Case Alumnus Spring 2020

Case Alumnus The Magazine of the Case Alumni Association Since 1921

Spring 2020 • vol. 36 • no. 1

Civil engineers like

Kirsten Bowen ‘96 put their work on display

Look who’s urban farming

Case’s ‘top prof’ has heart

Researchers pivot toward pandemic

Giving Corner

Turn Your Case Fund Gift Into a Forever Gift Case Fund gifts are a critical lifeline to the Case Alumni Foundation. Without them, we couldn’t support scholarships, student groups, academic departments or faculty on campus. If you’re a Case Fund donor, you know firsthand the satisfaction that comes from making a difference — and we deeply appreciate your generosity. But as you look to the future, you may wonder what will happen to the programs made possible through your gifts once you’re gone. How can you make sure your generosity continues forever?

One option is to make a gift in your will or trust to establish an endowment with the Case Alumni Foundation.

An example of how that could work Let’s say Jerry makes an annual Case Fund donation of $1,000 and would like to continue his support of student groups on campus after his lifetime. His estate planning attorney suggests that Jerry include a provision in his will to establish an endowment with a gift of $25,000. Once funded, the Case Alumni Foundation will use a portion of his endowment each year to fund the program of Jerry’s choice. The remainder is reinvested, which allows Jerry’s endowment to grow and support annual payouts indefinitely.

This generous arrangement replaces Jerry’s $1,000 annual Case Fund gift after his lifetime.* As a result, the programs he cared most about will be supported by the Case Alumni Foundation and will receive the benefit of Jerry’s generosity forever. *assuming 4 percent ($1,000) is used by the fund annually

Honor someone else You can also use an endowment gift to honor someone important to you who appreciates the work we do. Consider designating your endowment in his or her name as a way to celebrate their connection to the Case Alumni Foundation. This is a popular way to honor a professor who helped you through your educational experience or a favorite classmate or friend.

Ready to Learn More?

Find more information about supporting the Case Alumni Foundation at https://casealum.planmylegacy.org or contact Stephen J. Zinram, Executive Director at Stephen.zinram@casealum.org or 216.368.8841.

Disclosure Statement: The information in this publication is not intended as legal or tax advice. For such advice, please consult an attorney or tax advisor. Figures cited in examples are for illustrative purposes only. References to tax rates include federal taxes only and are subject to change. State law may further impact your individual results.

Dean’s Message

Proud of our resilience and character It is hard to believe how quickly and completely our lives have changed since the global COVID-19 pandemic began. The Case School of Engineering has rallied together in the face of these unprecedented challenges to adapt, respond and assist one another and the broader community.

As engineers, we have a crucial role to play in contributing to new and innovative solutions to contain this pandemic and keep our communities functioning amid crisis.

This tremendous response is due in no small part to the dedication, professionalism and creativity shown by our faculty and staff, and their consistent willingness to go above and beyond to meet the demands of a challenging situation — from working overtime to ensure essential research continues, to facilitating an extraordinarily quick and remarkably successful transition to a remote learning and working environment.

Our students, likewise, have shown their strong character through flexibility, a willingness to adapt to a difficult and disappointing situation and a determination to succeed in their new reality.

At its most basic level, engineering applies scientific principles to invent, design, build, create and solve problems. As engineers, we have a crucial role to play in contributing to new and innovative solutions to contain this pandemic and keep our communities functioning amid crisis. I cannot express how proud I am of the many ways our alumni, faculty, researchers and students have stepped up to this challenge.

Finally, I’d like to acknowledge the students who will complete their journey at Case Western Reserve this semester and join the ranks of alumni. Their final semester was one of upheaval and unexpected change, instead of ceremony and celebration. The resolve they have shown to adapt and complete their studies will serve them well, be that in further study or in the workforce. We can all be proud of the resilience of this next generation of CWRU engineers.

A simple “thank you” seems inadequate in a time like this, but I am more grateful than I can express for your continued support and the contributions you are making every day to engineer new solutions to our world’s problems.

Best regards, Venkataramanan “Ragu” Balakrishnan Charles H. Phipps Dean, Case School of Engineering

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Hope for a virus-weary world If anything good comes from this crisis, the first experience with a global pandemic for any of us, it may be a newfound respect for science.

The learned experts were too often ignored early in the outbreak. But soon, every politician had one standing by his or her side. That’s who the public wants to hear from now. A doctor.

A scientist. A straight-talking specialist.

I thought of that as Case’s researchers and innovators, many of them immersed in their own research, dropped everything to target the coronavirus. At the urging of the dean, Case staff and faculty went into “emergency mode,” focusing their world-class skills and research teams on the global crisis.

News of their nascent innovations and hopeful projects aroused the interest of a virus-weary public. Professors Yanfang Ye and Ken Loparo practically became media stars in Greater Cleveland after they introduced an online tool that helps people map the coronavirus danger around them. Seemingly every TV and radio station in the area sought to interview them about their Alpha Satellite, and some national outlets as well.

Why? There was no shortage of coronavirus news to report. But the thought of data scientists and engineers working on solutions gave people something new, hope — a blessing we had not felt enough of.

Everyone realizes now that COVID-19 will not be vanquished by money or might or bravado — but by science. And they have not heard the last from the Case School of Engineering.

Professor Anant Madabhushi, one of the world’s leading innovators in medical imaging, has trained his super computers on the disease.

Professor Jing Li asked the National Science Foundation for a rapid response to his proposal to apply data science to decoding the transmission of the virus. But he’s not waiting for the grant. He’s told his graduate students to get cracking.

When we finally win this war, I think all of us are going to look more deferentially toward the people who don’t deny problems, but address them and seek solutions: Scientists and engineers.

Robert Smith Editor Robert.Smith@casealum.org

The Case Alumnus is published quarterly for members and friends of the Case Alumni Association, which serves the interests of more than 20,000 alumni of the Case School of Applied Science, Case Institute of Technology and the Case School of Engineering.

Established in 1885 by the first five graduates of the Case School of Applied Science, the Case Alumni Association is the oldest independent alumni association of engineering and applied science graduates in the nation.

The Case Alumnus is a publication of the Case Alumni Association, Inc., a 501(c)3 public charity under the IRS code.

CASE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION, INC. Tomlinson Hall, Room 109 10900 Euclid Avenue Cleveland, OH 44106-1712 216-231-4567 casealum@casealum.org casealum.org

OFFICERS Sunniva Collins, MS ’91, PhD ’94, President Ron Cass ’84, 1st Vice President Joe Fakult ’90, 2nd Vice President Brian Casselberry ’95, Treasurer Frank Merat ’72, MS ’75, PhD ’78, Assistant Treasurer Curtis Grant ’11, MEM ‘12, Secretary

STAFF Stephen Zinram, Executive Director Thomas Conlon, Chief Financial Officer Emily Speer, Director of Gift Planning and Grants Compliance Robert Smith, Director of Communications Kelly Hendricks, Director of Alumni Relations Ryan Strine, Director of Annual Giving Janna Greer, Manager of Donor Relations and Grants Lillian Messner, Manager of Digital Content Pamela Burtonshaw, Database Administrator Melissa Slager, Manager, Executive Office

CASE ALUMNUS Robert L. Smith, Editor Steve Toth, Toth Creative Group, Layout and Design Duke Print & Mail Solutions

PHOTO CREDITS Wetzler’s Photography Roadell Hickman Photography Flaticon.com, Icons

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THE MAGAZINE OF THE CASE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION SINCE 1921 To serve and advance the interests of the Case School of Engineering, the math and applied sciences of Case Western Reserve University and its alumni and students.

Spring 2020 • vol. 36 • no. 1

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Look who’s farming As they learn engineering skills beneath the greenhouses, Case students help an innovative urban farm flourish.

Super humans New film makes stars of biomedical engineers and the people they help.

Emergency mode The pandemic demands the best of scientists and engineers — stat. Case researchers are rising to the challenge.

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Cover Story New civil engineer Civil engineers like Kirsten Bowen ’96 put their work on display. Exhibit A: The taming of Cleveland’s Memorial Shoreway.

Teaching with heart Students say Case’s “top prof” offers sound instruction and something more.

Alumni Adventures 26 The Entertainer An Invacare engineer by day,

Brett DiCello ’18 is drawn to

the stage at night. Thanks, mom.

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DEPARTMENTS 1 2 4 6 8 22 24 27 30 31

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Dean’s Message Editor’s column Letters, posts and emails Around the Quad Alumni Newsmakers News Bytes Case Memories Class Notes In Memoriam Tribute — Jack Flynn ’51, MS ’53, PhD ’56 Long We'll Remember

Cover photo of Kirsten Bowen ’96 by Roadell Hickman

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VISIT WWW.CASEALUM.ORG FOR THE LATEST NEWS AND EVENTS!

The best way to stay connected to the Case Alumni Association between magazine issues is to follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube. Please join our sites today for the latest news on alumni, students, faculty and innovative research and projects.

Spring 2020

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Letters, posts and emails

Comments on our winter issue Dear Case Alumni Association, Great job on the Winter 2020 issue.

I read it from cover to cover, first time I have done that with any publication from you since 1987. It was upbeat, the stories were good, pictures of the people were good, everything. Thanks!

The Winter 2020 edition of the Case Alumnus got me to looking into my old pictures (which I had since digitized and saved on a CD). Snow men and snow women were found all over the place back then. This was the CIT Sigma Nu version in 1953. The perpetrators were, as best I

can remember, (left to right) Tom Bowden, Dwight Decker and Jim Nay (me).

Thanks for the memories,

out that even math majors had to take three semesters of physics (I had a bad experience with physics in high school), I went all in as a Computer Engineering major. If I was going to have to take those three semesters of physics anyway, I wanted the engineering degree!

While I applaud the creation of the new department, I have to say that as a

woman, I still get a kick out of telling people that I am an engineering major.

It is sad to say that is still a rarity. I hope Case (and other colleges) work hard to attract and entice more women to enter the STEM fields.

James A. Nay ’56 — now retired for the last 23 years!

Via email: jimnay@yahoo.com

Susanna Dzejachok ’87 Via email: sdzejachok@gmail.com

Our story about the new Department of Computer and Data Sciences brought this response When I entered Case in 1982, there was no Computer Science degree, so I declared a major in math, with emphasis on computer science. When I found

Several readers responded to Warwick Doll’s delightful essay for the Long Well Remember section — “Punch Card Blues” Dr. Doll, I am a CWRU alum (undergrad ’99, MED ’04) and read your article about breaking the Univac 1108 in the Winter 2020 Case Alumnus magazine.

What a great piece on so many levels! For me, the example of moving on from a mishap, even if that was not your intent in writing the article, was the greatest part.

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I appreciate you sharing your story with all of us, and wish you the best in your retirement.

Yours truly, Libbie Stansifer, MD Chief Medical Officer, Signature Health libbie.stansifer@gmail.com

Christine Wolak ’87 Dublin, California catnmus@att.net

SUBMIT YOUR LETTER TO THE EDITOR Send by email to: Casealum@casealum.org

Dr. Doll lives just south of me down I-26 in Spartanburg! His story was very entertaining and reminded me of my first programming lab. As a junior in high school, I had the following discussion with my father: Dad: Tom, you don't always listen to me, but listen to me on this.

Tom: Ok Pops, I'm listening.

Dad: Do you have a free period or study hall this semester?

Tom: I do.

Dad: Take typing. It will come in handy with term papers and any computer work you do.

Tom thought bubble (Don't all the girls take typing as a secretarial class, now there's a thought) Tom: OK Pops, great idea!

I took typing on a Remington Secretarial manual and became a very speedy and accurate touch typer. Senior year of high school I was lucky enough to be in a community with a top-notch school system and had a programming course.

So I was all set for programming at Case!

I had my first assignment and went down to the computer lab. Took my punch cards and keyed in my program and data. I went over to the Univac (I think it was still the Univac in ’71 – ’72) and watched the upperclassmen put in their huge stack of cards into the hopper and set the separator. I watched as they got their output from the line printer — some tension on the green bar, wait for the perf and flick it with your finger. Great, I've got that.

I put my program in the stack, set the separator and other large stacks of cards go in on top of mine. It was my turn for output. Here it comes, slight tension on

Or by mail to:

Case Alumnus Tomlinson Hall, Room 109 10900 Euclid Avenue Cleveland OH 44106

the green bar and I whiffed on the flick.

I pulled the greenbar right off the tractor and all those large programs in the stack after mine printed a solid black line on the unmoving greenbar. Oh, the shame, the ignominy.

I didn't think I'd ever be let back onto the computer system. Forty-four years later I'm still programming without punch cards and without greenbar so it all eventually worked out.

Tom Fulton ’75 tommief@gmail.com

Comments on our Facebook posts and online stories On Joy Ward, PhD, being named Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences

On news that President Barbara Snyder is leaving to run the American Association of Universities

Good news for the university. An Ecologist. Exactly what the university needs. Our natural world is in serious trouble.

She served Case well for my daughter’s four years. Proud of the education she received. Fair winds and following seas, hope your next adventure is as successful for the association as your time at case has been. Thank you.

Lou Drasler louis.drasler@gmail.com

Rick Becker Newark, Delaware Via Facebook

A reaction to Rockwell Night at Sears think[box] I worked for Allen-Bradley during my last semester at Case and then hired on full time after graduation. Those early years cemented my career choice in software engineering and I like to believe that my code is still being used somewhere in the world today. I started my career in industrial automation and ended up writing robotic software for medical equipment just down the street at Picker/Marconi/Philips Medical Systems.

Thank you Case, Rockwell and all those others who let me put my talents to work, hopefully for the betterment of humanity.

John Hayes ’77 Macedonia, Ohio Via Facebook Rockwell Night at Sears think[box]

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Around the Quad New dean coming

An ecologist from Kansas will lead the College of Arts and Sciences An acclaimed scientist from the University of Kansas will lead the College of Arts and Sciences into a new era, starting this summer.

The appointment of Joy Ward, PhD, associate dean of research and a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, concludes a national search for the successor to Cyrus Taylor, PhD. Taylor led the college for a dozen years before returning to the physics faculty at the end of 2018.

“Joy’s own exceptional research achievements, coupled with her strong success in catalyzing accomplishments among others,

make her the right person to lead the College of Arts and Sciences at this moment,” President Barbara C. Snyder said, upon announcing her appointment in January.

Ward is internationally recognized for her studies of how plants are handling global climate change. In 2017, she was selected to lead scientific research in KU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

She’s been groomed for academic leadership. In 2014, KU named her a senior administrative fellow as part of a program to prepare campus leaders for greater op-

portunities. In 2015, she became a dean’s professor, the highest honor a faculty member in KU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences can receive.

“After 16 years at KU, I recognized that it would take a very special opportunity to persuade me to leave a university that has been so good to me,” Ward said in a statement. “From my first interactions with the College of Arts and Sciences’ search committee, I quickly realized that this is a special place with people eager to contribute and excel in meaningful ways.”

She’s scheduled to start her new job July 1.

Best of Case

Our 2020 award winners have shaped the campus and their professions The next time you drop your phone and the glass doesn’t shatter, thank Arun K. Varshneya, MS ’68, PhD ’70. The scientist and ceramics expert helped develop chemically strengthened glass, an essential material in everything from smartphones to bullet-proof windows to the lifesaving EpiPen. This fall, Varshneya will be honored by the Case Alumni Association for his professional achievements and his support of today’s students. He will receive the Gold Medal, the association’s highest annual honor, at Homecoming and Reunion Weekend Oct. 9-10.

The 2020 awards ceremony will honor six other distinguished alumni and a good friend of the Case School of Engineering:

Ken Barker ’70, will receive the Samuel Givelber ’23 Award, granted to an alumnus who fosters fellowship in the Case tradition.

Barker, a retired financial analyst endowed with a snowy white beard, spends much of the winter bringing joy to people as Santa Claus.

Arkady Polinkovsky ’08, MS ’10, will receive the Young Alumni Leadership Award. He is chairman of the Scholarship Committee of the CAA and has been a volunteer since his student days.

In addition, five men will receive the Meritorious Service Award, which recognizes outstanding service to the alumni association and to Case.

They are: Jim McGuffin-Cawley, PhD ’84,

Cream of the crop

Announcing a new class of Junior Senior Scholars Performing one of its most critical functions, the Case Alumni Association awarded 136 new Junior Senior Scholarships in March, propelling deserving students toward graduation from the Case School of Engineering and the 6

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College of Arts and Sciences.

The scholarships, granted to rising juniors and seniors by the Scholarship Committee of the Case Alumni Association Board of Directors, are designed to help students finish their degree programs at

a professor of materials science and the Senior Associate Dean of the Case School of Engineering Ed McHenry ’67, MBA ’71, a 13-year member of the CAA Board of Directors and the former president of the association.

Jim Kilmer ’00, MSE ’00, a 13-year member of the CAA Board of Directors and one of the association's most active volunteers.

Steve Hasbrouck ’62, a member of the CAA Board of Directors and a three-year member of the investment committee.

Daniel Ducoff, the Vice President for Strategic Initiatives and Global Principal Gifts at Case Western Reserve University.

Information on Homecoming events, including the 135th All Classes Celebration and Innovation ShowCASE Oct. 9, will be shared in the months ahead.

Case Western Reserve.

The Committee awarded a total of $688,100 to the students based on financial need, leadership potential and academic performance. The median award was $4,800; the top scholarship was $10,000.

Because of the pandemic, the annual Junior Senior Scholar Reception has been postponed. But the scholars now have

additional support they can count on.

“These are the cream of the crop and we want to alleviate some of the pressure for them,” said Arkady Polinkovsky ’08, MS ’10, a senior mechanical engineer at Altran and the Chairman of the Scholarship Committee. More than 20 alumni, faculty and CAA staff took part in scholarship interviews.

Polinkovsky, himself a Junior Senior Scholar, said the scholarships help students to focus on their research and classes by offering financial relief.

“This is the Case community taking care of its own,” he said. “I think the students realize that. I think they also realize they’ll be expected to help support the next generation. This is money well spent.”

Fond farewell

Barbara Snyder was a steadfast friend of the Case Alumni Association University President Barbara R. Snyder is leaving CWRU to lead the Association of American Universities, the organization that represents North America’s leading research universities, ending a 13-year tenure that saw impressive improvements in academic standards, enrollment and campus facilities.

While many will miss her, Case scientists and engineers share a special fondness for the university president.

Snyder, who took the helm in 2007, helped mend a rift between the university and the Case Alumni Association. She welcomed the CAA and its traditions back to campus and to Tomlinson Hall in 2011, ending a five-year exile to off-campus offices.

She was a familiar face at Case

homecoming celebrations, including the Innovation ShowCASE, and braved chilly temperatures to ride in the open-top 1957 roadster of Case Engineer Larry Sears ’69 in the Homecoming Parade. In 2013, the CAA presented her with the Silver Bowl, its highest honor.

Snyder announced in February that she plans to join AAU before the fall 2020 semester and the university board of trustees began a national search for her successor.

“The opportunity to serve as Case Western Reserve’s president has been the greatest professional privilege of my life,”

Snyder said in a statement.

The AAU includes such public flagship institutions as UCLA, University of Michigan and the University of Virginia, as well as private schools like Harvard, Yale, MIT, Stanford and CWRU.

Antarctic adventure

At the end of the earth, Allen Foster enjoys a fantastic view of the heavens — and a longer shower It was summer when Allen Foster arrived at the South Pole in January on a plane that lands on skis. A graduate student in physics in the College of Arts and Sciences, he had come to operate a telescope that CWRU helped design and build at the bottom of the world.

Before he began scanning the heavens, Foster laced up his boots for the annual Half Marathon of the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. He won — besting a 20-runner field in the 13.1 mile race.

Today, that trot across a sunny glacier

must seem like years ago. In the frigid Antarctic winter, which stretches from March to October, it’s too cold and dark for scientists “wintering over” to do much outside.

Fortunately for Foster, he has work to do. He’s operating the South Pole Telescope, a collaboration between CWRU and nearly a dozen other universities and research institutions. Since 2007, the radio telescope has sought out electromagnetic radiation from the early universe, lending insight into the structure of the universe and its expansion.

Darkness, elevation and a complete lack of moisture make Antarctica an ideal lookout, said John Ruhl, PhD, a professor in the Department of Physics who helped design and install the telescope. He said

Foster and a fellow scientist face a challenging task.

“It’s being the point person continually for eight or nine months,” Ruhl said.

“They’re doing data analysis and really looking at everything as it happens. If anything goes wrong, as it often does, they’ll fix it.”

Foster does enjoy a toasty perk. As the winner of the marathon he received, in addition to a medal, 10 extra minutes in the shower.

“Down here, that’s a hot commodity,” Foster told The Plain Dealer. “People definitely try to win for the sake of that alone.”

Follow Allen Foster’s South Pole adventure on his blog https://tinyurl.com/ southpolefoster.

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ALUMNI

newsmakers

Alumni newsmakers

Moving up

As associate dean, Sunniva Collins will design career-boosting degrees Sunniva Collins, MS ’91, PhD ’94, the president of the Case Alumni Association, has been elevated to the position of Associate Dean of Professional Programs at the Case School

of Engineering.

In the newly created role, she’ll oversee the school’s professional graduate degree programs, including the Masters of Engineering and the Masters of Engineering and Management degrees. She will also

lead the development of new, accelerated master’s degree programs — with ambitious alumni in mind.

The Case School of Engineering has been launching graduate programs that can add new skills and luster to a resume relatively quickly. For example, a new master’s in chemical engineering program, spanning one year, is designed for professionals who lack a chemical engineering undergraduate degree.

“These are additive educations, on top of a bachelor’s degree, that would allow someone to pivot or advance a career,” Collins said.

She added that she plans to develop a specialty master’s program for nearly every program at CSE. “I am grateful for the leadership and expertise she brings to advancing these important initiatives,” Dean Venkataramanan “Ragu” Balakrishnan said upon announcing her appointment.

Collins, who assumed the new title Jan. 1, remains on the faculty of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, where she is an associate professor.

Learn more about the accelerated master’s degrees at engineering.case.edu

Lifting as she climbs

Alumna shares her path to early success Several dozen students and faculty — including Smith’s former advisor, CAA president Sunniva Collins, MS ’91, PhD ’95 — gathered in a lecture room in Nord Hall Feb. 21 for a buffet lunch and career guidance. Smith had plenty of advice for the aspiring scientists and engineers, both men and women, including these tips: • Approach a career with an open mind Lauren Smith ’13, MS ’15, is riding an exciting career into space engineering as an operations manager for Northrop Grumman in Denver. She returned to campus in February as the keynote speaker at the Society of Women Engineers’ Luncheon celebrating Engineers Week.

“I try to be very open to things I know nothing about. What are some new networks I can join — new skills I can learn?

I do say ‘no’ to things sometimes, but I try to lead with ‘yes.’”

• Learn how to build relationships “Case is an amazing school. The network is one of the most valuable

assets you will graduate with.”

• Ask for help “I ask for everything.”

• Take advantage of internships “You’re being judged on character.

Don’t wait for someone to give you something to do. Pitch a project. Meet people. As an intern, you can ask anyone just about anything. You really want to take advantage of that.”

• Brand yourself a pro “I don’t date at work. I will not be seen as a datable person. I’m here to work.

I dress to be strong. I don’t dress to be pretty. I dress to be confident.”

In demand

As life went remote, business surged at BoxCast When no one’s allowed to gather, everyone wants to stream. That’s kept the staff plenty busy at BoxCast, the Cleveland live streaming pioneer founded and led by Gordon Daly '00, MS ’01.

Daly’s company provides digital streaming services to customers that want to broadcast events. By late 8

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March, with people working from home and keeping their social distance, BoxCast’s viewership numbers surged about 20 times higher than usual, Daly told The Plain Dealer. What’s more, he was hiring.

“It doesn’t really feel like there are any winners right now, and it’s very

strange to be in a situation where the world feels like it’s melting around you, yet we’re very busy,” Daly told the newspaper.

“The way we view it, now is the time the world needs us, because they need to communicate and that’s what we’ve built.”

Daly, a former Rockwell engineer, launched BoxCast in 2013, after he and his early team helped a Westlake funeral

home broadcast services over the internet. By its 10th anniversary in 2019, the company employed about 40 people and its broadcasts were viewed by more than 10 million annually.

The recent surge in demand has come from faith-based organizations that are

now streaming services, municipalities broadcasting public meetings, and fitness centers providing online classes, Daly said. The staff, working remotely, has had to hustle to serve the new and existing clients.

The silver lining, he added, is that the

health crisis may prompt institutions to become more digitally adept.

“There was always a need to reach people remotely, COVID or not,” he told the newspaper. “This is just accelerating that, which I think is a healthy thing for society.”

Crowning achievement

Ethiopia honors a Case engineer and a favorite son With a pair of Case engineering degrees and a desire to serve, Aklilu Demessie ’77, MS ’81, made a splash in his profession and in his adopted hometown of Cleveland, where he became a champion of multiculturalism.

Word made it back home, to Ethiopia, which recently recognized him with one of its highest honors.

Demessie, a retired senior engineer for United Technologies Aerospace Systems, in February received the Knight Grand Cross from the Ethiopian Crown Council.

It was presented to him at the Army and Navy Club in Washington, D.C., by Prince Ermias Sahle Selassie, the grandson of Emperor Haile Selassie.

Demessie, who lives in the Cleveland suburb of Hudson with Zufan, his wife

of 42 years, came to the U.S. as an American Field Service exchange student in the early 1970s. He graduated from Oberlin High School and went on to Case Institute of Technology, where he earned degrees in civil engineering and engineering mechanics.

He worked as a senior engineer and group leader at the former Goodrich Landing Gear for more than 30 years while contributing to the region’s cultural mosaic. He helped forge a Sister Cities agreement between Cleveland and Bahir Dar, Ethiopia, and served the International Community Council of Cleveland as its vice president. He also co-founded the Society of Ethiopians Established in the Diaspora, which raises scholarships for American youth of Ethiopian heritage.

More recently, he was instrumental in the creation of the Ethiopian Cultural Garden in Rockefeller Park, not far from campus. Upon its dedication in 2019, it became the first African garden in the 103-year history of the Cleveland Cultural Gardens.

Man for all seasons

Mount Union picks a president who can engineer success A Case degree helped launch Thomas Botzman ’81, PhD, speedily into engineering — he attained a dozen patents as a young polymer engineer for Goodyear. But the Eagle Scout from Stow, Ohio, was just getting started.

Botzman became a multi-lingual professor, a Fulbright Scholar and a top college administrator. In July, he’ll become the 13th president of the University of Mount Union. The private college of 2,200 in Alliance, Ohio, announced his appointment in January.

“He brings with him an array of experience,” Matthew Darrah, chair of the

Presidential Search Committee, said in a press release.

Botzman and his wife, Venessa, will return to a campus they know well. Botzman was on the faculty and served as an administrator at Mount Union from 1989 to 2004. The couple’s daughter, Gabriela Botzman, graduated from Mount Union in 2017 with a degree in elementary education.

He’ll be leaving Misericordia University in Dallas, PA, where he has been president since 2013. The local newspaper, the Times Leader, published these insights into the Misericordia president, supplied

by Botzman:

• He’s one of 13 children. All nine brothers are Eagle Scouts, and all four sisters are Gold Award Girl Scouts.

• He lived in Luxembourg in the 1980s and taught in Mexico (four times, once as a Fulbright Scholar) and Italy in the 1990s.

• Many of his 12 patents are for rubber products and tires in extreme environments.

• He’s worked as a short-order cook and dishwasher, a disc jockey, college business and economics professor and a CFO and claims “spinning records is much more difficult than it looks.”

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Engineering better farms

Students design sustainable systems, and hone engineering skills, as they help a community greenhouse grow

By Harlan Spector

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n fall 2018, Evan Powell ’18, a mechanical engineering student at Case, set out to solve a challenge common to produce growers in northern climates: What is the most efficient way to heat a greenhouse during winter’s deep freeze?

Powell was part of engineering teams that over two semesters designed and built a heating system for Community Greenhouse Partners, a sustainable urban farm on Cleveland’s East Side. For their senior projects, the aspiring engineers needed to research, design and build a system on the cheap. They had about $200 to work with, plus whatever Community Greenhouse Partners’ executive director Timothy Smith could kick in.

Spector, a Cleveland freelance writer, was an award-winning reporter for The Plain Dealer.

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Their project was to install a “rocket stove,” a high-efficiency wood-burning mass heater for the hard-shell greenhouse. Under the guidance of Sunniva Collins, PhD, an associate professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, they studied the heat capacity of oak and other woods, average winter temperatures and days of sunshine, and figured out how much energy would be needed to keep temperatures a comfortable 50 degrees to grow lettuce on the coldest of days.

“We wanted to create a solution that would allow them to grow food year ‘round,” said Powell, who now works as an engineer for a Colorado aerospace company. “We couldn’t use any material we wanted. We had to be creative in our solutions because we needed to trade off efficiency for more readily available and

inexpensive materials.”

The rocket stove is an assemblage of horizontal and vertical tubes atop sections of old 55-gallon drums. There are two combustion chambers in the tubing.

Temperatures inside the stove reach 2,000 degrees, which heats a bed of pea gravel that acts as a radiator for the greenhouse.

“I run the stove for an hour and the gravel stays hot for three hours,” said Smith, founder of the non-profit farm on the grounds of a former Catholic church at East 65th Street and Superior Ave. “We grew lettuce all winter without using electricity.”

For the past few years, Collins, a friend of Smith’s from their Cleveland Heights High School days, has had her seniors work on sustainable systems for Community Greenhouse Partners. Besides the rocket stove, their hands-on experiences

With Tim Smith’s guidance, students Ryan Materna, left, Jiahe “Noel” Chen and Alexander Edwards are designing a geothermal heating system for a greenhouse.

“

Everything is taken in stride. The farm is a place to experiment with new ideas or recreate old ideas.

”

Tim Smith, executive director of Community Greenhouse Partners, and his former high school classmate Professor Sunniva Collins, on the farm.

have included developing a rainwater cistern design, a solar-powered irrigation system (using a car battery and solar panel), and an aquaponic system, which involves raising fish and hydroponic plants together in an integrated system (basically, converting fish waste into nutrients for plants).

During a recent tour, Smith pointed out the tanks and gravel beds that make up the aquaponic system. Trout go in one tank, and carp in another. The farm feeds compost to the carp, and feeds carp minnows to the trout.

“The only thing we need to add is water,” Smith said. “We can harvest vegetables and eat the trout. This produces a complete diet. It’s got everything you need to survive.”

Smith finds opportunities for projects that students can do for the farm.

“He came up with a list of two or three we could do every year,” said Collins, who is also president of the Case Alumni Association. “The students take what they are learning in class and apply it to real-world situations. They have to be innovative, thinking about how to do it in a way that is cost effective. I always tell students, assume your budget is zero.”

URBAN FARM, ENGINEERING CLASSROOM

Innovations like a rocket stove allow the greenhouse to grow vegetables on the coldest days.

On a sunny but cold February afternoon, mechanical engineering majors Alexander Edwards, Jiahe “Noel” Chen and Ryan Materna converged on the farm between classes. They had come to discuss with Smith their senior capstone project: A plan to heat and cool a 50-foot long greenhouse with geothermal energy.

Their plan entailed digging eight feet into the earth to bury a network of pipes, designing a means of blowing air through the pipes cheaply, and solving intricacies of heat transfer and energy balance.

The students brightened when Smith told them their system, if successful, could help greenhouses everywhere. All three expressed enthusiasm for the hands-on lessons, especially in pursuit of cleaner, more efficient systems.

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“

The students take what they are learning in class and apply it to real-world situations. They have to be innovative.

Mechanical engineering major Alexander Edwards, left, is interested in designing sustainable power systems.

“Renewable energy is something I’m interested in, so it’s great to see it applied,” Edwards said. “I’m learning a lot about heat transfer, just a lot about sustainability.”

The engineering students are among several hundred Case students who every year help out on assorted community service projects at the three-acre farm.

Students who are interested in sustainability are attracted by the farm’s mission to provide organic, locally grown produce at low cost to urban neighborhoods.

The farm surrounds the former St. George Catholic Church, two-and-a-half miles from campus. It’s a collection of hoop houses, a greenhouse, fruit trees, a chicken coop and compost piles. Coming soon will be a vermicomposting pile, where worms will turn food waste into compost to fertilize the many varieties of tomatoes, peppers, herbs, greens and microgreens grown on the farm.

Collins’ students focus on water and electricity because those are the biggest expenses at CGP. One of the recent projects was the design of a solar canopy that will allow the farm to capture and store energy. A future group of students will work on that. Through the projects, students gain experience in data science, budgeting, deadlines and deliverables.

The process often involves trial and error. On tap for a next group of students is reengineering tank beds of the aquapon-

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ic system. Smith said the initial tanks they used shifted in the freezing ground and they also leaked.

“That was an oversight we didn’t expect, so we have to rethink the materials,” Smith said.

TRY, TRY AGAIN It’s all taken in stride. The farm is a place to experiment with new ideas or recreate old ideas. Designs are sometimes iterations to be improved upon by the next group of engineering students.

“The big takeaway for me was learning to be more service-oriented as an engineer,” Powell said. “We worked to come up with a solution that was scalable, that the farm could reproduce.”

Civil engineering major Madeleine Harris ’18 first heard about Community Greenhouse Partners from Powell, her fiancée. She wanted to be involved.

“I care a lot about sustainability. I saw an opportunity working with them to make tangible differences,” said Harris, who now works as a water and wastewater engineer in Denver.

In 2018, her group of four students designed a rainwater harvesting system to capture water from the roof of the church building in a 100-gallon plastic tank. The system would reduce the farm’s demand for water and also reduce the volume of water flowing into the overburdened storm water system. During heavy rains,

”

Cleveland’s aging wastewater system often experiences combined overflow from storm and sanitary sewers that discharges into Lake Erie “Reducing the amount of water that goes into storm sewers is really important, especially in a place like Cleveland,” Harris said.

Her group’s model takes into account the farm’s water needs, the fluctuating cost of purchased water, tank volumes and daily rainfall averages. Their model estimates an annual savings of $640 for the farm using the plastic tank. It also calculated savings using a larger, more expensive and longer-lasting steel tank.

Harris said she hopes all engineering students look at designs through a sustainability lens.

“I think there is a big opportunity to implement components of sustainability on every project,” she said.

The farm’s mission, in addition to growing healthy food, is to make discoveries and share the new knowledge. Smith said the Case students help make that more possible.

“They understand the world is changing and science will show us how to live,” he said. “It’s been a joy.”

Want to shop where Case students help grow the food? Community Greenhouse Partners offers its bounty at several area farmers markets and by delivery. Learn more at communitygreenhousepartners.org.

I Am Human made its Midwest premier Jan. 30, 2020, in the Hanna Theater in downtown Cleveland.

Super humans Film makes heroes of biomedical engineers and the people whose lives they change

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ou might not expect a movie that celebrates biomedical engineering to fill a theater. But this was a special film premiering in a special place — the city pioneering “human fusion.”

Nearly 500 people filed into the Hanna Theater in Playhouse Square Jan. 30.

They came for the Midwest premiere of I Am Human, a documentary that showcases life-changing technologies being pioneered by hospital and university researchers.

Case scientists and engineers, many of them family and colleagues of cast members, filled the seats. They saw a movie that introduced experimental engineering in poignant, often dramatic fashion.

I Am Human traces the medical odyssey of three people who are helped mightily by brain implants. It also introduces Case biomedical engineering faculty who are pushing the envelope; notably alumnus Dustin Tyler, PhD ’99, Robert Kirsch, PhD, and Bolu Dustin Tyler, PhD '99

Ajiboye, PhD; as well as their research partners from University Hospitals and the Cleveland Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES) Center at the Cleveland VA Medical Center.

This depiction of “team science” in University Circle is one of the film’s vital messages, according to Kirsch, the chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering.

“It takes a village to do the kind of work that we do,” he told the audience just before the film began.

Soon into the movie we meet Anne, a Baby Boomer afflicted with Parkinson’s Disease, and Stephen, who lost his sight midlife because of a neurological condition. Both are helped by a brain implant that restores a measure of their former selves. But the star of the show is Bill Kochevar, a fiftysomething Cleveland veteran who was paralyzed in a bicycle accident.

Kochevar volunteered for BrainGate2, the human fusion trial led by the Case Bolu Ajiboye, PhD

engineers. He dreams of being able to eat a plate of food on his own.

As the film loosely details, researchers implanted a computer interface into his brain, then used mathematical algorithms to translate his thoughts into electrical impulses that they used to trigger muscles in his arms and hands. The aim: to allow Kochevar to use the power of thought to move his limbs.

The film reaches its climax when Kochevar, his face a mask of concentration, raises a forkful of potatoes to his mouth. The theater erupted in applause.

Kochever passed away in 2017, a Cleveland research hero. The scientists and engineers have since begun clinical trials on a second, more sophisticated study of the BrainGate technology. Called the Reconnecting the Hand and Arm to the Brain (ReHAB) System, it is supported by a $3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense.

I Am Human, meanwhile, continues to screen worldwide, introducing the emerging power of biomedical engineering — the kind being developed at Case.

Learn more about the film and screenings at https://www.iamhumanfilm.com/.

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Emergency mode The Case School of Engineering marshalled its resources to confront the pandemic

Alpha-Satellite takes users to an interactive map where they can point to a spot and learn the risk of going there.

By Robert L. Smith

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s they considered what information people needed to have to weather a pandemic, professors Ken Loparo, PhD '77, and Yanfang Ye, PhD, pictured normal life. Even while social distancing, they thought, people still needed to know if it was safe to go to the grocery store or the doctor's office or maybe the park.

They also thought they could help.

Loparo, a systems engineer, and Ye, a computer scientist, worked with their students to design an online tool that helps people gauge the coronavirus risk in various locations in real time. After it debuted 14

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online, reporters started calling, and a blizzard of interviews followed.

Loparo, the Arthur L. Parker Professor at the Case School of Engineering, was happy to help spread the word.

“Certainly, in these times, we can help from the engineering side, and I think it is our responsibility to do so,” he said.

His peers heartily agree. Case faculty and researchers have thrown themselves into projects that harness the power of science and engineering to confront the health crisis. The full-court press is backed by the dean, who sees a

challenge and a calling.

“When the world needs us, we have to step up,” said Venkataramanan “Ragu” Balakrishnan, the Charles H. Phipps Dean of the Case School of Engineering. “We should be able to contribute in a meaningful way locally, regionally and globally. It’s a responsibility of being an engineer.”

Case graduates know well the school’s commitment to using engineering to benefit humanity. That value may never have been more important.

“The key question now is, ‘What can we do quickly to help people on the front lines?’ the dean asked in early April.

Balkrishnan said the resources and skills of Sears think[box] could be especially useful. He pointed to new devices coming out of the campus innovation center.

• Ian Charnas ’05, the Director of Innovation & Technology at think[box], helped design a quicker way to make face shields that protect healthcare workers from the virus. Soon, area manufacturers were preparing to fill orders from hospitals.

• Jason Bradshaw ’02, think[box]’s Director of Design and Manufacturing, designed a ventilator valve that can divert airflow to allow it to be used by two patients. A prototype went to Cleveland Clinic for testing.

Meanwhile, applied science at Case is being redirected. Across the school, top researchers have pivoted to focus on the crisis.

• Computer scientist Jing Li, PhD, is working with infectious disease experts at Cleveland Clinic to analyze the genomics of the coronavirus and fathom its transmission patterns, a key step toward a vaccine.

• Biomedical engineer Anant Madabhushi, PhD, is applying his lab’s expertise in computerized medical imaging to diagnose COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the virus. The university boosted his access to high-performance computers.

MAPPING THE RISK Loparo and Ye began working together in early March. They resolved to get actionable information to people who wanted to avoid getting sick. Ye, an assistant professor in the Department of Computer and Data Sciences, mustered her graduate students.

The team designed a tool, called Alpha-Satellite, that uses artificial intelligence to collect data on where people are gathering and where the virus may be lurking. It presents a “risk assessment” relative to other

This face shield was designed at Sears think[box] to be mass produced quickly using injection molding.

“When the world needs us, we have to step up,” said Venkataramanan “Ragu” Balakrishnan, the Charles H. Phipps Dean of the Case School of Engineering. “We should be able to contribute in a meaningful way locally, regionally and globally.

It’s a responsibility of being an engineer.”

areas, a guide for decision-making as people try to go about their lives.

“Until there’s any kind of a vaccine, the only option that we have to slow this thing down is with social distancing,” said Loparo, the faculty director of the Institute for Smart, Secure and Connected Systems (ISSACS). “The question always is, how do you do that?”

On April 1, the team made AlphaSatellite available for public testing.

Anyone can access it online at https://covid-19.yes-lab.org/, enter an address, or point to a location on an

interactive map, and get a risk assessment.

Loparo said they’re hoping to enhance and update the tool based on feedback.

If media interest is any indication, people are hungry for innovations that fight the coronavirus, especially when they spring from a research university.

There’s more to come, the dean promises.

“This is emergency mode,” he said.

“There’s an urgent need and we’re responding as fast as we can.”

To support these projects and learn more, go to casealumni.org/deansfund/.

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NEW CIVIL ENGINEER As Kirsten Bowen knows, there’s a special satisfaction that comes from building things that everyone wants to see

By Robert L. Smith

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n a chilly March afternoon, Kirsten (Geraci) Bowen ’96 returned to the scene of her latest act of public engineering. She stood in Edgewater Park on Cleveland’s lakefront and looked across the Memorial Shoreway toward the new housing that had blossomed on the ridge.

Once, the Detroit-Shoreway neighborhood was walled off from the park and from Lake Erie by a speedy highway and a busy railroad. Now, that highway is a 35 mph landscaped boulevard.

Coursing beneath the railroad tracks, artfully burrowed, is a dazzling new underpass and restored pedestrian tunnels that invite walkers, runners and baby strollers to go to the beach.

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Photos by Roadell Hickman

Suddenly, the old neighborhood is waterfront property — and a lot more people want to live and play there. My what a little civil engineering can do.

“None of this was here,” Bowen said, glancing toward the tops of new condominiums. “Once we started working on the road, the developers began to break ground.”

Such ripple effects give her a good deal of satisfaction. It’s part of the quiet pride known to civil engineers, who create structures and landscapes that shape communities.

“It’s a great perk to this job, to see things built,” Bowen said. “And there’s a legacy. You can take people to see your project.”

Bowen stands at the forefront of

one of the most exciting and fast-growing disciplines in engineering. Civil engineers are in demand and should be for years to come, experts say. They are being called upon to restore and rebuild aging infrastructures and to redesign transportation systems, often with people foremost in mind. Before the coronavirus pandemic, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics forecast that employment of civil engineers would grow by about 6 percent this decade as engineering firms address the new challenges.

As a project manager at a major national civil engineering firm, Bowen is hip deep in the trend. She’s a vice president and the Great Lakes Transportation Lead at Pittsburgh-based Michael Baker International. She’s a layer of railroads and

Overview of the almost-finished Shoreway project, with condominiums rising in the lower right. Courtesy of Michael Baker International.

a builder of bridges, but also a designer of trails and greenways meant to accommodate and encourage more active lifestyles.

She’s a petite, confident, well-traveled engineer in tune with the buzzwords of the day, like multimodal and “active transportation,” projects that promote walking, running and biking.

You’ll see her handiwork all around Greater Cleveland. Bowen was on the Michael Baker team that designed two of the final links on the towpath trail, linking the lofty Tremont neighborhood to the Flats near downtown Cleveland. She helped design the Opportunity Corridor — an emerging boulevard meant to bring new jobs and energy to Cleveland’s east side — and managed the structural and track engineering at the new University Circle

Rapid Transit station, the first and last stop for many CWRU students.

Most visibly, Bowen was the project manager on the Lakefront West Project — the Ohio Department of Transportation’s $80 million effort to tame the Cleveland Memorial Shoreway and open up access to the lakefront on the city’s west side.

A balancing act As project manager, Bowen orchestrated a symphony of designers, planners and engineers. Under her ken fell planning, environmental analysis and final design. So did communication, which was critical on a project with broad stewardship. Partners included ODOT, the City of Cleveland, the Cleveland Metroparks, utility companies,

neighborhood groups and community development corporations.

Bowen described an engineering “balancing act” motivated by an uncommon goal.

“It was different,” she said of the project. “Usually, we’re adding capacity, allowing for more cars on the road.

This time we were trying to slow people down, and connect the community to the lakefront.”

Much of the results are plain to see.

Her team converted a six-lane, limited access highway to a calmer, slower, sixlane boulevard with pedestrian-friendly features. An ugly concrete median came down. New lighting and landscaping went up. A new street and an underpass connected the neighborhood more Spring 2020

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easily to the lakefront. Wide, landscaped walkways were added, lending an inviting, intermodal touch.

Such feats required some nifty engineering. To bring people and cars into Edgewater Park, West 73rd Street was extended under Norfolk Southern’s Chicago Line and under the highway to an existing park entrance. Much of the work only an engineer might notice. Along with a new bridge to carry trains and a new roadway to carry cars, the project required the relocation of an 84-inch sewer interceptor and nearly a dozen fiberoptic ducts.

Bowen and her team also faced tricky topography, including a sharp 40-foot drop from the railroad to the existing highway. They temporarily relocated the tracks, dug into the hill and constructed the bridge using top-down construction techniques.

Just up the Shoreway, a pedestrian tunnel dating to 1912 was restored and made inviting with a new, ADA-compliant walkway that switchbacks down the hillside. Landscape architects added greenery and public art, including a so-called “glacial wall” that adds a contemporary, art deco touch to the scene.

The project was completed in 2019, capping a 12-year effort from planning through construction.

Critics complained that Lakefront West did not meet its initial ambitions and that the Shoreway remains too fast and barrierlike. But some of the original ideas did not work with facts on the ground, Bowen said. Traffic studies showed that adding intersections with traffic lights, as initially planned, would have created traffic backups on the Shoreway during morning commutes. Meanwhile, the project needed to balance all forms of transportation — walkers and cyclists as well as cars and trucks — while meeting ODOT and industry design standards.

“There’s always a few thing you might have changed,” Bowen said, “but I’m really proud of our effort.”

The project won numerous design and engineering awards — including the 2019 ACEC Outstanding Achievement Award — and spurred the hoped-for ripple effects. The Detroit Shoreway neighborhood 18

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Courtesy of Michael Baker International

By Roadell Hickman

Courtesy of Cleveland Metroparks

has experienced a surge in new housing, restaurants and nightlife.

Bowen, meanwhile, is excited for the next project. She believes it’s a great time to be a civil engineer.

“There’s lot of new infrastructure needs — a lot of rehabilitation and redevelopment of old industrial areas into new, thriving locations,” she said. “There’s a lot of work that needs to be done, especially in Ohio. Many of the (engineering) companies are hiring.”

A builder she will be Her journey into engineering did not follow a straight path. Growing up outside of Pittsburgh, the former Kirsten (Nicole) Geraci excelled at science and math. A summer high school engineering program helped steer her toward the Case School of Engineering, where she initially struggled.

“I’m the first person to admit, I’m not the best student,” she said. “High school subjects were really easy for me so college was a different world.”

She majored in mechanical engineering, thinking she wanted to design cars, but switched to biochemistry, and didn't like that much, either. A summer internship with the City of Pittsburgh Department of Engineering and Construction convinced her that civil engineering was the career for her. She could use her math skills to build things.

“You don’t have to love math — you have to understand it,” she said. “You’re going to be calculating no matter what you do. Would you rather be looking at concrete and steel or a spreadsheet?”

To her bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Case she added a master’s degree in urban planning from Cleveland State University.

Michael Baker International is her third job out of college. The company employs 3,400 people nationwide, nearly 40 in its offices high above downtown Cleveland, including nearly a dozen Case graduates. She has risen steadily since joining the company in 2001, from project engineer to project manager to vice president.

Bowen’s supervisor said she possesses the skills needed of a project engineer,

including a deep well of sincerity and an eye for detail.

“She takes a lot of pride in her work, and she runs out all the loose ends,” said Kenton Zinn, the Regional Director for Michael Baker International. “There’s a lot of soft skills that are required on these projects. It’s not just math. She’s coordinating with a lot of stakeholders and interest groups.”

In addition to leading transportation projects in the Great Lakes region, Bowen is the company’s national freight lead, making her a designer of freight yards for Class I railroads and intermodal terminals across the country. She spends about 30 percent of her time travelling.

“It’s been interesting,” she said. “I like meeting new people and working on challenging projects.”

Meanwhile, she’s a busy mom in the Cleveland suburb of Sagamore Hills, where she and her husband, Chris, are raising their 12-year-old son, Charles, who has autism. But she still gives back to her profession and to her alma mater.

Bowen is the founding president of the Northeast Ohio Chapter of the Women’s Transportation Seminar (WTS International), which promotes the advancement of women in transportation fields.

She served on the board of the Case Alumni Association for eight years before moving to the Case Alumni Foundation, where she is helping to manage a more than $70 million endowment fund.

She also mentors young women at

Case who are majoring in engineering — some as excited and unsure as she was.

“She’s super fun to talk to because she’s so passionate about what she does,” said Emma Wyckoff, a third-year civil engineering major.

Wyckoff met Bowen at the Junior Senior Scholarship Reception last spring.

They later met for lunch in Tomlinson Hall, and now Bowen guides her toward potential internships and co-ops.

“She just sent me a big list of links,” Wyckoff said. “It’s cool for me as a woman in civil engineering to have another woman as a mentor, someone who has done so much in the field. That means a lot to me.”

Wyckoff said her focus is on environmental engineering, but that Bowen helps her see the wide world of civil engineering — as she does with the other Case students that she mentors.

Bowen tells students that the scope of the trade is vast, encompassing structural, environmental, transportation and construction engineering. She advises them to try and land internships and to learn on the job.

And she shares a benefit of the trade that quickly struck her fancy and still does.

“In addition to the office work, you get to go outside and see your projects built,” she said. “That’s definitely one of the perks.”

Like to comment on this story?

Email the editor of Case Alumnus at casealum@casealum.org.

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“If you make it interesting, you can actually see the joy in their eyes as they learn about engineering.”

Teaching with heart

Photo by Lillian Messner

Memorial Teaching Award winner offers sound instruction and something more

S

he teaches more than 400 students a year and expects to get to know all of them by name. For Evren Gurkan-Cavusoglu, PhD, remembering names and faces, as well as majors and research interests, is part of making the classroom a safe place of discovery and teamwork.

That makes it easier, she said, to mold technically savvy, ethically motivated engineers: The kind who build a better world.

Her goal resonates with engineering students. The associate professor of electrical engineering was honored during Engineers Week 2020 with the 2019 Srinivasa P. Gutti Memorial Teaching 20

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Award. The annual award from Tau Beta Pi, the engineering honor society, recognizes a faculty member who shows an exemplary commitment to undergraduate teaching. It was presented to GurkanCavusoglu at the Engineers Week Reception Feb. 17 by senior Adi Akalay, the recording secretary of Tau Beta Pi. Current and former students expressed delight.

“She’s the reason I decided to pursue a degree in electrical engineering,” said Jason Lou, a third-year student from New York City.

He said took her course in Logic Design and then Signal Processing and came to see himself as a problem solver.

“She tries hard to get to know you as a person,” he added. “She really cares about whether you are learning, and she’ll try different approaches to help you learn.”

Lauren Lipscomb ’18, a software engineer with Lincoln Electric, said Gurkan-Cavusoglu’s popularity was often on display on the seventh floor of Olin.

“First of all, her office is always full of students,” she recalled. “Students feel very comfortable going to her because she’s so helpful. I went out of my way to take her classes. She’s awesome. She 100 percent deserves this.”

The attention is a bit unsettling for the soft-spoken professor who asks students to call her Evren. But it also

validates a career choice and a teaching style.

“I’m really happy about this because I love my job,” she said.

A happy discovery Evren Gurkan grew up in Turkey the daughter of a doctor and a pharmacist.

Like her sister, she enjoyed math and engineering. But while her sister builds dams in Turkey as a civil engineer, Evren was drawn to research and academia.

She earned her master’s degree in systems engineering at the University of Sheffield, England, and returned to Ankara — Turkey’s capital — for her doctorate degree. As a teaching assistant, she discovered her vocation.

“I realized I really liked teaching, and I loved interacting with students,” she said. “If you make it interesting, you can actually see the joy in their eyes as they learn about engineering.”

At an academic conference in Detroit in 2000 she met fellow Turkish engineer Cenk Cavusoglu, PhD. Three years later, they were married. She moved to Cleveland in 2003 when her husband joined the faculty of the Case School of Engineering. She became a research assistant and advanced to full-time faculty in 2013. Recently, she was promoted to associate professor.

Evren and Cenk are raising their 13 year-old son, Tolga, in Beachwood.

Gurkan-Cavusoglu teaches foundational courses for students majoring in electrical and computer engineering. That introduces her to more than 400 engineering students each year, but her impact stretches beyond Case Quad. She helped launch the Women in Tech Initiative at CWRU. As the group’s faculty advisor, she gained the support of Craigslist founder Craig Newmark ’75, MS ’77, who recently made his second $100,000 donation to the initiative.

“It’s a cause that’s close to my heart,” she said.

So is teaching.

“I’m truly honored,” she said. “We do this because we love our students. But when students come and say, ‘I really love your class,’ that is so great.”

As faculty advisor to the Women in Tech Initiative, Evren Gurkan-Cavusoglu tries to draw more women into STEM fields.

Senior Adi Akalay presenting the award at the Eweek Reception.

The family. Clockwise from left: Isin Gurkan (mom), Evren, Cenk and Tolga — after Evren's MBA graduation from Weatherhead in 2016.

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NewsBytes Silent spring

By March 17, the day before the university switched to remote classes, Case Quad was uncharacteristically still. Most students had packed up and departed. Many staff and faculty were already working from home. A message pinned to a bulletin board near Tomlinson Hall captured the mood of an emptying campus: “Be Well Everybody.”

New bridge builder

A physics first Kyle Crowley’s dissertation represented his success at isolating ultra-thin layers of 2D oxides to study their electrical properties. But that’s not what enshrined him in CWRU history. On March 26, he became the first person from the Department of Physics to defend a dissertation remotely.

Classmate Jaghit Sinhu repeated the feat the next day.

In a time of social distancing and remote learning, students are Zooming into everything, including their dissertation defenses.

This May, Nsisong Udosen became the first CWRU student to graduate with a major in Human-Computer Interaction — a mix of engineering, data science and business management. She’s off to Chicago to join Google’s sales team, but the former president of the Case chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers sees wide applications for her skill set.

“I hope I can use it to help people,” she said. “The world is powered by technology now. With automation, we can forget feelings. I think I can bring both sides together.”

Hot shot from Coldwater Almost lost in spring’s grim news was the fact that the Spartan basketball team finished the season with a winning record, 13-12 — thanks to a big assist from Cole Frilling. The freshman aerospace engineering major from Coldwater, Ohio, led all CWRU scorers with a 14.9 points-per-game average.

Cole was named Rookie of the Year for the Great Lakes Region, the first player in the program’s history to earn that honor.

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Lifesaving gift MetroHealth Medical Center in Cleveland knew it would see a surge of patients as the coronavirus pandemic peaked. So did tech entrepreneur Miguel Zubizarreta ’90.

The former CTO of Hyland Software surprised the hospital system with a $1 million gift announced March 31.

Justin Gallo, MetroHealth's vice president of supply-chain management, said the money would buy respirator masks, ventilators and other lifesaving supplies. “This is an incredible windfall, at a time when we most need it.”

Pied piper Daniel Lacks, PhD, chair of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, felt a desire to get outside — and pull the Case community with him. His virtual 5K on March 22 attracted more than 50 runners from 16 states.

“I wanted to do something to bring people together and help us all feel like we are still part of a community,” he said.

Case hardened and proud of it NASA astronaut Don Thomas ’77, PhD, knew just how to connect with his audience at the Engineers Week Reception Feb. 17, where he delivered the keynote address. After four Space Shuttle missions and more than 17 million miles in space, he said, his bachelor’s degree in physics remains a crowning achievement.

“This was the hardest thing I did in life — graduate from Case,” he said. “But, boy, did it train me.”

SyFy guy Charley Knox has been a fixture at the Science Fiction Marathon of the CWRU Film Society since its founding in 1975. The associate professor of astronomy was back in the projection booth Jan. 17 for the 45th anniversary, arranging reels and musing about the endurance of a film festival that makes room for alumni with sleeping bags.

“Now it’s a shared experience. That’s part of the allure,” Knox said. “I’m not the only one who’s been to all of them.”

Maybe not. But he’s arguably the fan who would be missed the most.

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Case Memories Here is another selection of images from our archives. If you know someone in a photo, or recall a memory from the era, please let us know: Casealum@casealum.org

Pushball contest, freshman vs. sophomores, 1913

The 90th annual CAA All Classes Banquet at the Hotel Sheraton in Cleveland, May 16, 1975

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Exam in Strosacker Auditorium, date unknown

The Navy V-12 unit, a training program for engineering specialists, on campus in 1943

Credit: Photos compiled by Emma Wyckoff ’21 and Sebastian Abisleiman ’21.

Diving at the Case Club pool, a tricky art, 1915

The basement of Sears Library after 1975 flash flood. It caused more than $1 million in damages Spring 2020

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Alumni Adventures

The Entertainer

Brett DiCello honed his acting chops with CWRU's IMPROVment comedy troupe.

An engineer by day, alumnus Brett DiCello commands the spotlight at night. Thanks, Mom.

By John Canale

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rett DiCello's theater career started with a bribe when he was six years old.

“My mom said she would take me to McDonald's if I went to an afterschool theater group called Creative Experiences,” DiCello recalled. “I played Sleepy in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. I had this gag where I'd yawn and say, ‘I need a nap.’ The audience would laugh.”

He can still hear it.

“I enjoyed getting that reaction from the audience so much, and I still do!”

During the day, DiCello ’18 puts his biomedical engineering degree to use as an associate development engineer at Invacare Corp. in Elyria, Ohio. At night, he turns to his theater degree and takes to the stage as a working actor all over Greater Cleveland.

Over the years, DiCello has taken on such well-known roles as Tony in Grease and Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. While at Case, he was a mainstay on the Eldred Theatre stage and since graduation has been in a variety of productions at Cleveland Public Theatre. Last December, DiCello was part of Teatro Publico De Cleveland's production of Xmas Cuento Remix, a Latino take on Dickens' A Christmas Carol, in which he played a caroler and a police officer.

While DiCello credits his mother for the

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start in theater, she also played a role in his development as an engineer. As a senior in high school outside of Pittsburgh, PA, he won a performing arts scholarship to Case Western Reserve and his path to Cleveland was set. But his mother had one more bit of advice.

“She told me there was no way I was only going to get a degree in theater,” he said.

“I had to add another major.”

Growing up, DiCello, who currently lives in Cleveland's Tremont neighborhood, had always had a love for science. In high school, he discovered biology and became more interested in the medical side of engineering, which led him to study biomedical engineering at the Case School of Engineering.

“I was always drawn to physics and sports science,” DiCello said. “Biomedical engineering includes a lot of biomechanics, so it was a great fit for me.”

On Case Quad, he learned to blend both of his passions. While pursuing his engineering degree, DiCello performed sketch comedy with IMPROVment, the campus improvisational theater troupe. He also performed in a half dozen stage productions in the Eldred Theater, still managing to squeeze in a co-op at Philips.

DiCello has appeared in a number of musicals in his career, but it's the roles he takes in

non-musical plays that mean the most to him.

“In musicals, you can always have your character develop with the additional help of the songs and music,” DiCello said. “When you're in a play, the only tools at hand you have for character development are language and acting.”

DiCello's favorite role (so far) was that of famed American painter Mark Rothko in the play Red. The role was so near and dear to him that he also took on the role of director just to play the part.

“It was my fifth year at Case and we put it on in the Black Box Theater,” DiCello recalled.

“Rothko was interested in the psyche of an artist, why they do what they do. I am also drawn to these elements of art.”

The intersection of art and engineering will continue to be a driving force, DiCello said, as he sees the contrasting fields complementing each other.

“With engineering, there are tangible outcomes,” he said. “You can help save a life, help someone breathe better. But I also want to continue to find the purpose of art.”

And to think it all started with a Happy Meal.

To give your regards to Brett DiCello, email him at brettdicello@gmail.com.

John Canale is a freelance writer in Greater Cleveland.

Class Notes 1950s Sesto J. Voce ’56 Rancho Palos Verdes, California Sesto is enjoying traveling and spending time with his family in the Los Angeles area. He retired from TRW Systems after 31 years with the company.

“In life, when everything is said and done, what remains is your family and the relationship you established with it,” he writes.

“I do go to the gym to stay in shape. My wife and I enjoy our travels to Europe.

We also enjoy our travels with my four children and my eight grandchildren. I don't do much technical work anymore.

I'm enjoying my family and God's creation.”

1960s Thomas E. Sampson ’63 Carefree, Arizona Tom has been awarded the Vincent J. DeVito Distinguished Service Award by The Institute of Nuclear Materials Management. The award recognizes his many technical contributions and achievements in the development of gamma spectrometry systems for nuclear safeguards.

1970s Kenneth First ’71 Midland, Michigan Ken recently retired from the Dow Chemical Company and is a parttime staff consultant with the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Center for Chemical Process Safety and a part-time lecturer at the University of Michigan. In February, he addressed the Mid-Michigan Section of the AIChE and talked about process safety. Ken earned his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Case Institute of Technology.

Stephen Mraz ’79 Cleveland, Ohio Steve was named senior editor of Hydraulics & Pneumatics, a trade publication of Endeavor Business Media. For more than 30 years Steve has been writing on engineering management, fastening and joining, tribology, motion control, materials and mechanical engineering. He earned his biomedical engineering degree from Case Institute of Technology, then entered the Navy, where he flew as a Naval flight officer in an airborne early warning squadron.

Susan Bagen ’86 Plano, Texas Susan is an Application Development Manager at Micro Systems Technologies, in Plano, TX, and has extensive experience as a process and product engineering consultant focused on electronic applications. She holds five U.S. patents. Susan earned her bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Case.

John Wiencek,

James Zizelman ’82, MS ’84 Rochester Hills, Michigan Jim has been named president of the Control Devices Division of Stoneridge, Inc., a maker of electrical and electronic components for the automotive industry headquartered in Novi, Michigan. He’s responsible for driving product development, innovation strategy and technical vision.

Previously, Jim supported Stoneridge as a consultant, was vice president of engineering at Aptiv, and worked for more than 20 years at Delphi. He earned bachelor’s and master's degrees in mechanical engineering from Case.

MS ’86, PhD ’89 Moscow, Idaho John, an accomplished chemical and biochemical engineer, has been named provost and executive vice president at the University of Akron and is coming home. The Portage Lakes native, provost at the University of Idaho for the past six years, starts his new job May 29. John will serve as second-in-command at the university, reporting directly to the president and overseeing academics and the faculty.

A professor of chemical education, he earned master’s and doctorate degrees in chemical engineering from Case Institute of Technology.

Gregory F. Shay ’83, MS ’91 Mentor, Ohio Greg won a technical Emmy in the 71st Annual Technology and Engineering Emmy Awards by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. His Emmy was to be presented in Las Vegas in April, but the awards ceremony has been postponed because of the pandemic. Greg is the CTO at the Telos Alliance in downtown Cleveland. The award recognizes broadcast technology that he helped develop and that has become an industry standard.

Samir Jadallah ’87 Burlingame, California Sam, a former Microsoft corporate vice president, recently joined Apple as its new leader of smart home technology. He talked about his journey from Case Institute of Technology to becoming the Head of Home at Apple April 8 as part of the online CWRU Alumni Entrepreneurship Speaker Series. A Palestinian-American from New Jersey, Sam is the co-founder and chairman of the Institute for Middle East Understanding.

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Class Notes Aarti Chandna MS ’88 Atherton, California Aarti is an executive board member and partner in the Silicon Valley Social Venture Fund, which strives to make investments that have meaningful social impact. She was an online presenter in the CWRU Entrepreneurship Alumni Speaker Series April 9. Aarti, a member of the CWRU Board of Trustees, earned her master’s degree in computer science from the Case School of Engineering.

1990s Vicente Nazario ’90 Aguadilla, Puerto Rico Vicente leads engineering operations as the Director and Site Leader for Honeywell Aerospace Puerto Rico. He earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and applied physics from Case Institute of Technology and joined Honeywell in 2007 as one of its first 12 employees on the island. Today, Honeywell’s workforce in the U.S. commonwealth nears 1,000.

Gabe Nelson ’92, MS ’95, PhD ’02 Wilmington, Massachusetts Gabe has joined Massachusetts-based Berkshire Grey as a Senior Principal Roboticist. Previously, he was the Senior Robot Scientist at Boston Dynamics, where he worked for 16 years. Gabe earned three mechanical engineering degrees at Case, including his doctorate.

Naci Ishakbeyoglu PhD ’94 Sunnyvale, California Naci has accepted a position as Director, Engineerings at eHealth, Inc., an online marketplace for private health insurance. Previously, has was Engineering Manager and a staff software engineer at Vida Health, Inc. Naci earned 28

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his doctorate in computer engineering from the Case School of Engineering.

Elliot Bendoly ’96 Worthington, Ohio Elliot finished a threeyear term as Associate Dean for Undergraduate Students and Programs at Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business and returned to the faculty ranks as a Professor of Management Sciences.

He earned bachelors’ degrees in materials engineering and economics at Case.

Jessica A. Gaskin, MS ’98, PhD Huntsville, Alabama Jessica is the NASAappointed study scientist for the Lynx X-ray Observatory mission concept. She’s leading a team focused on the next X-ray space telescope mission. Jessica is an astrophysicist in the Science Research Office of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL. She earned her master’s degree in astronomy from Case.

2000s Paul Adams, PhD ’00 Fayetteville, Arkansas Paul, an associate professor in the department of chemistry and biochemistry in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Arkansas, was named a Minority Access National Role Model by Minority Access, Inc. The group recognizes students and educators who inspire others to find cures or solve technological problems or address social disparities. Paul earned his doctorate in chemistry at Case.

Carmen Fontana ’00, MSE ’05 Chagrin Falls, Ohio Carmen leads the Modern Software Delivery Practice at Centric Consulting, where she focuses on

the Cloud and artificial intelligence offerings. She’s also a busy writer, speaker and an advisor to the Women in Tech Initiative at CWRU. Carmen earned her bachelor’s degree in systems and control and her master’s in computer engineering at the Case School of Engineering.

Eric Perreault, PhD ’00 Evanston, Illinois Eric was a featured speaker at the BME Distinguished Lecture Series at the University of California, Irvine, in February. He talked about neural and musculoskeletal systems and how they are linked in the control of movement and posture. Eric, who earned his doctorate in biomedical engineering from the Case School of Engineering, is a professor and chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Northwestern University.

Carl Tashian ’00 San Francisco, California Carl, a software engineer, writer and entrepreneur, is offering his services as an executive coach in the San Francisco Bay area via nerdcoach.io. He earned his bachelor’s degree in computer engineering from Case and has worked in the startup world for more than 20 years.

Carl was the Head of Engineering and Co-founder at Yerdle.

Bill Rabbit ’03, MS ’06 Chesterland, Ohio Bill is Engineering Project Manager at Nottingham Spirk Design Associates in Cleveland. Recently, he worked with staff at Sears think[box], the campus innovation center, to help design personal protective equipment for hospital workers caring for pandemic patients. Bill teamed up with a former classmate on the project, Ian Charnis ’05, the innovation lead at think[box]. Bill earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering.

Elizabeth Altenau ’09 Medina, Ohio Liz recently became Global Director of Marketing-Lower Extremity, for Integra LifeSciences, a global medical technology firm headquartered in New Jersey. She earned her bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering from the Case School of Engineering. Liz, who played soccer for the Lady Spartans, shares her love for the game as a youth coach.

2010s Katelyn Ballard ’10 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Katelyn is a Senior Engineer for Bechtel Plant Machinery. For nearly a decade, she has served as a presentation judge for the Pittsburgh Regional Future City Competition, which seeks to increase public awareness and appreciation of the engineering profession during national Engineers Week. Katelyn earned her bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Case and her master’s at the University of Pittsburgh.

Colleen Konsavage ’12 New Albany, Ohio Colleen has joined Zane State College in Zanesville, Ohio, as an assistant professor of electrical engineering technology. Previously, she was an engineer for American Electric Power, where she supported power generation at transmission stations in its Indiana-Michigan region. Colleen earned her bachelor’s degree in Systems & Control at Case, where she was a member of Engineers Without Borders.

Send your updates, including photos, about job promotions, professional development and personal milestones to casealum@casealum.org.

Maryam Hashemian, MS ’13 Shaker Heights, Ohio Maryam has moved into the position of Senior Systems Security Engineer at Rockwell Automation, which she joined in 2013. She earned her master’s degree in computer engineering from Case and is working toward her doctorate degree.

Stephanie Hippo ’15 Seattle, Washington Steph was named a Women of Wisdom by the Women in Tech Initiative at CWRU for helping young women follow her path to success as a mentor and role model. She joined Google four years ago through its engineering residency program and today is a Site Reliability Engineer managing her own team. Steph earned her bachelor’s degree in computer science from Case, where she was a member of the Hacker Society and the Fencing Club. In 2016, she received the Young Alumni Leadership Award from the Case Alumni Association.

Abigail Sevier '15, MS '17 St. Louis, Missouri Abby was the featured speaker at the Soar into STEM program of the St. Louis Science Center in April 2019. An aerospace engineer for Boeing Research and Technology, she talked about her experience with Boeing and the NASA Glenn Research Center to illustrate the teambased process of developing aerospace vehicles. She also staged a live demonstration of vertical lift aerodynamics using a small UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle), or drone.

Abby earned her bachelor’s degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering and her master’s in aerospace engineering at Case.

Austin Engelbrecht ’16 Crown Point, Indiana Austin recently became engaged to Caelainn Crnjak and

the couple plans a June wedding. He’s a software developer for Applied Systems, where he is a member of the “tiger team” formed to expedite work on a feature in jeopardy of missing its target date. Austin earned his bachelor’s degree in computer science from Case, where he was a member of Phi Kappa Theta and sang with the a cappella choir Case in Point.

Bingying "Judy" Feng '16 San Francisco, California Judy is the co-founder of AntX Technologies, which she and a friend launched in 2019.

The company has developed a “smart scale” that not only weighs food but provides calorie counts and nutritional information.

She exhibited the technology at CES 2020 as part of the CWRU presentation team.

An international student from China, Judy earned her bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Case and her master’s in systems engineering at Penn.

Daoning Zhou ’16, MEM ’17 Cleveland, Ohio Daoning is a business analyst at Cohen & Company in Cleveland. He’s also an organizer of Cleveland’s popular annual GiveBackHack, where cash prizes are awarded for the best ideas for improving the community. He earned his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering and his master’s in engineering management from Case.

Nicholas Vitale ’17, MS ‘20 San Francisco, California Nick is pursuing his doctorate at Stanford University, where he is working towards developing wearable integrated neural microsystems for applications in nonhuman primates. He earned two degrees in electrical engineering at Case.

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Class Notes Janet L. Gbur, PhD ’18 Canfield, Ohio Janet, a research associate in materials science and engineering at the Case School of Engineering, was elected to the Leadership Council of the Microscopy Society of America. The society champions all forms of microscopy and the development of new imaging technologies. Janet will serve as its treasurer.

Turner Montgomery ’18 Boston, Massachusetts Turner is now a Field Clinical Engineer for Neocis Inc., a Boston company that develops assistive surgical robots. During the

coronavirus pandemic, he volunteered for the Ventilator Project, an effort of engineers to develop and rapidly produce ventilators that could help patients stricken with COVID-19. He earned his bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering from the Case School of Engineering.

Jessica Powell ’18 Providence, Rhode Island Jessica is an Associate Product Development Engineer at BD, formerly Becton Dickinson & Company, a medical technology firm in Warwick, RI. She earned her bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering at Case and is working toward her master’s in biomedical engineering at Brown University.

Jeffery Sagerer ’18 Columbus, Ohio Jeffery is an Engineer Associate with Worthington Industries in the WIRED Rotational Program. He’s also a volunteer with the Ventilator Project, an effort of engineers to develop and rapidly produce ventilators that can help people stricken with COVID-19. Jeffery earned his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering at Case.

Send your updates, including photos, about job promotions, professional development and personal milestones to casealum@casealum.org.

In Memoriam Robert E. Willison ’42; Nashville, TN; 9-16-15

Roger N. Hasselbach ’57; Brecksville, OH; 8-13-19

William C. Reinberger ’43; Hudson, OH; 12-24-19

David R. McRitchie ’57, MS ’60; Boulder, CO; 7-21-19

Milton R. Spielman ’44; Claremont, CA: date unknown

Richard K. Wilmer ’57; San Jose, CA; 7-2-19

Erwin B. Wittus ’45; Port Charlotte, FL; 2-26-18

William L. Marn ’58; Hilliard, OH; 4-30-19 (listed in error as William C. Mann’58)

Bruce J. Ferencz ’48; Strongsville, OH; 2-23-20 Louis A. Levar ’49; Lyndhurst, OH; 2-26-20 Theodore Ake, Jr. ’50: Blacksburg, VA; 12-4-19 Raymond M. Warner, Jr. MS ’50, PhD ’52; Edina, MN; 4-23-10 John M. Flynn ’51, MS ’53, PhD ’56; Parkville, MD; 1-22-20 David H. Rush ’51; Dallas, TX; 2-17-20 Robert J. Unger ’51; Cleveland, OH; 9-29-19 George A. Fisher ’52; Cleveland, OH; 3-28-20 John W. Kloss ’52; Wadena, MN; 12-3-19 H. James Theiling ’52; Willoughby, OH; 1-5-20 Dale A. Johnson ’54; Columbus, OH; 1-2-20 John C. Martin ’54; Wickliffe, OH; 2-10-20 Charles E. Sax ’54; Sarasota, FL; 3-6-20 John D. Venables, PhD ’54; Towson, MD; 3-15-19 Frank W. Hesford ’55; Montgomery, OH; 8-16-18 David D. Doss ’56; Columbus, OH; 4-26-18 Fred W. Stang, Jr. ’56; Sunnyvale, CA; 12-2017

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Nobuyuki Nakajima PhD ’58; Amherst, MA; 9-19-19 Mei Mei Tang MS ’58, PhD ’60; Shaker Hts., OH; 12-3-19 Thomas D. Nielsen ’61; Lorain, OH; 12-11-19 Richard E. Dimery, Jr. ’62; Austin, TX; 8-3-18 George C. Thatcher ’62; Mount Liberty, OH; 10-1-19 John D. Sinsley ’63; Pinehurst, NC; 12-18-19 James L. Chevalier ’64, MS ’66, PhD ’70; Central Valley, NY; 10-20-19 James E. Warner MS ’65, PhD ’69; Canton, OH; 3-16-13 Christopher G. Pinkney ’68, MS ’71; Bartlett, TN; 1-25-20 John A. Shields, Jr. ’68, MS ’71, PhD ’75; Cleveland, OH; 12-14-19 Thomas J. Wdowiak PhD ’71; Birmingham, AL; 4-27-13 Walter O. Augenstein ’73, MS ’81; Pleasantville, OH; 3-5-20 Thoams E. Rittinger ’75; Chillicothe, OH; 9-22-19 George M. West ’80, MS ’83; Franklin, TN; 2-4-20 Jeff S. Hudren ’88; Overton, NV; 3-19 Eric A. Zahn ’93, MS ’94; Cincinnati, OH; 2-1-20

TRIBUTE Jack Flynn December 9, 1929 to January 22, 2019 John “Jack” Flynn ’51, MS ’53, PhD ’56, went from Case Institute of Technology to the Dow Chemical Co. and soared like a meteor.

At a company that crowned few vice presidents, he attained the VP level at a relatively young age and became one of Dow’s top executives, working closely with CEO Ted Doan, grandson of company founder and Case alumnus Herbert Dow. Flynn credited Case for his career success. He showed his thanks as one of the most enthusiastic and effective fundraisers in the school’s history. Upon his death in January at age 90, Flynn left a legacy that helps thousands to receive a Case education.

Roger Cerne, executive director emeritus of the Case Alumni Association, believes Flynn had a hand in the creation of 70 to 80 percent of the CAA endowed scholarships awarded to Case students today.

Tom Kicher ’59, MS ’62, PhD ’65, the first dean of the modern Case School of Engineering, said Flynn was also a key catalyst behind the launch of the school in 1992.

“Jack was very bright,” said Kicher. “He was a mover and shaker, and if you didn’t believe it — just ask him.”

John Matthew Flynn was born in Cleveland in 1929 and graduated valedictorian from North Olmsted High School. He was 17 when he stepped onto a Case Quad teeming with World War II veterans. He stayed to earn three chemical engineering degrees, including a doctorate.

In 1953, he married Barbara Ann Good, with whom he raised seven children. The couple moved to Midland, MI, where Flynn reported to work at Dow as a chemical engineer and stayed for 36 years. He rose to become Vice President of Dow USA and General Manager of North American Agricultural Products.

Flynn had long supported Case as a donor, fundraiser, class agent and a member of the Visiting Committee and Case Advisory Board. Upon retiring in 1990, he volunteered to lead the landmark Case Promise fundraising campaign, working closely with Cerne, who recalls long drives visiting alumni at Case Clubs and in their homes.

“I called him a Type Triple A personality,” said Cerne, today an executive advisor to the Case School of Engineering.

“He was unbelievable. Not just because of his communication skills. He had a powerful voice and he would get emotional.

He would talk about how he got to Case and how he needed help in graduate school.”

A precious scholarship arrived from the Case Club of Roger Cerne, Jack Flynn and Tom Kicher 1995 Midland, MI, and Flynn never forgot, Cerne said.

The 1990-94 campaign raised $33 million, exceeding its $30 million goal, a record for the CAA. Flynn, along with Phil Gutmann ’54, was instrumental in bringing faculty and alumni together to create the Case School of Engineering and selling the idea to the university’s board of trustees, Kicher said. In 2014, he received the school’s Lifetime Service Award.

Anne Cunningham, the Associate Dean for External Relations in the Case School of Engineering, recalls a passionate alumni leader who wanted the best for Case. “He was a supporter, a leader and a mentor to many.

He was one of a kind and he is missed.”

In 2006, Flynn was awarded the Gold Medal, the highest honor bestowed annually by the Case Alumni Association. At the awards ceremony, he shared a message with his fellow alumni: “You can see by now how much an independent CAA means to me and where my loyalty lies.”

That they surely could.

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“LONG WE’LL REMEMBER…”

HOW DOES THE MERCEDES-BENZ? Alumnus recalls plenty to smile about from his days at Case

By James Peckol ’66, PhD

T

hank you for letting me share a small bit of memory and humor.

The first event occurred in mid spring, as I recall, in the parking lot in front of Old Main. A member of the faculty had parked his car, a Mercedes-Benz. Unfortunately, there was a heavy wind that day and it was enough to topple the flagpole out there.

Where did it go? It landed smack through the length of his car — bumper to hood.

When the prof came out, the first thing he noticed was that someone had taken his parking pass. Thereafter, looking at his car, his only comment was, in very good humor, “Well, I guess, that's the way the Mercedes-Benz.”

Telling an engineer ‘It can’t be done’ Here’s a pair of stories from the tech side of Case. Prior to the 1108, the available computers were the Burroughs's 220 and the Univac 1107. Starting with the 32

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Burroughs machine, the head of the computing labs had worked quite hard to try to increase the speed of the machine. He resorted to asking Burroughs how to speed up their computer and their response was: It can't be done. If you increase the speed, they said, it drops bits.

Undeterred, he continued working and managed to speed up the machine.

Ultimately, he informed Burroughs. Their response was “How did you do it?” To which he replied: “I installed a random bit generator.”

Good sister, bad habit With the Univac, when the department bought the machine, they were selling time on the computer. Some of that time went to the folks at John Carroll University. There was a nun (in full habit then) who took advantage of the opportunity and started working on the machine.

The problem arose that every time she ran her program, the machine would crash. At the same time, if someone else

ran the Univac, it worked fine. People struggled for quite a while trying to figure out what was going on. Eventually, someone watched every single thing that the good sister did.

What they discovered was that she would load her card deck into the input and then go to the front of the machine to wait for her output. So far, so good.

When standing waiting for her output, her habit blocked the air intake on the machine, causing it to overheat. When they moved her away, all was cool.

Thereafter, that problem became known as the “Nun effect.”

Jim enlivens the electrical engineering faculty at the University of Washington in Seattle. Reach him at jkp@uw.edu If you would like to share your own Case memory, write us at casealum@casealum.org

DEAN’S DISCRETIONARY FUND

“

“There’s an urgent need, and we’re responding as fast as we can. Any donation to the Dean’s Discretionary Fund is not only helping our response to this crisis, it’s helping the Case School of Engineering help our community, our region and our world.”

— DEAN VENKATARAMANAN “RAGU” BALAKRISHNAN The Case School of Engineering has partnered with the Case Alumni Association to support the Dean’s Fund at this unprecedented time. This fund lends the dean flexibility to support research and projects that address the pandemic and that could help provide solutions and even breakthroughs.

SUPPORT THE DEAN’S FUND AT CASEALUMNI.ORG/DEANSFUND

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