JACKSONVILLE — Stephen Coleman, a third-year mechanical engineering student at Jacksonville University, secured a summer internship with Cadillac's new Formula 1 team. This opportunity follows his previous internship with Alpha Prime Racing in NASCAR's Xfinity Series.

Coleman will help engineer power unit components for Cadillac's Formula 1 team during his internship. Last year, he sent more than 500 cold emails to racing teams, engineers, and NASCAR executives as he pursued motorsports internships.

Coleman founded the university's first Formula SAE racing chapter with support from faculty and alumni mentors. Formula SAE is an international engineering competition where college students design, build, and test small Formula-style race cars. This chapter includes more than 50 students from engineering, business, and psychology disciplines. The newly established chapter plans to compete in Michigan in May of the following year.

Participants in the Formula SAE competition must develop and present a business plan in addition to designing and building a race car. A local Porsche racer and other motorsports engineers speak to and mentor students at the university. The university incorporates discussions about failure into its student preparation framework. "There's a really great advantage in having this hands-on experience, and I think that's the biggest gap between typical academia and industry." Coleman said.

Coleman first climbed into a go-kart at a local short track in Long Island, New York, at age 5. "The process taught me a lot about perseverance, and you're going to get a lot of nos, but you got to keep trying." Coleman said.