Category: Awards

Aurenice Oliveira Receives IEEE Outstanding Branch Counselor Award

Aurenice Oliveira working in the mobility lab.
Aurenice Oliveira working in the mobility lab.

The IEEE Outstanding Branch Counselor and Branch Chapter Advisor Award is for the exceptional and dedicated efforts of Student Branch Counsellors and Branch Chapter Advisors.

This is an international award since the counselors are chosen from all the branches within all the IEEE regions within and outside the USA. The following is Dr. Aurenice Oliveira’s dedication:

“Dear Dr. Aurenice Oliveira,
It is with immense pleasure and great pride that I extend my heartfelt congratulations to you on being selected as a winner of the prestigious IEEE Outstanding Branch Counselor and Branch Chapter Advisor Award for 2023. Your exemplary leadership, dedication, and significant contributions to your Student Branch have been recognized and celebrated.”

IEEE Member and Geographic Activities and Technical Activities Boards

The primary criteria for selection are the enthusiastic support of the Branch Counselor, or Branch Advisor, by his or her students, and the commitment he or she has made to the engineering profession by the fostering of activities that encourage the development of IEEE Student members. The award recipient receives a certificate and other items.

The Member and Geographic Activities and Technical Activities Boards sponsor the cash award to maximum of 20 Outstanding Counsellors and Advisors around the world. Winners are those individuals who, through their work as Counsellors and Advisors, exemplify the Institute’s commitment to the educational, personal, professional, and technical development of students in IEEE related fields of interest.

Aurenice Oliveira Leads IEEE Section to Membership Retention Award

IEEE Region 4 Northeastern Wisconsin Section Received the 2022 Membership Retention Award

Aurenice Oliveira, the IEEE Section Chair, accepted the award on behalf of the section during IEEE Region 4 RCom Meeting 2023. The meeting took place January 27–January 29 in Chicago. The geographic area of the section also includes Michigan Tech.

Oliveira is an associate professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering, the IEEE Region 4 Section 27 chair, an IEEE MTU Student Chapter advisor, an MTU Vice President for Research Faculty Fellow, an ELATES-Drexel Fellow, and an Eta Kappa Nu (HKN) Honor Society Advisor.

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineering (IEEE) is the world’s largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for the benefit of humanity. IEEE is the trusted voice for engineering, computing, and technology information around the globe.

Aurenice Olveira stands between two people while accepting an engraved plaque.
Aurenice Oliveira, the IEEE Section Chair, receiving the award on behalf of the Section.
Aurenice Oliveira is seated at a table next to Eduardo Palacio.
Aurenice Oliveira at dinner with the IEEE-USA President Eduardo Palacio.

Christopher Middlebrook is a Co-recipient of the 2022 CTL Instructional Award for Curriculum Development and Assessment

Christopher Middlebrook
Christopher Middlebrook

The Jackson Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) will recognize Chris Middlebrook (ECE) and Josue Reynoso (COB) as co-recipients of the 2022 CTL Instructional Award for Curriculum Development and Assessment on Tuesday (Nov. 8) at 3:45 p.m. Middlebrook and Reynoso were selected for the award after being nominated via the Deans’ Teaching Showcase during the spring 2022 semester.

Please plan to join us in recognizing their accomplishments by registering for the event.

Middlebrook’s award presentation: “Curriculum Development: Creation of a Printed Circuit Board Manufacturing Laboratory Course.”

From the abstract:
Why Michigan Tech? Why go to school there? Why hire Michigan Tech engineering grads? What skills do they possess that are lacking in other engineering grads? A consistent answer to these questions is the hands-on laboratory experience students have throughout the engineering curriculum. The response is echoed with the hundreds of companies that continuously recruit Michigan Tech Engineering students. Laboratory experience increases student knowledge retention and fosters a deeper understanding through direct concept application. However, the creation of a new course with a laboratory component can often be a daunting task to faculty and staff given the amount of time and the number of resources that are often required. In this talk I will share my experience with the creation of a formal course and laboratory on Printed Circuit Manufacturing utilizing prior research equipment coupled with existing infrastructure and corporate participation and in-kind donations. The outcomes and ancillary activities associated with the course and lab, such as the building of the new Plexus Electronics Maker Space, will also be discussed.

By the Jackson Center for Teaching and Learning.

Lucas and Whitaker Place in Computing[MTU] Showcase Poster Session

Evan Lucas
Evan Lucas
Steven Whitaker
Steven Whitaker

The Institute of Computing and Cybersystems has announced the winners of the first Computing[MTU] Showcase Poster Session. Among the winners were electrical and computer engineering graduate students Evan Lucas and Steven Whitaker for “Active learning with binary feedback on multiclass problems,” who were tied for second place with Suresh Pokharel of Computer Science.

Active learning with binary feedback on multiclass problems

An active learning approach is often used for multiclass classification problems, where predictions are made on new data and a human user is used to determine if the predictions are correct. Typical approaches may ask a human to select the correct class if the prediction is incorrect. This work attempts to use a binary feedback on the predicted classes to save time and allow maximal use of a negative prediction on a partly trained model.

Ranit Karmakar Wins Best Overall Venture Award

Husky Innovate Students Win Top Prizes in New Venture Online Competition

Pitch screenshot on eye banks from the Focus presentation.

For the 11th year running, Central Michigan University and Michigan Tech collaborated to offer Tech students a chance to compete at CMU’s New Venture Competition. 2021 marked the second year the pitch competition was held online as the New Venture Online Competition (NVOC).

Despite the challenges of a pandemic and a virtual platform, our students persevered, honed their pitches and won top prizes. This year’s NVOC winners were also winners at the 2021 Bob Mark Business Model Pitch Competition held at Tech in January. All of their hard work and effort paid off!

Congratulations to this year’s MTU winners:

Read more in the NVOC 2021 Booklet.

By Husky Innovate.

Anna Browne Wins President’s Award for Leadership

Anna Browne
Anna Browne

Outstanding students, staff, and a special alumni were honored Friday (April 16, 2021) during Michigan Tech’s 27th Annual Student Leadership Awards Virtual Ceremony.

Anna Browne was selected to receive the President’s Award for Leadership. Brown is pursuing a degree in electrical engineering with a concentration in electrical power. She has shown excellent success during her time as a student. Her involvement and contributions to Michigan Tech’s campus are numerous and cast such a wide net as shown in her 13 nominations.

Anna, who has had multiple internships at Black & Veatch and Westwood Professional Services, has served in project and team leader roles with the Alternative Energy Enterprise on projects like the Baraga Community solar and the on-campus mine water geothermal system. She’s been an active part of the residence education and housing services community as a senior student resident assistant and resident assistant for three years.

She’s also been a valuable contributing member to the Center for Diversity and Inclusion community. Anna has left a mark on Michigan Tech’s community. In her essay she writes how she strived to be a role model for others through community building.

She wrote, “Through my Michigan Tech Experience, my values of leadership, community, openness, and integrity have been demonstrated through every aspect of my involvement. In trying to create a supportive community, I have strived to give a sense of comfort and belonging to those without a place. Michigan Tech has helped me find my values and my identities, and I hope through my involvement that I have left a positive mark on Michigan Tech as it has left on me.”

By Student Leadership and Involvement.

Play 27th Annual Student Leadership Awards video
Preview image for 27th Annual Student Leadership Awards video

27th Annual Student Leadership Awards

Kaitlyn Bunker is an Outstanding Young Alumna

Kaitlyn Bunker
Kaitlyn Bunker

Outstanding students, staff, and a special alumni were honored Friday (April 16) during Michigan Tech’s 27th Annual Student Leadership Awards Virtual Ceremony.

Keynote speaker Kaitlyn Bunker ’10 ’12 ’14 (BS, MS, PhD Electrical Engineering), won the Outstanding Young Alumni Award along with Megan Kreiger ’09 ’12 (Mathematics and Materials Science and Engineering).

By Student Leadership and Involvement.

Play 27th Annual Student Leadership Awards video
Preview image for 27th Annual Student Leadership Awards video

27th Annual Student Leadership Awards

Tim Schulz Receives a 2019 CTL Instructional Award

Tim Schulz receives a 2019 Center for Teaching and Learning Instructional Award for his outstanding progress in online course curriculum and learning tool development. Tim is pictured (left) receiving the award from Mike Meyer, director of the Jackson CTL. On the right, Tim is pictured presenting on his curriculum development methods at the awards ceremony held Tuesday, October 22, 2019. Tim was chosen from a pool of Deans’ Teaching Showcase award recipients. Read more about the CTL awards.

James Davis Receives the 2019 Jonathan Bara Award

James Davis is the 2019 recipient of the Jonathan Bara Award, an award given each year to an outstanding teaching assistant in ECE. This endowed award was set up by the family of Jonathan Bara, a 1975 electrical engineering master’s graduate who suffered a heart attack and passed away at the young age of 25. The award was presented at this fall’s Graduate Student Banquet held on September 23rd.

James then accepted the Matt Wolfe award on behalf of the 2019 recipient, Wyatt Adams.  The award was set up by the family of Matt Wolfe, a 1992 BSEE graduate and MSEE candidate who was tragically killed in an automobile accident.

Schulz Receives Prestigious University Professor Award

ECE’s Tim Schulz was presented with the University Professor award at a ceremony yesterday. Schultz was nominated by Dan Fuhrmann, former ECE chair. The prestigious award recognizes faculty members who have made outstanding scholarly contributions to the University and their discipline over a substantial period of time. Standing with Schultz are Provost and Senior Vice President Jackie Huntoon, and Dan Fuhrmann. Read the full article on the awards ceremony in Tech Today https://www.mtu.edu/ttoday/….

Schulz has served Michigan Tech for nearly 27 years and has been a role model for all with his commitment to excellence in teaching, research and administration. He became ECE department chair in 1997, and was promoted to the rank of full professor in 2007, the same year be became dean of the College of Engineering. As ECE department chair, he tripled the size of the PhD program and developed a new BS degree program in Computer Engineering. As dean of the College of Engineering, he led efforts to bring more accountability and transparency to our activities through the establishment of goals in faculty achievement and recognition, in research and in our educational programs; and then putting in place methods for measuring progress relative to those goals.

When Schulz stepped down from the Dean’s Office, he returned to the ECE faculty where he has been a leader in using technology to deliver technical material in electrical engineering and developing new online courses.