Kira Cowell: From Baking to Building Systems at McKinstry
“Do what you love” goes the common advice for career seekers. Kira Cowell (mechanical engineering, ’26) also considers two other aspects: find people you want to work with, and people you want to work for.
Cowell developed that perspective through a non-traditional path to engineering. Before returning to college, she spent 20 years in the baking industry, including 16 years as a cake decorator. When she was ready for a new challenge, she discovered that engineering offered the same creativity and problem-solving she had always enjoyed, along with new opportunities for growth.
“I always figured you only need two of them in order to be satisfied,” Cowell said. But within a couple of weeks of starting an engineering internship with McKinstry, a national construction and energy services company, she recognized she found a workplace that met all three career needs.
She kept working with McKinstry throughout her senior year, both with a senior-year internship and a McKinstry-sponsored Senior Design project. Today, she is a full-time HVAC design engineer at the Spokane office.
She says she’s glad she found McKinstry early. “I cannot relate to all the memes about hating Mondays because I want to be here. I think I knew immediately what I had and that I wanted to stay here.”
McKinstry’s Spokane office is expanding their internship experience with the Gateway Scholars program, bridging college academics with professional practice.
What kind of engineering?
One of a student’s greatest challenges is determining which areas of engineering to specialize in. Cowell started with mechanical engineering because she enjoyed tinkering, but that still left her with a wide array of options.
“There's no way in school to cover the breadth of opportunities that engineering offers,” she says. “It’s hard to get experience in them—especially early on. By the time you’re a junior or senior and trying to take tech electives, you’re still gambling on what areas to do. Do I want to do aeronautics? Do I want to go into energy? Do I want to do automotive? When you don't have experience or understanding of the industry, there's no way to know if that's what you want to do,” she said.
Cowell thinks she got lucky by connecting with McKinstry early on. “Having that knowledge early on, to dabble in the industry would be really helpful for students to understand what they’ll apply their education to. It helps ease the transition between being a student and having to consider your future. That’s a scary thing to do, and having mentorships and experience of what the industry has to offer is helpful to any student.”
To understand what opportunities were out there, she made a point of attending Gonzaga’s career fairs starting freshman year. “You go around and talk to people even if you're not looking yet. I found that really valuable. And McKinstry was one of the names that kept popping up.”
For current students looking to take a similar step, the 2026 Engineering & Computer Science Career and Internship Fair takes place on Thursday, Oct. 8.
Internships for mentorship and growth
Cowell’s internship at McKinstry went far beyond solitary technical tasks. During her summer internship, with a cohort of 68 interns across multiple regional offices, she participated in professional development sessions focused on transitioning from student life to the workplace. The experience included regional site tours, mentorship activities, and a direct Q&A session with the company CEO.
"They really focus on making sure that you're learning and you've got experience, but then you also have a sense of community with the other interns. Past interns – current employees - talked to us about their experiences; we got to find out more about what they do now, and how they turned their internship into employment.”
Her direct supervisor, Derek Larson—who also teaches as an adjunct instructor at Gonzaga—created an environment where learning was continuously supported. "And I know any single person I can just go into our giant teams meeting and ask a question and I will get, you know, a wealth of answers and all kinds of help, or somebody will just roll their chair up next to me and be like, let's talk about this."
When it came time to request which Senior Design team to join, she looked for a project sponsored by McKinstry. Her multi-disciplinary student team was tasked with analyzing building loads and designing a battery storage system for solar panels at a McKinstry manufacturing warehouse.
That work fed into her current HVAC job, with crossover between the types of calculations involved with analyzing a building and its load. “I had the inside knowledge for what the company was working towards, and the software we were using in our senior design are the same programs McKinstry uses every day.”
Cura Personalis in the workplace
Cowell describes McKinstry’s company culture as encouraging community. Professional “alliance” groups involve continued professional development. Offices volunteer as a group for organizations like 2nd Harvest and Vanessa Behan Crisis Nursery. Cowell plays on an after-hours office softball team—an activity she never would have thought she’d be excited about, “But here I am like, ‘Yes, let’s play tonight!’”
And it sounds a lot like cura personalis or ‘care for the whole person,’ the Jesuit principle at the heart of Gonzaga University’s community spirit.
“I think McKinstry offers that too,” Cowell reflects. “They make a huge focus on taking care of us as part of the team. And you can feel it while you're here. I'm thriving right now.”
The shared culture is reinforced by a strong Gonzaga presence within the company’s Spokane office. Nearly half of Cowell’s 14-person engineering team are Gonzaga alumni. This strong alumni network ensures that Zag grads find a familiar, supportive community.
Opportunities in the making
Looking back on her path from career fair attendee to full-time HVAC design engineer, Cowell points to active curiosity and early involvement as the primary drivers of her success. Asking questions, seeking mentorship, and stepping into professional environments early in college provided her with the confidence to build a fulfilling career.
For prospective students considering the McKinstry Gateway Scholars program, Cowell says it’s an important opportunity for a strong career foundation.
"I might be kind of biased because I'm kind of a McKinstry fan girl, but it would just be so helpful," she said. "Getting to know people in the industry, getting to see engineers in their environment, how they interact with each other and with the people around them. It's powerful to see and I think it’s such a good lens for students to look through early on in their education. I don't see a downside to it."