The Debbie and Jerry Ivy College of Business celebrated a record year of women enrollment Wednesday at the 2018 Ivy Women in Business Awards held at the Iowa State Alumni Center.

The event honored three Iowa State Alumni Kelli J Schmidt, Christina Moffatt, and Luann K Rickert. The award ceremony was accompanied by Ivy College of Business Dean Spalding as well as President of Iowa State Wendy Wintersteen and was helped put together with the help of the Collegiate Women in Business (CWIB).

“At Iowa State University we are committed to having Iowa State be the most welcoming and inclusive land grant university in the nation,” Wintersteen said.

Following a dinner and opening announcements, awards were given out to each of the winners of the 2018 Ivy women in business awards where each of the women honored with awards had many words of inspiration.

The first winner of the 2018 Ivy women in business awards was Kelli J Schmidt who was awarded the Outstanding Young Alumna Award. Schmidt graduated Iowa State University in 2004 and she is currently an audit managing director at KPMG. KPMG is one of the largest financial accounting firms with over 30,000 employees in the United States and over a 150,000 employees globally.

“I always just loved the fast pace environment of a big four accounting firm,” Schmidt said.

The second winner of tonights ceremony was Christina Moffatt who is the owner of the award winning dessert shop in Des Moines Crème Cupcake. Moffatt graduated Iowa State in 2002 and was the winner of the 2018 Ivy Women in business Inspiration award.

Moffat founded Crème in 2010 starting with only one employee and grew her in home business to a staff of 14 employees within just two years. In addition to being a well established entrepreneur Moffat serves as the director of small business resources at the Des Moines partnership where she met with over 60 women entrepreneurs in 2017.

“I have faced a lot of challenges on my way here but each one of them has only strengthened me to make me the person I am today,” Moffatt said.

The final award for the Ivy Women in business awards was the Champion Award which was given to former Ivy College of Business alumn Luann K Rickert. Rickert currently works for Deere and Company where she holds the title Vice President of Internal audit for Deere and Company where she is responsible for its worldwide internal audit function.

Rickert received her degree from Iowa States Ivy College of business where she majored in industrial administration and accounting. She has been with Deere and Company since 1979, and even with her career Rickert finds time to be involved with many charities such as the Junior League of the Quad Cities, the Waterloo Chamber of Commerce, and she is a member of the Women’s Leadership Council for United Way of the Quad Cities area.

“The way I see it every group of people regardless of what they look like or where they come from needs support and I have worked hard throughout my career to help provide it,” Rickert said.