EAA Board Members
Board Members
Scott is currently the President and CEO for Northstar Aerospace. Northstar is a leading manufacturer of gears, transmission, and components for the global aerospace industry. Northstar has operating facilities in Bedford Park, IL, Phoenix, AZ and Windsor, ON Canada.
Scott graduated with his degree in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University and has spent his entire career in the Aerospace industry. He started at Goodrich in their Manufacturing Leadership Program and spent time at sites in Pueblo, CO, Vergennes, VT, and Phoenix, AZ before setting into the Landing Gear business. There he progressed through operational leadership roles including as the Plant Manager for sites in Tullahoma, TN and Oakville, ON, Canada. The rest of his tenure at Goodrich/United Technologies Aerospace system encompassed P&L leadership roles over a variety of design & build-tospecification mission-critical systems businesses including rescue hoists, de-icing systems, anti-icing, digital data, potable water, heated composites and specialty heaters. Scott’s next role was President for TECT Aerospace, a built-to-print aerostructures business with four manufacturing sites in the Wichita, KS and Seattle, WA areas. Scott then moved to Precision Castparts Corporation (PCC), with his final role being General Manager for the Wyman Gordon sites in Pennsylvania.
David is President and CEO of ECO Oxygen Technologies, LLC, (ECO2) a cleantech company specializing in water and wastewater treatment technology. David’s experience stems from a broad range of water and wastewater treatment systems, construction management and business development.
David holds a Bachelor Degree in Civil/Environmental Engineering from Purdue University (Purdue, BSCE 2000) and is a licensed PE in Indiana. He is an active member in a number of professional and civic activities including Water Environment Federation, North American Lake Management Society and Boy Scouts of America.
David holds a number of U.S. and International Patents, has authored several published articles, and regularly speaks at technical conferences and educational forums. He has a long history of involvement with Purdue University including being a past board member of Purdue Engineering Alumni Association (serving from 2017-2020). He has partnered with the Lyles School of Civil Engineering and worked with eighty-two students in their senior design course CE 498 which focused on ECO2's Savannah River Expansion Project. Most recently David and ECO2 were featured in Purdue Alumnus Spring 2023 edition.
David is married to Anne Clidence (Purdue, HTM 2000), has four children and resides in Carmel, IN.
Originally from St. Louis, MO, Darius graduated from Purdue University with a B.S. in Computer Engineering in 2016. During his time at Purdue, he interned three times for Eaton Corporation, actively participated in University Residence Global Organizations, was a member of the Purdue University Jazz Bands, and became a lifelong member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. Darius Elliott has a wealth of experience in assisting small, medium, corporate, and enterprise businesses in growing and scaling their cloud infrastructure to meet their business objectives. He holds eight Azure Cloud Certifications and currently works as a Sr. Advanced Analytics & AI Solutions Specialist at Microsoft, where he helps customers explore the possibilities of Microsoft Azure Data Services. Prior to this role, he served as an Applications & Infrastructure Cloud Solution Architect for five years. In 2022, he received the Platinum Club award at Microsoft, the highest distinction within the company. Darius currently resides in Dallas, TX, where he continues to pursue his passion for technology and music by mentoring college students heading for corporate careers and honing his jazz skills on the trumpet and saxophones.
Hank Hoelscher graduated from Purdue with a degree in Nuclear Engineering in 1979. Later in his career, he earned an MBA from the University of St Thomas. He retired from Xcel Energy after 40 years in the nuclear power business including designing, constructing, and operating nuclear facilities in the upper Midwest. Hank managed Xcel's nuclear fuels engineering program, leading efforts in nuclear core design and safety analysis for multiple nuclear power units.
Three generations of the Hoelscher family have attended Purdue since 1951 - Hank's father, sister, wife, daughter, and son-in-law are also Purdue graduates. Since retirement, Hank has focused on his family, served his community as a Lake Elmo Parks Commissioner, and served six years on the University of St Thomas (Minnesota) Graduate School of Business Alumni Board.
Jill Inglis is the Founder and President of Gram Interactive, a marketing strategy consultancy serving B2B and technology companies. She partners with organizations ranging from leading global brands—including Salesforce, Hitachi, and Tata—to emerging technology startups, helping them tackle complex marketing challenges and accelerate growth.
Jill earned her Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University (BSIE, 2001) and completed Executive Education in Marketing Analytics through The Wharton School of Business. While at Purdue, she participated in the Purdue Engineering Cooperative Education Program, completing multiple work rotations with The Walt Disney Company’s Imagineering Team.
Following graduation, Jill joined Accenture, where she spent fifteen years. She began her career as a management consultant, leading digital transformation initiatives for major financial institutions, including Allstate, Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, and ABN Amro. She later transitioned into Accenture’s global marketing organization, where she held several leadership roles focused on marketing strategy and innovation.
Jill remains an active member of the Purdue engineering community and is passionate about mentoring future engineers and marketers. She is married to fellow Purdue graduate James Inglis (MET, 2001), and they have two children—who they hope will one day be Boilermakers too.
Raj is currently Chief Technology Officer for 374Water, a pioneering startup in the waste destruction space, whose mission is to destroy “forever chemicals” (PFAS) through a novel supercritical water oxidation process.
After graduating from Purdue with a BS (Honors) in Chemical Engineering, Raj went on to earn a PhD in Chemical Engineering at the University of Minnesota. He began his industrial career with Amoco Oil in Naperville, IL in oil refining R&D. In 1994, he embarked on a 13-year career with General Electric, starting with their Plastics division in Mt. Vernon, IN, where he drove process changes at their crystalline polymer & polycarbonate plants. He spent several weeks in Schwarzheide, Germany helping start up a polyester facility—an experience which still stands out as a career highlight. In 1999, he moved to GE’s Lighting division in Cleveland, OH, where he led teams in phosphor coating and fluorescent lamp engineering. In 2005, he moved to GE’s Global Research labs in Niskayuna, NY as an R&D project leader.
After director-level roles with United Technologies (fire suppression), Honeywell (personal protective equipment), and Brooks Automation / Edwards Vacuum (ultrahigh vacuum pumps and chillers for the semiconductor market), Raj made his foray into the cleantech arena when he joined BayoTech in late 2022 as SVP of Technology and later CTO. The experience he gained there, working on localized hydrogen generators for the burgeoning mobility & energy markets, positioned him for his current role.
Despite having lived in 16 different places since birth prior to his current residence in Greater Boston, Raj considers himself an Indiana native and is a diehard Colts/Pacers fan. His interests include biking, vegetarian cooking, travel, and fantasy football. He is very involved with both his alma mater universities, serving on the External Advisory Board for Chemical Engineering & Materials Science at Minnesota, as well as Scholarship Chair for the Purdue Club of Greater Boston. He has also been an engaged mentor, with Minds Matter Boston (preparing first generation high school students for college), PASE (Purdue), and CSE Alumni Mentoring (Minnesota).
Upon graduation he joined Chevron, where his extensive career has been dominated by negotiating oil, gas, and NGL gathering and transportation agreements, as well as business development work for the acquisition and divestment of upstream fields.
With any available time he enjoys running, playing golf, and cheering on Purdue sports teams with his wife and three children.
Words of Encouragement to New Engineering Alumni: Recognize the value of the opportunity in front of you with a Purdue engineering degree, but continue to develop your soft skills by learning how to better communicate, lead, and seek counsel. As always, be sure to embrace diversity to learn about people different than yourself. Boiler up!
A native of West Lafayette, Indiana, Pritesh Patel earned his Bachelor of Science in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from Purdue University in 2014. He is proud to continue to call West Lafayette his home where his wife (Kathleen Patel), son (Killian Patel), and dog (Winston) still reside.
Pritesh currently serves as a Program Manager at Butler Aerospace & Defense, where he leads engineering and technical programs supporting key clients in the aerospace and defense industry. He has built a career at the intersection of engineering, operations, and project management, working closely with cross-functional teams to ensure successful program execution and delivery. Butler is headquartered in Shelton, Connecticut with a design facility also located in the Purdue Research Park so he occasionally travels between the two coasts in support of different clients.
He remains closely connected to the Purdue community, mentoring students and supporting alumni initiatives that help empower the next generation of engineers. He also serves his community volunteering for organizations and recently finishing a term of being President of the Bharatiya Temple & Cultural Center of Greater Lafayette.
Outside of work and volunteering he likes to travel, grow superhots and make spicy foods from them, work on anything with an engine, and enjoy a nice campfire.
MacKenzie is a 2016 (BS) and 2017 (MS) graduate of Purdue's Biomedical engineering program. While at Purdue, MacKenzie was a member of the Varsity Diving team where she was an All-American, team captain, USA National team member, and 2016 Olympic trials finalist. She was also the 2015 recipient of the B1G Medal of Honor.
Upon hanging up her suit and graduating with her Master's degree, she started her career in the pharmaceutical industry as a data scientist, but quickly realized that she was more interested in the wearable devices the clinical trials were using than the drug the trials were testing. Since that realization, she's been working in the med-tech startup space, focusing her efforts on developing new algorithms and software to deploy on wearables to both diagnose disease and monitor progression, specializing in the integration of signal processing with machine learning. With several patents and publications in the field, she is driven to help push the industry forward through machine learning and AI. She currently works as a Senior Data Scientist on the Science team at SPARKNeuro, working to create an algorithm with EEG to help diagnose dementia.
Outside of work, she continues to stay involved in the diving community through coaching high school diving in Chicago and collaborating with the USOPC (U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee) and USA Diving to bring new technology to the sport. She also enjoys swimming, cycling, and golfing in her spare time.