Glen Mandigo '85

Brother Glen Mandigo, from Bethesda, Maryland, was initiated into Delta-Mu chapter of Kappa Sigma at the University of North Dakota in 1985. After graduating in December 1988 from the University of Arizona, Glen landed a job as a research engineer at Lockheed Aeronautical Systems in Burbank, CA. He worked on composite materials qualification for the F-22. This job resulted from a summer internship in 1988, enabled by Kappa Sigma brother Joel Rapp ‘88, whose father worked at Lockheed. Mr. Rapp was kind enough to offer Glen the internship and to have him stay in his house with Joel over the summer. 

Mandigo quit his structural engineering job in 1991, with a plan to explore careers beyond engineering. He packed everything he owned into his beat-up cabriolet convertible and drove across-country to the “indecision capital of the world”, Washington, DC, to take a six month break before going to graduate school. 

The work on Capitol Hill led to a position with Futron Corporation where he became a manager and led a support contract team working on commercial space policy at NASA Headquarters in Washington, DC from 1991 to 1995. To that end, he started with SMI in 1995 as employee number one, doing federal program development and legislative advocacy work with aerospace materials companies. Mandigo took over as President of SMI in 2013. 

Glen served as one of the Alumnus Advisors to the Alpha-Eta chapter at George Washington University in Washington, DC in the early 1990’s. “Kappa Sigma has always meant inclusion to me. Both Delta-Mu and Gamma-Rho chapters were mini melting pots. Kappa Sigma is filled with men with all sorts of backgrounds, attitudes, beliefs, strength, and weaknesses who have lived, worked, and matured together in a way that benefitted almost everyone. He often hears fraternities described as exclusive, but that wasn’t Glen’s experience and he hopes that it is still that way today.”

Jay Ferguson, ‘54 says: “Glen is the primary reason I joined Kappa Sigma!” He also noted that: “Glen is the only Kappa Sigma to graduate with an aerospace degree, while coaching pole vaulting, while also helping run a heart donor matching program, while minoring in adventure drinking.” Anyone remember the T.O. drink skit?

Randy Christensen ’89 says: “It is no easy task to come up with a quote to summarize Glen Mandigo.  He has inspired many of us to live life to the fullest.  I owe him a great deal—not only has he been a dear friend and brother for over thirty years but without him I would not have found my way to the Brotherhood of Kappa Sigma.”