Kira Welker ’24

Behind the scenes at Walt Disney World, Kira Welker plays a key role in ensuring everything runs smoothly. As an associate industrial engineer, she focuses on optimizing operations that directly impact the guest experience such as analyzing metrics for Lightning Lane, a paid service that allows guests to skip the standby line for park rides. Welker’s expertise in data analysis and problem-solving is at the heart of Disney’s commitment to efficiency and innovation.

“The technical conceptual skills that I learned at RIT are the most valuable in my work,” Welker says. “Being able to look at a problem and immediately have a few different ideas on how to solve the problem has been super helpful.” Her ability to analyze, visualize, and present data has allowed her to drive improvements in everything from labor optimization to product development. “I am able to look at what is being asked and identify what data needs to be collected in order to analyze the situation and help drive decisions to solve the problem.”

During  her first semester at RIT, Welker was in the engineering exploration option, which allows students to explore different engineering disciplines before deciding on a major. “I realized that I was really interested in industrial engineering and the other options were not right for me,” she recalls. It was within the exploration option that she found her passion and recognized the importance of RIT’s hands-on approach to learning. “The application portions of our classes were extremely impactful. Getting to take what we were learning in lectures and applying it to real-life situations helped me to understand the topics and be able to use them in the real world,” she said.

Welker’s co-ops are the perfect example of how RIT’s emphasis on experiential learning prepared her for her career. “My co-op experiences were extremely valuable,” she says. “They gave me a head start in understanding how to apply what I had been learning in school as well as how to work in an office and industry environment.” Her final co-op with the industrial engineering team at Walt Disney World confirmed her desire to work there, and she was hired full-time after graduation.

Today, Welker continues to rely on the foundational skills she learned in her industrial engineering degree. “I use problem-solving techniques that I learned in my degree every day at Disney,” she says. “There are constantly new projects, asks, and problems that arise. The conceptualizing skills I learned from my degree have been extremely helpful.” From defining project scopes to presenting data and influencing decision-making, Welker’s work helps improve Disney’s ongoing commitment to innovation and excellence.