A calling center

Senior Allison Shelly was talking to incoming first-year students and their parents at a Future Flyer business day when she received something unexpected — a business card.

It came from a parent whose employer was hiring business analysts. “That’s kind of a future job offer, right?” she laughed.

Shelly, a business analytics and management information systems double major, is mindful of how tasks, knowledge and opportunities influence her in the job market. Her résumé is stacked with experience, but standing out above the rest is a student job with UDit.

She first worked in the University’s IT Service Center’s call center, where she learned customer service and technical skills from solving phone, computer and other issues.

Shelly said it was strange to be seen as the expert, but she learned to be confident even if she didn’t feel it. She got promoted to analyst before becoming a project manager.

“Being able to climb up the ladder helped me reinforce the confidence that I’ll be able to do that in the professional world, too,” she said.

The confidence helped her seek greater heights. She recently accepted a full-time position from her internship sites, Dayton Freight Lines and its sister company, Kelley Logistics.

Another UD senior, Tidiane Dia, also found student employment with UDit to be more than a job he clocks in to.

“It’s pretty fulfilling to help somebody,” he said.

“Being able to climb up the ladder helped me reinforce the confidence that I’ll be able to do that in the professional world, too.”

Dia, a computer information systems major, like Shelly, moved up in UDit’s ranks to a call center training lead.

If the future of AI and cyberwarfare are worrisome, there is peace knowing Dia will be in the field.

“A lot of cybersecurity issues come from emotion,” said Dia, who also is interning with SecureCyber. “You don’t blame the person for something happening to them, you hear them out and fix it for them, and then teach [them].”

Jonathan Rike ’02, the city of Dayton’s chief information officer, also got his IT start with UDit.

By his own assessment, Rike wasn’t the most engaged student. He was late finding an internship when Shirley Favors in Career Services shared an open position with UDit.

Rike wasn’t thrilled — he recalls hating computers at the time — but applied hoping for a regular paycheck.

He got much more. The internship turned into a career thanks to encouraging mentorship from his boss, Jacquise Jackson, former executive director of IT services. “I found this sweet spot in coaching and management; it has never left me,” he said.

More than 20 years later, he’s still happy he chose to stick with it.

“There’s things I still don’t like about technology,” Rike said. “But it completely opened up a whole new realm [for me].”

Photography by Sylvia Stahl

A version of this article appears in print in the Spring 2026 University of Dayton Magazine, Page 18. EXPLORE THE ISSUE — MORE ONLINE