I’ve learned because of Endicott.”