S7:E23 | Dan Sterkenburg

Cedarville Stories

From Healthcare to Business

How does a student epidemiologist end up teaching international business at Cedarville University? For Dan Sterkenburg, God mapped out an entirely different course than what he had planned.

Dan grew up as a missionary kid in Brazil, where he saw medical missions in action. This was for him. Or so he thought. He began pursuing epidemiology as a path to medical school, but his love for missions ended up taking him down an entirely different path.

Instead of pursing healthcare, Dan earned his MBA and began teaching in global business courses. He started out his global business career at Reynolds and Reynolds near Dayton, Ohio. One day his supervisor came to him and encouraged him to work full time at Cedarville, where he had been adjunct teaching for two years.

Dan took this advice, and he started working at Cedarville full time in 2010.

Having grown up in a foreign country and worked over 25 years in the global business world, Dan has been able to have a profound impact on international students as they transition to life at Cedarville. Senior Victor Pomelli and sophomore Elisa Araujo share how their experiences as international students was impacted by Dan and his knowledge.