Summing up success:
Eggleston transitions to teaching with experience, degrees

With two bachelor’s degrees and a master’s degree under his belt, Ben Eggleston took calculated steps that added up to a successful career as an auditor with Crowe Chizek, one of the top 10 public accounting and consulting firms in the United States.

In the fall of 2008, Ben will transition to a new career as a full-time mathematics instructor at Bethel College in Mishawaka, Ind. He will use his education and experience to teach courses in pre-calculus, probability and statistics, applied math for business, applied calculus and differential equations.

In 2004, Ben earned Bachelor of Science degrees in both mathematics and accounting from Huntington University. He continued his education at Indiana University, graduating with a Master of Arts in mathematical finance in 2006.

“I felt that I was very prepared for my master’s program,” Ben says. “Huntington University gave me the academic background necessary to continue my studies in mathematics.”

Practical experiences Ben gained through his college career helped him build a strong foundation for his roles at Crowe Chizek and Bethel College. In the summer before his senior year at Huntington, he completed an internship with Lincoln Financial Group in Fort Wayne, Ind., a diverse family of companies that offers a broad range of financial services.

While Ben was at Indiana University, he secured an internship with Honeywell, a manufacturer of civil and military avionics and other aerospace products, doing Sarbanes-Oxley auditing work. He says these practical experiences ultimately helped him land his job with Crowe Chizek.

In addition to equipping him for further study and career success, Huntington’s professors gave Ben solid role models for his position as an associate instructor at Indiana University where he taught algebra and tutored.

“Since I taught while I pursued my master’s, I tried to mimic what the professors at Huntington University did while I was there,” Ben says. “They seemed genuinely concerned with their students’ wellbeing, and I tried to do the same for my students.”

Through his time at Indiana University, Ben became more aware of the Huntington difference.

“Being at Huntington allowed me to grow as a person in many areas,” he says. “At bigger state universities, a person normally just grows academically and socially. At HU, however, I was able to grow spiritually in addition to athletically, academically and socially. Also, the professors, faculty and fellow students genuinely cared about each other, and this meant a great deal to me.”

Ben believes attending Huntington strengthened his faith through the support he felt from fellow Christians – both his classmates and his professors.

“My professors helped me to see that academics and Christianity do not have to be separate,” Ben says. “Everything can be studied and still be viewed through Christian eyes. Studying math and science does not make someone any more or any less of a Christian. It’s all in how it is approached.”

Ben encourages anyone interested in pursuing a degree in mathematics and building a strong relationship with Christ to consider Huntington.

“In terms of mathematics, the faculty members definitely know the material,” he says. “Most professors have this quality, but where HU mathematics stands out is how hard the professors work to teach their students. All of them have an open door policy, and they are available the majority of the time when they are not teaching. In addition to the standard mathematics required to earn the degree, the professors are more than willing to work with students to learn more in a specialized area. Again, they are always available and are excited to see their students learn and do well.”