Engineering Alumni Association Awards honor outstanding achievements

At the 43rd annual Cornell Engineering Alumni Association awards banquet held on May 1 in Upson Hall, members of the Cornell Duffield College of Engineering community were recognized for excellence in teaching, student mentorship, undergraduate research, student leadership and experiential learning.

Association co-president Ricky Yu '04, M.Eng. '05, gave the opening remarks and spoke of the association's mission - to provide financial sponsorship to project teams, give alumni opportunities to mentor current students, and support current students, faculty and staff through their annual awards.

Alan Zehnder, associate dean for undergraduate programs, emceed the awards banquet and stressed that the five awards given acknowledge excellence outside of the classroom, and represent the high value Duffield Engineering places on service, mentoring and experiential learning.

The five award categories and winners are:

Tau Beta Pi Professor of the Year: David Delchamps, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering

Tau Beta Pi Professor of the Year is awarded through the Cornell Engineering Alumni Association but elected by engineering students in recognition of exemplary teaching. Tau Beta Pi, the engineering honor society, oversees the selection process. He previously received the Tau Beta Pi Professor of the Year four times, the Kenneth A Goldman '71 Excellence in Teaching Award in 2021, the Michael Tien '72 Excellence in Teaching Award in 2015 and the Sonny Yau '72 Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2009.

Academic Achievement Award: Lauren Stulgis, Swanson Director of Student Project Teams

The Academic Achievement Award recognizes non-tenure staff and lecturers who go well beyond their job duties for advising, teaching and giving general help to students, and who enhance undergraduate education outside of the classroom.

Student Organization Award: National Society of Black Engineers and Chemical Engineering Graduate Student Association

This award is given to a standout student organization on the basis of their outstanding service to the college or community, and for providing innovative programming and increasing student participation.

Undergraduate Research Award: Nedzma Srkalovkic '28, electrical and computer engineering

The Undergraduate Research Award recognizes an undergraduate student who has made outstanding research accomplishments. Nedzma analyzed spectroscopic data from experiments conducted on the Z machine at Sandia National Laboratories, the world's largest pulsed-power facility, to determine the temperature and density of extremely hot aluminum plasmas.

Albert R. George Student Team Award: Cornell DEBUT

Named in honor of Professor Al George, the John F. Carr Professor of Mechanical Engineering Emeritus, this award recognizes student project teams that have exhibited the highest level of professional skills, attitude and growth during the current academic year. Cornell DEBUT is an undergraduate project team that develops innovative biomedical devices, from initial concept through prototype, and competes in VentureWell's national DEBUT competition.

CEAA Student Project Team Sponsorship: FSAE, iGEM, Extended Reality, and Electric Vehicle

Each year the Cornell Engineering Alumni Association accepts applications from project teams to receive sponsorship in support of their projects. Teams are evaluated on current and future goals, project impact and funding needs. This year four teams were selected to receive support. FSAE Racing at Cornell has grown to be one of the most formidable Formula SAE teams in the world. Cornell iGEM is an award-winning synthetic biology research team that works to solve local and global problems related to medical applications, environmental concerns, and human and animal health. The Cornell University Extended Reality team explores and creates software, hardware, games and events for virtual, augmented, mixed reality and human-computer interaction. Cornell Electric Vehicles is dedicated to building autonomous, hyper-efficient electric vehicles that compete at the highest levels.