Brock graduates and co-founders of Moyers & Stark Consulting, Darryl Moyers (BBA ’11) and Tyler Stark (BBA ’11), are being honoured for their outstanding contributions to the Brock Co-op program.

The Brock University Alumni Association’s (BUAA) Alumni Co-op Employer Award is presented jointly by Brock Co-op and the Brock Alumni Relations office each year to recognize an extraordinary Brock graduate who has contributed to Brock Co-op’s success through their mentorship and advocacy.

Inspired by Moyers’ overwhelmingly positive co-op experience as a student and a mutual desire to give back to the institution that brought them together, the dynamic duo turned to Brock Co-op to help provide the next generation of learners with employable skills and experiences.

Since 2016, Moyers & Stark Consulting has regularly recruited talent from Brock’s co-op programs, with some students finding full-time employment within the firm, or with their clients, upon graduation.

“At Moyers & Stark, our students have been given meaningful, impactful and real-world projects to work on and problems to solve,” says Julia Zhu, Associate Director, Co-op Education. “Darryl and Tyler have made a conscious effort to discover each student’s potential and provide them with opportunities to shine.”

Moyers and Stark look for candidates who are fundamentally curious and have a keen interest in learning, even if they do not check off all the technical boxes and qualifications for the job.

“The reason we keep going back to Brock and the Goodman School of Business is that we feel like the University and co-op program is doing a great job at positioning so many students to be curious and really strong learners,” Moyers says.

By investing in professional development opportunities, training and assigning co-op employees with meaningful projects, students have been empowered to apply theoretical knowledge from the classroom in practical workplace situations.

“We have no shortage of challenges we can throw at students to help increase their skill set,” Moyers says. “We firmly believe that many of the things they learn in this area of technology will be completely cross compatible for the rest of their career, no matter what industry they end up in.”

These experiential opportunities have been transformational for students like Ishan Kohli. Starting his placement with a relatively blank resumé in September 2020, the Bachelor of Business Administration Co-op student was instructed to spend the first month at the firm learning online.

“The whole month I did not have deliverables and was being paid to learn highly valuable and in-demand industry skills,” Kohli says.

Afterwards, Moyers and Stark sent him to a professional development course for Salesforce Administration, resulting in his first Salesforce Certification. He describes the experience as “career changing.”

Similarly, Bachelor of Business Administration Co-op student Justin Dilgert says opportunities to shadow each Moyers and Stark on client calls and work through the problems they were solving was key to his success later in his role.

“Within the second term, I was taking client calls on my own, helping train new staff, providing input on internal process changes and even passed my Salesforce Certified Administrator exam,” Dilgert says.

Both Dilgert and Kohli have been recognized with Brock’s Co-op Student of the Year award for their exceptional performance and contributions in their roles at Moyers & Stark.

“As a co-op employer, it’s been rewarding to see what the co-op students get out of the experience when they apply themselves,” Stark says, while adding the benefits of the employer-student dynamic are not one-sided.

“We often get a lot of fresh ideas, solutions and perspectives that we haven’t thought of before that directly helps the business and our clients,” he says. “Justin and Ishan have been great assets to the team throughout the pandemic. Their ability to think critically and embrace our problem-solving philosophy is fantastic.”

Moyers adds that their students’ unbiased perspectives keep them sharp and encourage them to think differently or approach problems in new ways.

To learn more about hiring Brock co-op students, visit the Co-op Education website.