Cynthia Garcia (Orozco) receives National Women of Color Award

Cynthia Garcia, aka Cynthia Orozco, graduated with a BS in Chemical Engineering in Dec 2004. Prior to graduating she was actively involved with AIChE and OCE, to level that she served as the President of both organizations her senior year. As President she inspired the Ch E students to come together and get more involved with the community and NMSU events. She also helped kick off a now upheld tradition of "Ch E socials" and got new furniture donated for the Ch E student lounge. In February 2005, Cyndi was offered a position as a Multi-Disciplined Engineer I at Raytheon Company located near Dallas, TX. She would be the first Latina to join the Materials & Process Engineering (M&PE) team. In 2007, she was promoted to Multi-Disciplined Engineer II where she has been mentored by the Engineering Technical Director, Hector Reyes. As a process engineer, her main responsibilities are to support the production lines, make process improvements and resolve production issues. M&PE provides shop processes, as well as, consulting for engineering regarding design and meeting Military material specifications.

Her accomplishments include expert knowledge of cleaning and handling optical elements, creating innovative techniques to protect optics; optical quality is a high priority for the Raytheon customer. She has also presented papers at two Mechanical and Materials Technology Network Symposiums, the topics related to primer testing and optimization. She has published over six papers since 2005. Six Sigma projects are valued at Raytheon and Cynthia has participated in three projects saving programs over $1.1 million. Cynthia will also work on a Pb-free solder project in association with NASA later this year. Cynthia will provide test results and a detailed report with recommendations for the best Pb-free solder alloy. Although, her work does not require the classical skills of a chemical engineer; Cynthia believes her studies and training at NMSU gave her the fundamentals of a promising engineer with the skills to tackle any engineering issue.

Cynthia has received numerous awards and recognition. Now, in 2008, receiving the National Women of Color Award for Technology Rising Star and a team achievement award. In 2007, she received an individual achievement award, followed by a Spotlight on Excellence award for outstanding performance and commitment to excellence. Also, in 2008, Cynthia was selected as a "Person on the Move" for the Texas Engineering Department, recognizing her strong potential at Raytheon. Cynthia continues to be involved with her community by joining several community service groups. Cynthia main effort is MathMovesU, a program sponsored by Raytheon, designed to engage middle school aged students with math and encourage careers in engineering.

Cynthia met her now husband at NMSU and they married in June 2006 in their new town of McKinney, TX. They have a home, two dogs and a cat.

More info related to NWOC Award can be found at: http://www.marines.mil/news/messages/Pages/MESSAGES163.aspx.

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