Maceo Sample ’16 attended Church Farm School for just two years, but the Alaska native made a big impact during his short tenure, always offering a warm smile and positive energy to his peers and faculty. Maceo says the transition to private school was initially difficult, because his public school in Anchorage had been much stricter and oftentimes “felt like a prison.” “Church Farm School allows their students to express themselves in a positive manner. There was a schedule and criteria to be met, but after that, I was able to manage my own time,” he says.

When it came time to decide on college, Maceo said he created an Excel spreadsheet to compare costs of attendance and other factors for the 16 schools to which he was accepted. “I found that Central Washington University had a better cost per year, more offerings and was on the west coast, which is closer to home. Everything about the school fit exactly what I was looking for in a university.”

Maceo says he wasn’t sure what major he wanted to pursue when he arrived at CWU; he advises researching different fields through a mix of academic work and fieldwork to find out what interests you most. “In the summer of 2017, I worked for Target as a back stocker managing inventory. Although I was not high in the chain of command, I always asked questions, which allowed me to gain more knowledge about a field I would later come across.” That field is Supply Chain Management, which Maceo declared as his major this year (along with Economics). The dual majors, along with his involvement in campus groups including the CWU Supply Chain Management Association, the CWU Economics Club and his role as the Vice President of Public Affairs for the CWU Investment Group, helped him nab a prestigious 10-14 week internship at Boeing that will start this summer.

“The Boeing internship is huge here at CWU. There is a lot of competition between students, and it is no easy task to receive an offer. My first encounter with the Boeing Company was called the Boeing BASE program, which is a Supply Chain Boot Camp that you undergo for a week. There are three stages of interviews before you are accepted to the program. Considering that I was a freshman at the time and the first freshman Student Ambassador for the College of Business, I made it to the second round, however, I did not make the last round because I didn’t declare a Supply Chain Management major. By the beginning of my junior year, I had declared two majors and had the experience that Boeing was looking for in an applicant. I also made efforts to establish a relationship with department chairs of both respective majors, and put forth effort to be active in the community. These tiny details set me apart from the rest of the applicants for the Boeing Business Internship Program. I will be doing Supply Chain Analysis for the company. This means that I manage inventory and mitigate through shortages or surplus problems. If that sounds familiar, then you probably heard me say the same thing about my time at Target.”