Volume 4, Number 9, June, 2008
Welcome to Ahoya! Engineers - Marquette University's College of Engineering e-Newsletter for alumae, alumni, students and their families, faculty, staff, and MU friends. We want you to know what’s happening in your College of Engineering. This newsletter will be published periodically to share our accomplishments, milestones and activities.
Please Note: If this e-Newsletter was forwarded to you by fellow alumni and you want to receive future editions directly, signing up is fast and easy. Click this link Subscribe, provide your name and e-mail address, and submit your subscription.
Be sure to visit the College Web site for complete information on your College.
They're Engineers!. Another Commencement and you have another stellar class of Marquette Engineers who will transform the 21st century. Welcome to the ranks of your fellow alumni, Class of 2008!
On Sunday, May 18th, Marquette University conferred 148 Bachelor of Science, 14 Master’s and 7 Doctoral degrees to your graduating engineers (additional candidates will receive their degrees in August). After all of those late nights of studying, writing lab reports and completing design projects, their accomplishments and happiness were apparent through their smiles.
At the conclusion of the University commencement at the Bradley Center, your graduates and approximately 2000 of their guests packed the Riverside Theater for the College of Engineering individual diploma ceremony.
Featured speaker at the diploma program was Dr. Chris Foley, Associate Professor in the Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering and recipient of the 2008 Engineering Outstanding Teacher award. The two graduates who spoke on behalf of their class were Peggy Keane, Biomedical Engineering, and Brandon Hahn, Electrical Engineering. After everyone crossed the stage to be congratulated by their Department Chairs and OPUS Dean Stan Jaskolski, the program concluded with a rousing rendition of the Marquette Engineer’s Cheer.
Peggy Keane
Brandon Hahn
Graduates, you are most deserving of your well-earned degrees. No one said becoming an engineer would be easy, but you persevered and your College is proud of all of you!
Lead Picture: Engineering graduates celebrate at the University commencement.
Green Machine. The ingenuity of your Marquette engineering students was showcased for five days on the front page of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. For over a year, Mark Johnson, an award-winning reporter at the Journal Sentinel, followed a group of students who worked on a biodiesel reactor for their senior design project. The result was a five-part series that ran May 11- 18 and included the front-page story on two Sundays. The series paints a human story of a group of five students and their adviser, Dr. Mark Polczyinski, Adjunct Assistant Professor, and the successes and failures of trying to build a reactor while putting it in the context of an important issue that the world is facing. This story is illustrative of the great innovation that is coming out of your College. Please visit the University News Center for links to the stories.
A Formal Welcome. On May 9th, your College celebrated the generosity of Bob and Ruth Greenheck and Jim and Kelly McShane as their faculty Chairs were officially introduced. At an afternoon reception, Fr. Robert Wild, S.J., President, expressed the University’s gratitude to the donors of the two endowed Chairs, after which Dr. Kevin Craig, Greenheck Chair in Engineering Design, and Dr. Mark Federle, McShane Chair in Construction Engineering and Management, expressed their enthusiasm for their new faculty roles in Engineering.
Fr. Wild, S.J., Dr. Kevin Craig, Bob Greenheck and OPUS Dean Stan Jaskolski
Jim and Kelly McShane, Dr. Mark Federle, Fr. Wild, S.J., and OPUS Dean Jaskolski
Attention Brothers and Sisters! Remember the parties on West Highland Boulevard - the Engine House - beverages and sandwiches at the Westowne Tap or the Fin n’ Feather - early morning breakfast at the Parker House - homecoming floats - the Blueprint - the Engineering Knights Banquet - the Highland Dorms - and more?
Whether you are celebrating your reunion year or not, we invite Alpha Omega Epsilon Sorority, Sigma Phi Delta and Triangle Fraternity alumni and your families to the College of Engineering’s Centennial Celebration in conjunction with Marquette University’s long-standing tradition of Reunion Weekend. This celebration will reflect on the Panhellenic history of the College of Engineering while looking forward to the next 100 years for the College of Engineering and the Discovery Learning Complex.
Events have been planned from Friday, July 25, through Sunday, July 27. Feel free to participate in any or all of the activities, tours, dinners, etc. – and plan on creating fond new memories. To view the calendar of events and register, please visit http://www.marquette.edu/alumni/reunions
Maintaining the Bond. One group of brothers has already been having reunions of their own. Each spring for the past 21 years, a group of Engineering alumni from Triangle Fraternity gather to play golf and enjoy a break from our northern winters. The event is always planned around Marquette’s Spring Break so Frank (Bud) Jacoby, Adjunct Associate Professor in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, can be with the group.
This year’s event was held in Gulfport, Mississippi, with 12 alumni (see below picture) in attendance from Wisconsin, Georgia, Michigan, New Jersey, North Carolina and Texas. Several of them decided to donate their “winnings” from the event to the Triangle Fraternity Fund for the new COE building. Thanks guys!
Standing, left to right: Jerry Doyle, Ron Castillo, Tom Weber, Bud Jacoby, Pat Kelly,
Bob Hock and Bob Lipscomb
Kneeling: Jim Pinion, Tom Schoenauer, Ernie Horinek, Bill Rose, and Dave Brown
Editor's Correction. In last month’s edition of this newsletter, the winning teams of the Senior Design Poster Competition were listed and a student member of one of the teams was inadvertently left out. We apologize for this and want to correct our error:
First place for Mechanical Engineering was awarded to Mark Johnson, Jay Belanski, Devin Dobie, MikeZahner, Zach Savage and Alan Suva for “Electricity Generation Systems for Developing Countries.”
COE Represented at Awards Ceremony . The Milwaukee Business Journal has selected Dr. Kristina Ropella, Chair and Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, as one of the recipients of its 2008 Women of Influence awards. Honoring influential businesswomen throughout the Milwaukee area, she will be presented an “Inspiration” award at a luncheon at the Midwest Airlines Center on June 26th. Congratulations, Kris!
New Graduate Certificates to be Offered. Beginning in fall 2008, your College will offer two certificates in Engineering Innovation and New Product and Process Development.
The graduate certificates, which were recently approved, are for practicing engineers or other qualified individuals with bachelor’s degrees who wish to update and/or expand their knowledge in these fields but do not necessarily wish to pursue a master’s degree. However, coursework is applicable for those interested in getting a Master’s degree in Engineering Management.
The engineering innovation coursework will prepare practitioners to pursue technically and commercially viable new technology-based products, processes and services. Students must take four three-credit courses from among the following: Lean Manufacturing Systems; Engineering Six Sigma Design and Development; Engineering Project Management; Reliability and Failure Analysis; New Product and Process Portfolio Management; and System Design, Modeling and Analysis.
The new product and process development certificate is designed to improve the capabilities of engineering managers in bringing new opportunities to market in a timely and efficient manner. Students must complete 12 credits from among the following three-credit courses: Innovation and Technology; New Product and Process Portfolio Management; Front-End Engineering Product Development; System Design, Modeling and Analysis; and Engineering Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
Click here for additional information on the certificate programs or contact Dr. Mark Polczynski, Adjunct Assistant Professor.
Forging a Global Partnership. From April 21 to 25, Dr. Charles S. Melching, Associate Professor in the Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, participated in a delegation from the State of Wisconsin that visited Guizhou Province in China to explore possible collaboration between Wisconsin and Guizhou on environmental issues. The other members of the delegation were Jeff Smoller from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources in Madison representing the State and Gary Vaughan, Associate Director of the Venture Center in Appleton representing the business community (in particular the New North economic development group).
The delegation visited the Environmental Protection Bureau (EPB) of Guizhou Province in Guiyang; Guizhou Research and Designing Institute of Environmental Science (the research arm of the Guizhou EPB); the City of Liupanshui and its Environmental Protection Bureau, Hong Feng Lake, Baihua Lake, and Aha Reservoir (Two Lakes and One Reservoir) Administration which provides 70% of the water supply of Guiyang, the capital of Guizhou Province.
Representatives of Guizhou Province will attend this summer’s U.S.— China Water Consortium: A Wisconsin Idea Approach in the locations of Madison, Door County, and Milwaukee for which Dr. Melching is organizing the technical content. Others from Guizhou may visit Marquette University in the fall. The photo below shows the Wisconsin delegation (from left: Jeff Smoller, Dr. Melching, and Gary Vaughan) at the Huangguoshu Waterfall (the largest in China) between Guiyang and Liupanshui.
Summer Short Course Offered. Your College’s Thermofluid Science and Energy Research Center is pleased to announce the Summer Heat Exchangers (HEXs) Design & Analysis seminar course especially designed for companies that require thermal-fluid engineering analysis and design. This four day, hands-on course will cover the fundamental laws and theories related to the HEXs design and analysis and various practical industry problems will be solved using the methods to be studied.
Two sections of the course will be offered. Session 1 will meet from 3 PM to 6 PM June 23-26 and Session 2 will meet at the same time from July 28-31. For additional information and registration materials, please contact Dr. Hyunjae Park, Director of the Center and Associate Research Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering.
Taking the Top Two . On May 13th, your student chapter of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) showed up at the Milwaukee section IEEE Student Poster Night to compete for prizes. Out of a total of six competing teams, four of them represented Marquette (three undergraduate and one graduate). The other two represented the Milwaukee School of Engineering.
Judging was done by IEEE members in industry – who understood and appreciated the technical aspects of the students’ research projects. Each team was also given a voting ballet to select the top three posters, excluding themselves. Your IEEE members proudly report that Marquette teams took the top two prizes:
1st Place: eLIMO team (Derek Heiser and Greg Novak with Business Administration students Tom Walsh and Erik Hendrickson in attendance; unable to attend: Andy Sovol, Greg Lesher, Ryan Agnew, Pat Zirbel and Ed Speck-Kern).
2nd Place: Remote Power Control for Embedded XINU (Diane Dechene, Zachary Lund and Paul Wolffersdorff in attendance; Brandon Hahn unable to attend).
Jumpstarting Their Engineering Education. All graduating high school students entering your College’s engineering program next fall have been invited to come together on campus June 17-19 to be part of a dramatic event – a three-day transformational experience. Each student will be immersed in a complete design experience. Students will work in teams; mentored by your engineering faculty, professional engineers from industry and junior/senior standing engineering students on a short-cycle complete design focused on the problem of water in Tanzania. Guest presenters from industry and academia, discussions, and demonstrations will help inspire and inform the design teams.
Students will experience what it means to be an engineer. They will come to view their next four years in a very different way, a transformational way, as they will see how individually they can transform the world, one person at a time.
To learn more about this summer event, followed by an exciting, new freshman engineering program beginning next fall, please read an article written by Dr. Kevin Craig, Greenheck Chair in Engineering Design and Professor of Mechanical Engineering:
More to follow next month about the Transformational Design for the Developing World event!
Help Us Spread The News! We realize that we are missing many e-mail addresses for alumni and friends who should receive this e-newsletter, so we're asking for your help. If you received this e-newsletter directly from Marquette, it means we already have your e-mail address on our list serve. However, we would really appreciate it if you would forward this newsletter to your fellow-alumni, friends and other friends of the College and tell them they can subscribe to the list to receive future editions of this e-newsletter.
To subscribe to this newsletter: Click this link Subscribe, provide your name and e-mail address, and submit your subscription. Be sure to visit the College Web site for complete information on your College.
To unsubscribe, please send an e-mail to jessica.bulgrin@marquette.edu with the word "unsubscribe" in the subject bar.