Engineering At Nebraska: Summer/Fall 2022

The Power of Connections

CONTENT

04 ALUMNI SNAPSHOTS

We asked, you answered! See what alumni are up to and where they’re at

12 SOLVING PROBLEMS OF GLOBAL IMPORTANCE

Read about innovative research such as an “electronic nose” to identify diseases

19 WRITE STUFF

Alum Danielle Passaglia takes readers on ‘Lucy’s Engineering Adventure’

20 CONNECTING WITH INDUSTRY

Olsson’s unique history includes proud partnership with UNL

Lucy

Written by Danielle Passaglia Illustrated by Gabriella Vagnoli

ENGINEERING AT NEBRASKA Summer 2022

FUTURE

On the cover and inside the magazine (page 8), we highlight engineering military students who shared the annual Ruck March experience

ENGINEERING AT NEBRASKA is published by the University of Nebraska–Lincoln College of Engineering; the known office of publication is 114 Othmer Hall, 820 N. 16th Street, Lincoln, NE 68588-0642. Requests for permission to reprint materials and reader comments are welcome.

Editors/Contributors: Phillip Carter, B.A. 1993, M.A. 2019 JS Engebretson, M.A. 2005 Karl Vogel, B.A. 1987

Send mail to: ENGINEERING AT NEBRASKA College of Engineering P.O. Box 880642 | 114 Othmer Hall Lincoln, NE 68588-0642

(402) 472-3181 engineering.unl.edu engcomm@unl.edu

Editorial Queries: Phillip Carter pcarter2@unl.edu

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of Nebraska–Lincoln College of Engineering

go.unl.edu/ nondiscrimination. ©2022, The Board of Regents of the University of Nebraska. All

ENGINEERING CONNECTIONS

ABHI SHRIVASTAVA, M.S. 2000, Aurora, CO

I am a 2000 M.S. Manufacturing Systems Engineering graduate. For me, Mother Nature is the greatest artist. She is the sculptor, the artist, the environmentalist; nurturing, caring and everything else that we could ever think of. For these reasons we need to take care of her by putting all our efforts so that she continues to provide the same love, support, nurturing and gifts of incredible arts to this planet and living beings on it.

MATT ROKUSEK, B.S. 1997, Gilbert, AZ

UNL helped me get my first job in Arizona at Motorola. I worked 17.5 years at General Dynamics (previously Motorola) and then the last 6 years as a senior engineer at Amazon.com helping Artisans sell their handmade products. I grew up in Clarkson, Nebraska, where I received my high school degree. I got the Nebraska Engineering shirt I’m wearing sometime around 1999-2001 when an engineering head at UNL visited Nebraska Engineering Alumni in Arizona. I got the Nebraska coffee mug from my best friend Todd Cerny, who also graduated from UNL (BS Mechanical Engineering).

VERN KEMP, B.S. 1957, Santa Barbara, CA

1957 alum Vern Kemp graduated with a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and retired in 1994 from The Aerospace Corporation in El Segundo, California. He and his wife, Judy ChotinerKemp, currently reside in Santa Barbara, California. They have two children (James Martin of Santa Barbara and Roy Edward of Santa Clarita, California), five grandchildren and a 2-year-old great granddaughter.

JOHN (BOB) KELTY, B.S. 1979, M.S. 1983, PH.D. 2005, Lincoln, NE

I just began reading the inaugural issue of ENGINEERING AT NEBRASKA magazine and I thought I’d send a picture. I am retired from the UNL Physics and Astronomy department but have degrees from UNL in Electrical Engineering (B.S. 1979, M.S. 1983, Ph.D. 2005). My electronics expertise is now mostly spent with gadgets on my toy trains: pictured is a flashing billboard for the UNL Dairy Store.

DAVE FUHRMAN (and Chloe), B.S. 1990, Grapevine, TX

GO BIG RED from North Texas!! I received my copy of the ENGINEERING AT NEBRASKA magazine and saw the request for pics. I graduated from UNL in 1990 with a B.S. Computer Science in Engineering.

DEAN’S MESSAGE

LANCE C. PÉREZ

Dean, College of Engineering

Omar H. Heins Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Welcome to the latest issue of the ENGINEERING AT NEBRASKA alumni magazine. With the Fall 2022 semester now underway in a truly post-pandemic mode, the college is full of energy and there is a great deal of good news to report.

To begin, total undergraduate enrollment in the college is up 7 percent compared to last year with the freshman class 8.5 percent larger than last year. This is a result of the hard work of our recruitment team and a testament to the incredible value and opportunity that a Big Ten engineering, computing or construction degree from Nebraska provides. Maintaining a robust student population also includes celebrating when they graduate. In the 2021-22 academic year, degrees were awarded to 653 undergraduate students and 233 graduate students.

This year’s freshman class includes the second cohort of 10 Kiewit Scholars and our first cohort of 40 students in the Peter Kiewit Foundation Engineering Academy. With the generous philanthropic support of our partners, Peter Kiewit and Sons and the Peter Kiewit Foundation, these two signature scholar program provide students with very generous financial support as well as unparalleled experiences and support services. You may read more about these programs and the students in them at: engineering.unl.edu/kiewit-scholars/engineering.unl.edu/pkf-engineering-academy

We are also pleased to announce the addition of a new Data Science major that was officially approved in August 2022 and will have its first enrollees in the Fall 2022 semester. This is a unique interdisciplinary major with degrees offered from the College of Engineering (B.S.), College of Arts and Sciences (B.A., B.S.), and College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources (B.S.). The degree in the College of Engineering is housed in the recently formed School of Computing and will provide students with a rich education in computational data science and prepare them for an increasingly diverse set of careers.

Finally, we continue progress on our $190 million investment in our City Campus facilities. In August, we held a topping off ceremony and beam signing for Kiewit Hall. This privately funded $115 million building, the largest academic facilities project in the history of UNL, will be completed in January 2024 and will be the new academic heart of the college. We have also completed the new Engineering Research Center, an 87,000 square foot building that houses faculty research labs, and are currently renovating Scott Engineering Center. When all of these projects are completed in spring of 2024, the College of Engineering will have been physically transformed and our faculty, staff and students will have truly world-class facilities in which to learn and work.

I hope you enjoy the stories in this issue and, as always, please reach out to us to share your good news and if you have any questions.

Sincerely, Lance

STUDENT INVOLVEMENT

E-Week

Engineers Week (E-Week) has been a University of Nebraska tradition since 1913. In conjunction with National Engineers Week, engineering students in Lincoln and Omaha celebrate their collegiate accomplishments as they work toward graduation and future careers. College of Engineering students plan and coordinate all events for E-Week.

While events change on an annual basis based on the theme, these student-centered events generally include competitions, student banquets, and lighthearted social events that bring the collegiate engineering community together.

Senior Design Showcase

The College of Engineering’s Senior Design Showcase—Nebraska’s premier undergraduate engineering student design event—highlights our seniors and their capstone projects.

ENGINEERING A MARCH TO RAISE VETERAN SUICIDE AWARENESS

The Things They Carry Ruck March

It’s not just about raising awareness but building comradery so that the military community knows they have help. It’s important we create a support system so, if a veteran is struggling, we can help them as best and as fast as we can.

TREVOR STEPHENS, U.S. MARINE CORPS VETERAN

— Tyler Kluthe, treasurer for the Student Veterans of America

For nearly a decade, student veterans from UNL and the University of Iowa have partnered in raising awareness for military veteran suicide with the annual The Things They Carry Ruck March. The event takes place at the end of November and involves dozens of active duty and military veteran students rucking 10 hours a day for more than a week as they carry with them the game ball for the Nebraska vs. Iowa regular season finale. It’s a meaningful journey for everyone involved as bringing awareness to veterans struggling with mental health issues looms larger than carrying a football across state lines.

“It’s bigger than football,” said Tyler Kluthe, treasurer for the Student Veterans of America – UNL Chapter and organizer of the event on behalf of the UNL Student Veterans organization. “The ruck march means more than just a football game.”

The annual march, which will be in its seventh year this fall, begins at the visiting team’s home stadium and covers 325 miles in eight days. For Kluthe, a construction management major, and Cory Grieb, a mechanical and materials major from Omaha, Nebraska, veterans suicide hits close to home as both have known fellow soldiers who took their own lives.

“It struck close to home, when someone in my company had taken his own life,” said Grieb, who served three years in the U.S. Army as a Heavy Track Mechanic before enrolling at the UNL College of Engineering. “It’s definitely a serious issue throughout the military community. People are struggling.”

Kluthe, too, had a friend who died by suicide and says there are more people than he’d like to admit who are impacted from veteran suicide. It’s why he’s been involved in UNL’s rucking group for four years.

“I’m just trying to do something,” said Kluthe, a senior-to-be from Lincoln. “It’s not just about raising awareness but building comradery so that the military community knows they have help. It’s important we create a support system so, if a veteran is struggling, we can help them as best and as fast as we can.”

While the ruck march happens in late fall and temperatures can vary from extreme cold to beautiful fall conditions, preparation for it begins in the heat of the summer, nearly five months before the game ball will be exchanged.

“We’re fortunate to have a lot of support, whether it’s food that’s donated or monetary donations covering other expenses,” added Kluthe, a U.S. Marine Corps reservist. “A lot of alumni come out and we always have students from ROTC and the National Guard reserves who find time to march. A wide range of people, even civilians, are welcome.”

A typical day in the march can be atypical depending on the weather. The day begins at 6:30 a.m. with roll call followed by the morning shift of five hours and 20 miles of marching, including 20 pounds of personal belongings for those rucking. There’s also an afternoon shift of 20 miles of rucking before the group turns in for the night. The number 20 is significant because it’s estimated that 20 veterans die by suicide daily.

Grieb, who marched as a freshman Army ROTC student last fall, described the final rucking day to Lincoln as a memorable one as the game ball made its way to Memorial Stadium through Eagle, Nebraska.

“It was a special day. Multiple fire departments from the area were there to greet us, talked and walked with us as we made our way through town,” he explained.

When the Husker ruck marchers reached east Lincoln, they were welcomed by police and fire department officials who provided an escort down Vine Street and all the way to City Campus.

“It was great to have that type of support as we made our way into Lincoln,” added Grieb, who hopes to continue his military service as an engineer following graduation from UNL. “There were banners on the RV following us along the route so when people heard the sirens and saw the police escort, they came out of their homes to wave and encourage us. It was pretty awesome going down Vine Street.”

Being part of the ruck march, from start to finish, is something Kluthe doesn’t take for granted whether it’s seeing the many faces supporting the veterans as they make their way from town to town or seeing members of the University of Iowa Veterans Association at Freedom Rock near Menlo, Iowa—where the game ball exchange is made.

“It’s always fun seeing them come up the hill, running and trucking the game ball,” he said. “It’s an exciting environment to be in.”

TALLEY MASTERS GRAD PROGRAM WHILE THROWING FOR HUSKER MEN’S TRACK TEAM

Both academically and athletically, Alex Talley has built a stellar resume.

He graduated in May 2021 with a bachelor’s degree in engineering and was a track and field All-American in the shot put and the weight throw. He even placed seventh in the hammer throw at the U.S. Olympic Trials, ranking as the top collegiate thrower in that event and was the only athlete in the top 10 of both the U.S. hammer and shot put rankings.

But Talley had another year of athletic eligibility remaining after graduation and began looking for a school that would fit his desire to pursue both throwing and engineering careers.

While Talley was considering schools and track offers from across the country, he was being recruited by the Nebraska track team and assistant coach Justin St. Clair, who was one of Talley’s former coaches at NDSU. St. Clair suggested Talley investigate Nebraska Engineering’s Master of Engineering Management program, one of the nation’s highestranked fully online MEM programs.

Both programs, Talley said, were a natural fit.

ALEX TALLEY

Photo Credit: Husker Athletics

“I told him (St. Clair) what I was looking for academically, and he suggested to take a look at the engineering management program here at Nebraska,” Talley said in a Huskers.com article. “Everything else just fell into place perfectly, and in many ways, my collegiate journey came full circle.”

Since coming to Nebraska, Talley has not only excelled in the throws –including earning All-America honors in two events, seventh indoors in the weight throw (72 feet, 3 inches) and sixth outdoors in the hammer throw (a school-record 234 feet, 8 inches). He also won the Big Ten indoor title in the weight throw and was second in the shot put, leading to the Men’s Field Athlete award for the Big Ten Indoor Championships.

Off the field, Talley has also exhibited mastery in his performance, being named to the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) Academic All-District team for compiling a 3.83 grade-point average in the MEM program. He is on track to graduate in December.

How did you decide to join the Master of Engineering Management program at Nebraska? What was it about MEM that made it the right fit for you?

“I wanted to learn more about the business and management side of engineering, not just the math of it. The MEM program has helped teach me how to work more effectively with others, which is what I was looking for. It drew me in because I was able to learn about how to work with others in engineering.”

What are your career goals?

“Currently, my goals are to work as a civil engineer after college and grow my knowledge through career experience. However, down the line I want to become a manager of an engineering firm and work more with clients and other engineers.”

Considering the MEM is an online program, how have you had to adjust your study regimen?

“Going all online has been an easy transition for me and one I kind of enjoy truthfully. I do miss the human connection with classmates, however, but MEM has made it easier on me because I can do my schoolwork on my time and has made doing assignments easier. I have had to put more time into reading textbooks, but overall, I enjoy that I can do it at my pace and on my time. I am not missing any class time by traveling and can do homework anywhere. The MEM program fits the life of a student-athlete greatly.”

Are there any observations about the program that you’d like to share?

“The MEM program has given me a lot and has really grown my knowledge of not only engineering but how to work with others. It also allows me to work with more-established engineers, many who have as much as five years more work experience than me, and that has helped me learn about the field I am working to join. I have also been connected to engineers in different disciplines, people I normally would not have had the chance to meet.”

Photo Credit: Husker Athletics

ALEX TALLEY, HAMMER THROW

INNOVATIVE RESEARCH

Electronic Nose to Identify Disease

A Nebraska Engineering team led by Eric Markvicka has developed the “electronic nose,” a sensing device that can be used to identify volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that are excreted by human skin or present in exhaled breath. This data could be used to identify the presence of diseases, such as COVID-19.

Placed on the skin, clipped on clothing, or integrated with a mask, the sensor passively identifies chemical patterns— or “breathprint signatures”—that can be useful markers for diseases. The sensor was validated using a combination of six VOCs—acetic acid, ammonium hydroxide, ethanol, methanol, pyridine and triethylamine—that are commonly excreted from the human body and associated with health or disease.

The platform is composed of an array of conductive polymer filaments created with a two-layer system of multi-walled carbon nanotubes and four different solution-processable polymers. The “breathprint” signature—consisting of the resistance of each filament—can be read using a near-field communication-enabled device, such as a smartphone.

Watch the video: https://go.unl.edu/electronic-nose

Monitoring Spent Nuclear Fuel Canisters

Nuclear energy is a key component of a clean, green future, producing more than half of America’s zero-emissions electricity. But with the U.S. generating about 2,000 metric tons of spent fuel waste each year and that waste stored at more than 70 sites in 34 states, research is needed to ensure safe transportation, storage and disposal.

Jinying Zhu, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, and Fadi Alsaleem, assistant professor in The Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction, received a three-year, $800,000 award from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop a dual-sensing, healthmonitoring system for spent nuclear fuel canisters.

This project will collect data using sensors that will monitor conditions in a similar way to processes used in smart homes and will have a process for sending out notifications—or “sounding the alarm,” Alsaleem said—when levels rise above or fall below certain standards.

ELECTRONIC NOSE

GRAD STUDENT AND ALSALEEM

Plant Growth and Nitrogen

Rajib Saha, assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, and graduate student Niaz Bahar Chowdhury have created a genome-scale metabolic model to study how corn roots adapt to insufficient nitrogen, with an eye toward making genetic tweaks that might increase, or at least maintain, plant growth and yields without excessive application of fertilizer.

“One of the critical aspects of growing any agricultural product is how much of the required micronutrients it can get from the soil,” Saha said. “The idea is to understand what happens when any plant needs to grow with nitrogen deficiency or stress. What kind of changes does the plant go through? If we can understand that better, can we now do some tweaking so that plants can survive or even thrive with taking lesser amounts of nitrogen?”

Discovery: Low-Symmetry Material

Research conducted by Mathias Schubert, JA Woollam Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, “planted the seed” that has grown into an international collaboration on a new class of materials that could lead to fruitful discoveries to change the way the world uses electricity and on emerging technology in many fields.

“What we’re looking at is really a discovery,” said Schubert. “This is a new material class to our interest— low-symmetry material—that’s been on Earth for all ages. In fact, most of the Earth’s crust is made up of these materials, but people in our fields haven’t looked at them because we were busy working with silicon and traditional semiconductors.”

The team includes Schubert and researchers from the Max Planck Society in Berlin, Germany, City University of New York, Vanderbilt University and the University of Iowa. The team’s paper was published in the Feb. 23 edition of Nature, one of the world’s most highly regarded science journals.

Efficacy of K-12 Classroom Air Cleaners

Josephine Lau, associate professor in The Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction, is studying the efficacy of air cleaners in K-12 classrooms and how they impact student health and learning.

Lau received a two-year, $556,000 grant from the Nebraska Department of Education for this project, which builds on results she gleaned from research as part of a $1 million Environmental Protection Agency school environment study.

“We know COVID-19 is an airborne virus, and schools are looking for ways to further improve air quality to protect their students,” said Lau. “We also know that many are using air treatment units that plug into a wall and recirculate the air. But we don’t know how well they work, in terms of protecting the students and improving the academic outcome in the long run.”

This project will involve 300 classrooms in both public and private schools and in both larger, primarily urban cities and smaller, more rural communities across Nebraska.

State Senator Eliot Bostart of Lincoln introduced LB 630 in January 2021, calling for the Education Department to provide a grant for this study. It was passed in late April 2021 and signed by Gov. Pete Ricketts the following month.

SAHA

SCHUBERT

LAU

CHIP OFF THE OL’ BLOCK

Student Designs Electrical Engineering Class for Curriculum

When electrical engineering majors registered for a new embedded systems class in the spring of 2022, students chose a course assembled by one of their own.

“This is a first in our curriculum, where an embedded systems class leverages an in-house microcontroller with an anticipated positive impact on the undergraduate research activities within the department,” stated Balkir, who has been a member of the ECE faculty since 1999. “As the embedded controller chip is custom designed by one of our own, the resources on the chip are aligned well with the degree requirements in several pivotal areas such as embedded systems applications, interfacing with outside information sources, employing both analog and digital processing techniques, and programming.”

MURRAY

As a graduate student, Sam Murray knew the day would come when he had to teach a Nebraska Engineering course, so the Cortland, Nebraska native decided to build his own, taking a “by-a-student, for-students” approach.

With assistance from Sina Balkir and Mike Hoffman, professors in electrical and computer engineering (ECE), Murray developed the embedded systems class using ECE’s own integrated circuit solutions in addressing a variety of research needs, including the intersection of the hardware with software for operation and control related to the use of “smart” electronics.

“The class is about electronics and how embedded systems work,” said Murray, who earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from UNL in 2018 and is a Ph.D. student. “Like a cellphone is a complicated version of ‘smart’ electronics or a garage door when it receives messages to open or close.”

Balkir says Murray developed a custom version of the public domain RISC-V processor and created his own embedded controller around it to be included in the single “System-on-a-Chip” (SoC) design. RISC-V, the Linux of the chip world, is a technical breakthrough when it comes to chip design and for Murray to fabricate his own design for the curriculum didn’t go unnoticed.

Murray has been fully instrumental in all aspects of the course from design of a custom RISC-V to its accompanying documentation, including software tools, evaluation kits and application examples.

“Sam is very talented and has a lot of self-determination,” added Hoffman, who also serves as one of Sam’s coadvisors for graduate school. “And he’s very curious, too. That’s a great combination.”

Murray’s curiosity turned into motivation to teach by example and show other students how important it is to be creative and resourceful when it comes to this type of technology.

“A good engineer is one who’s passionate about what they’re doing,” said Murray, who was awarded a Milton Mohr Graduate Fellowship in 2018. “This is the passion stirring in me, all the cool things I could do in designing our own microchips so we can show the students how it’s done.”

Following the spring debut, Murray said the new class was a hit with students.

“They were excited about the custom chip and the projects they have been doing with it,” Murray said.

“Several of them have encountered one of those magic moments when it suddenly clicks for them, and they realize how a part of the circuit works or the reason behind some tasks they have to perform. Those moments are supremely gratifying for me as a teacher.”

PRIDAL ELEVATES OTHERS

Honored as College of Engineering Alumni Master

Nancy Pridal (‘94) is using her platform as CEO and board chair of Lamp Rynearson to elevate her community but, more importantly, to elevate others.

“Diversity and inclusion align with our core values of employee development and integrity and advancing our profession,” Pridal told Omaha’s metroMAGAZINE in 2020. “If we don’t have different perspectives at the table, we’re not going to be innovative and creative.”

PRIDAL (CENTER) WITH CHANCELLOR

Pridal was recognized on April 1 as the 2022 UNL College of Engineering Alumni Master during the Alumni Masters’ Medallion Dinner, which was sponsored by the Nebraska Alumni Association, the Student Alumni Association and UNL Chancellor’s Office. She was one of nine distinguished UNL alumnae to be honored. Pridal utilizes her leadership position at the civil engineering, landscape architecture and surveying firm to oversee community betterment whether it’s through engagement opportunities or designing large infrastructure projects.

Because of her leadership role at Lamp Rynearson, Pridal oversees a firm fully committed to diversity, equity and inclusion while enhancing its corporate social responsibility. With projects like ChangingCOMMUNITIES, Lamp Rynearson is helping complete projects like the North Omaha Trail or the Roeland (Kansas) Park Improvements.

“The work of civil engineering is long-lived and can be in place for generations,” said Pridal, a recipient of the 2019 ICAN Leadership Award. “It’s very gratifying to work with project owners to help develop a project that will leave a legacy.”

Pridal is also a member of the Greater Omaha Chamber Board of Directors, the University of Nebraska College of Engineering Advisory Council, and the Engineering Change Lab-USA steering committee. She is grateful for her career in civil engineering because of the numerous opportunities to take on diverse and engaging assignments.

“Getting a broad range of experiences early on can open possibilities as your career advances,” Pridal said when prompted to lend advice to civil engineering students. “The relationships and experiences can build skills as well as be fulfilling.”

Pridal didn’t take a traditional road to becoming a civil engineer. As a non-traditional student raising two small children on her own, Pridal credits having a Regents Scholarship and supportive faculty for helping her navigate the twists and turns she went through as an undergrad.

“Support from faculty during that difficult time made all the difference in the world,” said Pridal, who began her career working for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. “I got divorced during my tenure as an undergrad and if I hadn’t had my regent’s scholarship, I could not have afforded the tuition.”

RONNIE GREEN AND SHELLEY ZABOROWSKI

THE POWER OF RED

Jake Jundt graduates to engineering career following memorable UNL run

If someone’s asked to characterize the “perfect Husker,” they could very well describe Jake Jundt. The Lincoln native and College of Engineering alum did not waste a minute of his time as a student at UNL—both as an undergrad and graduate student. Jundt recently graduated in May 2022 with a master’s degree in mechanical engineering and applied mechanics, but how he got there is a journey filled with opportunities and making the most of them.

“There’s nothing I’d change,” Jundt said about his UNL experience. “There were several opportunities put in front of me. I got to travel the country, from Tempe (Arizona) to New York City and California to Gainesville, Florida with a storied Nebraska program and its traditions. I did it and there’s nothing I’d change about it.”

Jundt is as active as one gets, going nonstop from sunup to sundown. Engineering classes consumed a lot of daylight whether it was the classroom or a laboratory. As an undergraduate student, afternoons and evenings were spent managing the women’s gymnastics team as the team’s student manager for four years. His love and dedication to gymnastics later paid dividends when the UNL Husker Cheer Squad brought back male cheerleaders in 2019. Since then, he’s actively voiced his support of Nebraska football from the sidelines and at alumni events. And when he finds a little downtime, Jundt picks himself up by lifting weights as a powerlifter, competing nationally, which involved training rigorously nearly three hours a day, four times a week.

Husker Destiny

He was always destined to be a Husker. Growing up in Lincoln, Jundt seized the opportunity to go to college in his hometown as his parents, Robert and Gloria Jundt, encouraged their son to pursue his passion, which was becoming a UNL student. It was also a learning experience for Jake, who was finding out what he really wanted to do or who he’d like to be.

He began as an accounting major but after a couple of semesters, he realized business wasn’t for him. Jundt weighed his options and decided he wanted to be a mechanical engineer.

“I just like taking things apart and putting them back together,” added Jundt, who graduated from Lincoln Pius X in 2014. “It was hard for me, to be honest. I never took AP classes in high school, but I did like physics and science.”

He also liked gymnastics and staying involved with a sport he grew up with. Having competed as a gymnast all through high school, Jundt knew he wasn’t good enough to compete collegiately; that didn’t stop him from wanting to be part of the storied Husker gymnastics program.

“I still practiced and worked out at (the) Devaney (Center) because I loved it so much,” he explained. “But I wasn’t really good enough to do it collegiately.”

After talking with Head Coach Chuck Chmelka, the 12-year Husker head coach suggested Jundt work with women’s gymnastics as the program needed a student manager. Jundt jumped at the chance and, over the next four years, didn’t miss a practice or a meet despite taking courses like kinematics and fluid mechanics.

The team’s meet schedule also ate into his class schedule, particularly during spring semesters when he traveled with the team to places like Augusta, Georgia; East Lansing, Michigan; Gainesville, Florida and

Champaign, Illinois all during the final month of the season (March 2018) when his academic calendar was filled with exams, assignments or projects.

“It was a significant time commitment,” said Jundt, whose siblings, Derek and Emily, also graduated from Nebraska. “I was a half hour early before every practice and a half hour after every practice.”

Husker Power

As if working with the women’s gymnastics program wasn’t enough to keep him busy, Jundt also was an active power lifter as a student, joining the Nebraska Barbell Club to not only keep in shape but better himself through personal growth by meeting new people in a challenging strength sport. He even competed at the 2019 Collegiate Nationals in Columbus, Ohio.

“Training as a power lifter takes a lot of work and time,” described Jundt. “But it got me into better shape, kept me active and with my cheer squad schedule, helped with stunts and lifts.”

Husker Cheer

A funny thing happened on the way to graduation for Jundt, who concluded his four-year career with the women’s gymnastics program in the spring of 2019. A door opened up for the former gymnast in the fall of 2019 when he and five other male cheerleaders were added to the Husker Cheer Squad for the football season. It was the first time men were allowed to join the cheer team in more than a decade.

“I loved it so much, I didn’t want to give up cheer,” he said. “That’s when I thought about doing grad school and continuing on as a member of the squad.”

As a cheer member, Jundt and his teammates endured long days that sometimes began with 6 a.m. morning lifting and concluded with 9:30 p.m. practices a couple of times a week. But the dedication

was worth it as Jundt and his cheer squad teammates often served as the face of Husker Athletics, appearing at multiple events throughout the season and even during the off season. During these engagements, Jundt has mingled with a fair share of prominent alumni and Husker fans, including Chancellor Ronnie Green and his wife, Jane, who consider Jundt a friend and enthusiastic ambassador for the university.

“We attend many athletic events and often travel with the team to away events, as does Jake as a spirit squad member,” said Chancellor Green, who noted that Jake’s presence, enthusiasm, energy, and optimism made every athletic event better. Jane Green added, “Jake has the most welcoming and positive countenance, seemingly greeting the world with a smile.”

Jundt is now taking his energy and enthusiasm to Hexagon Lincoln as a research and development engineer. He’s no stranger to the composite cylinder technology company, having interned at their Lincoln location since 2019. But no matter where Jundt’s career path takes him, he’ll always be a proud Husker ambassador having impacted many people along the way.

“Over the years we had brief conversations to learn more about Jake and his school and career ambitions,” said Jane Green. “It became tradition to exchange waves and smiles from the stands, and then to hug whenever we met.”

JUNDT

BAZATA A RISING STAR

Bazata helps keep Union Pacific Railroad on track, named ‘Rising Star’ in railroad industry

Stephani Bazata is on the right track when it comes to her career in the railroad industry. Bazata, a principal consultant in technology at Union Pacific Railroad, was named a “Rising Star” in 2021 by Progressive Railroading.

“The gratifying part of being a network engineer at Union Pacific is how my role has changed throughout the years,” said Bazata, a Scott Scholar who began working at Union Pacific in 2003 as an intern. “I knew someone who was interning at Union Pacific when I was a sophomore in college. He mentioned they were looking for engineering interns and how good of an opportunity it would be if I worked there, so I applied.”

Her family’s unique history with the railroad industry dates back to her grandfather who worked as a train engineer for Union Pacific. Fast forward to 2022, Bazata’s nearly two-decade career at Union Pacific includes designing IP networks and building out connectivity to hundreds of railyard locations to modernize railroad operations and radio technology.

“It’s all about optimization and how do we get better,” noted Bazata, who earned a B.S. in electronics engineering from the UNL College of Engineering (2005) and her M.B.A. from the University of Nebraska at Omaha. “Union Pacific has a world-class engineering team, always ahead of the game, building technology platforms which enable us to be a leader in the industry.”

Union Pacific is happy to have invested in Bazata as Beth Whited, executive vice president – Sustainability and Strategy, described Stephani as a leader with “deep technical and business knowledge.”

“Her collaborative approach to leadership combined with her deep technical and business knowledge have allowed Stephani to engage with various other groups within information technology and across business units to identify opportunities to focus on incrementally delivering value, while maximizing the use of all resources,” Whited said in her Rising Stars nomination of Bazata. “Stephani is focused on driving the advancement of technology platforms to enable Union Pacific to compete as the most efficient logistics provider.”

Her advice to college students and recent college graduates is longevity. Finding a career where leadership is earned, not imparted, is gratifying and worth the time and effort as an up-and-coming engineer or technologist.

“Technology is embedded in our lives. You’ll never go wrong with a foundation of engineering or technology,” explained Bazata, who lives in Omaha with her husband, Brent, and three girls ages 3, 5 and 7. “The skills you will build about how to learn, how things work, and how to problem solve are a solid foundation for any path you ultimately take in your career.”

BAZATA

AUTHOR, ENGINEER PASSAGLIA

Danielle Passaglia Shares Life Lessons in Lucy’s Engineering Adventure

Passaglia, a mechanical engineer at Arup in Chicago, Illinois, utilized her experience as a student ambassador with the Nebraska Engineering Ambassadors Network. She continues to champion STEM as a professional engineer serving in a volunteer capacity with ASHRAE’s Illinois Chapter as the Student Activities Chair and Treasurer.

about this building site, would be interesting to kids as well,” added Passaglia, who grew up in the Chicago suburb of Wheaton, Illinois.

Danielle Passaglia remembers what he taught her: “always be curious and don’t be afraid to ask questions.” These principles helped Passaglia bring her character, Lucy, to life in the children’s book she authored, “Lucy’s Engineering Adventure.”

“It’s pretty close to home,” Passaglia says of her experience writing the book, which details young Lucy on a day she accompanies her father to a construction worksite. “What I wrote three to four years ago in my notebook, my ideas for Lucy, her father and the engineering points I wanted to emphasize, all came together fairly honestly.”

“Lucy’s Engineering Adventure” is the first-of-its-kind illustrated children’s book published by ASHRAE, the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and AirConditioning Engineers, and serves as a fun introduction to building and HVAC engineering through the eyes of a young girl, who learns from her father how beams, columns, electrical systems and HVAC ducts work like the human body to make buildings function.

“I’ve always been interested in outreach and I wanted to continue that when I graduated from college,” noted Passaglia, who was a Scott Scholar at UNL and graduated in 2016 with her bachelor’s degree in architectural engineering and in 2017 with a master’s degree in the same degree. “During a Regional Student Activities Committee meeting three or four years ago, we were thinking of ways to reach K-5 students. I brought up the idea of a children’s book to illustrate the HVAC industry.”

With a publications group within ASHRAE as well as assistance from ASHRAE’s Janice Means, who provided educational oversight for the book, and Gabriella Vagnoli, who illustrated “Lucy’s Engineering Adventure,” Passaglia volunteered her own time to bring the character of Lucy to life.

“It was very important to me that Lucy was ethnically ambiguous” Passaglia explained. “So children of all backgrounds could relate to her.”

Join Lucy on an Engineering Adventure!

A rhyming story followed, one where girls Lucy’s age—or younger—could see themselves. Passaglia drew upon a time when she was a junior in high school attending a field trip at a construction site. It ultimately influenced her passion to become an engineer.

“It was a unique experience to me, I certainly thought my experience as a young girl, with so many questions

While creating “Lucy’s Engineering Adventure,” Passaglia thought a lot about her own family, particularly her three nieces and nephews, as well as her late father, Rick, and her mother, Sally, who’s a school teacher and, Passaglia claims, “the writer in the family.”

“My parents were always supportive and I wanted that support to be a part of Lucy’s journey with her father,” said Passaglia, who’s engaged to fiancée Jacob Clatanoff, also a graduate of the architectural engineering program at UNL.

She also wanted it to be fun and exciting for kids to read, so she wrote a rhyming story complete with conflict resolution and a happy outcome for Lucy.

“I’d love to introduce Lucy to climate change, sustainable energy and how to work in teams,” added Passaglia when asked if there’s a series or sequel to Lucy’s story. “Green energy with solar and wind power or rain harvesting. There’s a lot of ways we can go with more Lucy Engineering Adventures.”

Lucy’s Engineering Adventure

PASSAGLIA

Written by Danielle Passaglia

Illustrated by Gabriella Vagnoli

CONNECTING WITH INDUSTRY

OLSSON ENGINEERING STUDENTS

Olsson definitely shares our vision to develop Complete Engineers and positively impact workforce and economic development for the state of Nebraska and beyond.

— Lance C. Pérez, dean

For nearly five decades, Olsson committed to Nebraska Engineering

Olsson, a nationally recognized engineering firm offering design and consulting services in planning and design, engineering, environmental, technology and field service, is continuing its support of Nebraska Engineering by committing an additional $50,000 per year for five years to the College of Engineering.

Since its first gift in 1973, Olsson has been a key partner to the College of Engineering by investing in several strategic initiatives, including the Olsson Student Program Initiatives Fund, which was established in 2012; the Olsson Faculty Excellence Fund, established at the University of Nebraska Foundation in 1992; and the John E. Olsson Scholarship Fund, an endowed scholarship fund created in 2000 to honor company founder John E. Olsson.

In the past 10 years, Olsson has provided more than 57 scholarships to engineering students and was one of the early investors in Kiewit Hall. The company also contributes annually to student and graduate career development by offering numerous internship and employment opportunities for UNL students and graduates.

“Olsson definitely shares our vision to develop Complete Engineers and positively impact workforce and economic development for the state of Nebraska and beyond,” noted Lance C. Pérez, dean. “We’re grateful for our continued partnership with Olsson and look forward to providing our students and faculty with opportunities to develop and succeed in engineering.”

STRITTMATTER

OLSSON

With 1,600 employees nationally, Olsson continues to grow and make a difference in everything from community planning and civil engineering to construction management and hydrogeology. By contributing to student success, Olsson scholarships will greatly benefit student events and student organizations such as E-Week, Rock the Block, and the college’s ASCE student chapter. Funds from Olsson will also supplement travel to national or regional conferences; and foster valuable mentoring and professional development programs, including Women in Engineering and the Multicultural Engineering Program at UNL.

Olsson’s financial support enhances opportunities for engineering faculty, too, including high-performing assistant professors in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.

“Our support of the College of Engineering resonates in so many ways, especially student development and faculty success,” added Olsson CEO Brad Strittmatter. “We’re proud of our partnership with UNL and of our commitment to expand engineering education opportunities for the next several years.”

Olsson was founded in 1956 when John E. Olsson was just 30 years old and a recent UNL graduate, having come to Lincoln in the 1940s from Queens, New York. Olsson even served the College of Engineering through its Technology Advisory Council and received the college’s Outstanding Alumnus Award in 1996. The company currently employs more than 260 UNL graduates, including more than 170 employees with a specialty that contains the word engineering.

Pictured are Nebraska Engineering alumni working for General Dynamics in Lincoln. Rapidly expanding, GD-OTS provides reliable and affordable composite products to the defense and commercial aerospace markets. With more than 50 years of expertise, General Dynamics designs, develops, manufactures and tests a full range of composite missile and space structures, including rocket motors, pressure vessels, launch tubes and fuel tanks.

HELPING COMMUNITIES

When natural disasters strike, they typically leave a costly path of destruction in their wake.

Civil and environmental engineering researchers Richard Wood and Christine Wittich are studying the aftermaths of natural disasters to help understand why some buildings can withstand the high winds of a tornado or the seismic forces of an earthquake while others cannot.

Using 3D mapping technology among their many tools, Wood and a team of graduate students surveyed damage caused by hurricanes in the Bahamas (Dorian) and Texas’ gulf coast (Harvey) and by the 2017 tornado that ripped through Pilger, Nebraska.

Their mission: to detect where engineering fell short in the design of key structures and develop computer algorithms for remotely detecting structural damage caused by natural disaster events.

“By doing this, we can examine the exterior of the structure, and in specific cases, its interior, from afar,” Wood said. “It provides safety to the inspectors and allows for an electronic collection of data for use by others.”

Wood studied earthquake damage in California before joining UNL in 2013. His trip to Pilger was his first foray into studying tornado damage.

In Pilger, Wood’s team examined six sites and using data collected from a LiDAR (Light Detecting and Ranging) 3D scanner and photogrammetry from a camera-equipped tethered drone, they created a point-cloud model of the school building.

The findings included that unreinforced masonry appears particularly vulnerable to tornado damage and that anchors and rivets used to connect buildings to foundations are prone to failure.

With expertise in seismic research and experience in assessing earthquake damage, Wittich joined the CEE faculty in 2017.

Wittich analyzed the impacts of the 2020 derecho, the most damaging thunderstorm in U.S. history as it ravaged four states over two days. From Nebraska to Indiana, high, straightline winds accompanied by rain, hail, and tornadoes, caused $7.5 billion in damage.

The derecho gave Wittich an opportunity to focus on the resilience of critical infrastructure in rural communities, particularly storage bins and silos that hold grain or livestock feed. When those structures are damaged or destroyed, the impact is felt locally but can also disrupt the U.S. economy and global food production.

Wittich believes her research will advance knowledge of structural vulnerability, identify regions that are especially vulnerable to damage from high winds, influence standards for new construction and lead to solutions that safeguard existing structures.

“We hope to determine what measures should be incorporated,” she said. “And what are the mitigation measures that we can recommend?”

COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING RESEARCHERS SURVEY DAMAGE IN PILGER, NEBRASKA

COMPETITION TEAM RESULTS

Each year, engineering students spend countless hours outside of class preparing for national and international competitions, honing their skills and knowledge with the support of faculty and industry professionals.

ASABE International Quarter-Scale Tractor

The University of Nebraska–Lincoln team won a world championship in one division and earned a fifth-place finish in the other at the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE) International 1/4 Scale Tractor Student Design Competition June 2-6 in Peoria, Illinois. The Nebraska team, comprised mostly of engineering students, won the X-Team competition in which the team’s tractor from the previous year’s competition is brought back as an improved version. The Nebraska A-Team, which builds a tractor from scratch with a new design, finished fifth. It was Nebraska’s sixth X-Team title since 2014, to go along with two A-Team world titles (2016 and 2019).

Debate Team National Champions

When the University of Nebraska–Lincoln Speech and Debate Team recently earned the first national championship in its 151-year history, three students from the College of Engineering were key contributors to the Lincoln Douglas Debate victory. At the National Forensic Association’s National Tournament in April 15-18 in Normal, Illinois Zachary Wallenburg (a freshman in software engineering from Lenexa, Kansas) was named the third overall speaker. Salman Djingueinabaye (senior in computer science from Lincoln, Nebraska), and Amber Tannehill (sophomore in mechanical engineering from Bennet, Nebraska), were also among the six Huskers to post winning records and advance to the elimination rounds.

AEI International Student Design Competiiton

A team from the Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction earned multiple awards at the 2022 Architectural Engineering Institute (AEI) International Student Design Competition: first in the electrical category; second in building integration, mechanical and structural; and a special award for building performance enhancement. The team’s presentation can be viewed at go.unl.edu/aeisc-awards

Husker Motorsports

The Husker Motorsports teams’ 2022 season got underway in May with the Formula SAE team, which builds a smaller version of a Formula One racecar, finishing 12th (out of 99 teams) in the competition at Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn, Michigan. The Baja SAE team, which races its vehicle over rugged terrain, opened its season 36th out of 100 teams at the event in Cookeville, Tennessee.

Concrete Canoe

The Nebraska concrete canoe team took third place at the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Mid America Symposium in April in Ames, Iowa. While the annual race was canceled due to weather, the canoes were judged based on aesthetic, display, and mix of the concrete.

NBAA Bass Fishing Champion

AJ Lincoln, who graduated in May with a degree in construction management, teamed with fellow Omaha native Garrett Woockman to win the National Bass Anglers Association Championship in April at Table Rock Lake near Branson, Missouri. Lincoln and Woockman reeled in the maximum of 15 fish over the three days of competition with a combined weight of 51 pounds, 15 ounces - more than seven pounds greater than the runner-up team. For first place, Lincoln’s team earned more than $42,000 in cash and prizes, including a 20-foot, red bass boat valued at nearly $38,000.

UNL SPEECH AND DEBATE TEAM

HIGHLIGHTS AND AWARDS

Biological Systems Engineering

Civil and Environmental Engineering

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Seven students from the Biomedical Engineering Society chapter participated in the GoBabyGo! event at the MunroeMeyer Institute at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. The Nebraska chapter of GoBabyGo!, established in 2016, brings future engineers and health professionals together to customize electric cars to meet the specific needs of children with mobility issues.

Expansion of our world population and our national and state economies, along with increased public concern for environmental quality, have created a burgeoning need for more environmental engineers. To meet workforce demands in Nebraska and across the U.S., the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering introduced a new Environmental Engineering undergraduate degree program, beginning in Fall 2022.

Curtis Tomasevicz, associate professor of practice in Biological Systems Engineering, completed his first year as director of sports performance for USA Bobsled/ Skeleton and helped Team USA athletes prepare for the 2022 Olympic Winter Games in Beijing, China. Tomasevicz is a two-time Olympic medalist in the four-man bobsled, including winning a gold medal in 2010.

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Aemal Khattak, professor of civil and environmental engineering and a national leader in highway and rail crossing safety, has been chosen as director of the MidAmerica Transportation Center (MATC). Khattak, who became associate director of MATC in July 2019, was named interim director of both MATC and the Nebraska Transportation Center (NTC) this past July.

The Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction

Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering

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Rajib Saha, assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, received a five-year, $1,828,734 Maximizing Investigators Research Award (MIRA) for Early Stage Investigators award from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The grant supports Saha’s research that studies how cellular metabolism helps control the human immune system’s response to pathogens with an eye toward development of therapeutics or drugs that could assist the immune system in its response.

Invited speakers and participants from academia and industry gathered at the Scott Conference Center in Omaha in May for the 2022 Future of the Building Industry (FoBI) Workshop, hosted by The Durham School. The workshop brought leaders in the building industry together to brainstorm toward realizing high-performance, sustainable, and healthy ‘smart’ industry of the future. Keynote speakers included Alfred Fischer of the UNMC Department of Internal Medicine’s Division of Geriatrics, Gerontology and Palliative Care Medicine; Ryan Haller from McNair Living and VARCity; and Stephanie Taylor of Building4Health. https://go.unl.edu/fobi

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Dianna Morris, a Ph.D. candidate and graduate research assistant in chemical and biomolecular engineering, was awarded a three-year, $177,000 USDA Pre-Doctoral Fellowship that supports research on engineering a non-model bacterium—Parakburkholderia sacchari—for sustainable bioplastic production.

Samuel Underwood, a Ph.D. student in architectural engineering with an emphasis in acoustics, received two prestigious fellowships from the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) to support his graduate studies. The Leo and Gabriella Beranek Scholarship in Architectural Acoustics and Noise Control, which was first awarded in 2016, is a $30,000 award. The Frank and Virginia Winker Memorial Scholarship for Graduate Studies in Acoustics, first awarded in 2017, is a $3,000 award.

BOWLES

TOMASEVICZ

KHATTAK

UNDERWOOD

SAHA

MORRIS

Electrical and Computer Engineering

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Research conducted by Mathias Schubert, JA Woollam Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, “planted the seed” that has grown into an international collaboration on a new class of materials that could help change the way the world uses electricity and on emerging technology in many fields. The team’s paper –“Hyperbolic shear polaritons in low-symmetry crystals” – was published in the Feb. 23 edition of Nature, one of the world’s most highly regarded science journals.

 Electrical and computer engineering researchers Wei Qiao and Mark Bauer are supporting a new $25 million contract between the University of Nebraska National Strategic Research Institute and the National Nuclear Security Administration to support strategic deterrence and nuclear threat reduction efforts.

Mechanical and Materials Engineering

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The Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2021. Since its creation in 2011, MME has grown from 19 tenured/ tenure-track faculty to 32. In those 10 years, faculty have earned six National Science Foundation CAREER awards, brought in $72 million in external research awards and grants, received 90 U.S. patents and have had more than 1,400 journal publications.

Shane Farritor, David and Nancy Lederer Professor of Engineering in Mechanical and Materials Engineering, is the inaugural winner of the University of Nebraska system’s Faculty Intellectual Property Innovation and Commercialization Award. As one of the President’s Excellence Awards, it was created to honor NU faculty who have developed and nurtured intellectual property from concept to licensing or startup business. Farritor is chief technology officer of Virtual Incision, a Nebraska-based startup co-founded with Dmitry Oleynikov, former University of Nebraska Medical Center professor of surgery. The duo’s goal is to commercialize miniature surgical robots they developed together.

School of Computing

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The legacy of David Swanson continues to support student and faculty research through the Holland Computing Center with the launch of Swan, a new supercomputer providing cuttingedge resources at no cost to researchers, instructors and students across the University of Nebraska system. The supercomputer is named in honor of Swanson, founding director of the Holland Computing Center who was killed in a two-vehicle crash in rural Minnesota in 2019.

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Intelligent.com selected the University of Nebraska–Lincoln as having the top Software Engineering Degree Program in the United States.

SCHUBERT

FARRITOR

QIAO BAUER

SWANSON

ENGINEERING TEAM SOARS

Team reaches semifinals at Lockheed Martin Ethics in Engineering Competition

A team from the College of Engineering reached the semifinals of the Lockheed Martin Ethics in Engineering Case Competition held virtually in the spring semester.

The Nebraska team was comprised of two students –Mary Ankenbauer, a senior mechanical engineering major, and Cassie Perry, a junior chemical engineering major – and faculty advisor Mohamed Amar, Ph.D., lecturer in mechanical and materials engineering.

Nebraska began the double-elimination competition by defeating Baylor University, then defeated 2021 champion Texas A&M in the second round. After a win against The Citadel, Nebraska lost to the Coast Guard Academy and to the U.S. Military Academy, the two teams that then tied for the championship.

The competition brings together a two-student undergraduate team and accompanying faculty from colleges and universities across the U.S. to present solutions to a fictional case involving ethical, business and engineering dilemmas. Finding students willing to take on the requirements of the ethics competition was not easy, Amar said, especially with the many hours of training required outside of already rigorous engineering coursework and, in some cases, research responsibilities.

One of the first students Amar contacted was Ankenbauer. Perry was recommended by Karen Stelling, professor of practice in mechanical and materials engineering, who teaches Engineering and Workplace Ethics.

Ankenbauer and Perry said some of their interest in being on the team was how the competition’s focus on ethics aligned well with their personal approaches to engineering.

“I liked learning about engineering case studies of how engineering disasters could have been prevented, especially in the decisions made beforehand,” Ankenbauer said.

“Ethics should be a big, big part of engineering, and I don’t think enough young engineers think about it like that.”

“It’s the same thing with me,” Perry said. “You can find someone in an engineering building who can do math all day, but when you find somebody who cares about other people and takes into account the community and other things that are impacted by their decisions, that’s what makes a good engineer.”

To prepare for the competition, the team met weekly, starting in the fall semester. These sessions, Amar said, included debating mock ethics cases provided by Lockheed Martin and then working to develop a short pitch on the various aspects of the case. Ankenbauer and Perry would present their solutions during Friday sessions, and he would provide feedback.

“We’d go back and forth and debate every single thing until we found something we liked,” Ankenbauer said. “Most of the time it came to us pretty simple, really fast, and then we’d spend hours forming facts around it.”

Amar said learning the parameters of criticism within a business team structure is something this competition teaches that is extremely valuable in an engineering environment.

“I saw them develop from two virtual strangers to the way they work together now, almost seamlessly,” Amar said.

The experience helped the students form a bond they could see lasting a long while. They’ve even brainstormed names for a possible professional venture.

“I’ve said I found a primary business partner if I ever start an engineering firm,” Perry said. “I know the first person I’m going to.”

PERRY AND ANKENBAUER

TOP PRIZE

Durham School students take top NCEES prize

For the third time in the last six years, the team from the Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction won the $25,000 NCEES Engineering Education Award for engaging students in collaborative projects with licensed professional engineers, making it the only course, program, or university in all national engineering programs to have won the Grand Prize more than once.

The 2021-22 class had three student teams (29 students) that were mentored and evaluated by 57 industry professionals. Each student team completed the documentation for the NCEES submission, which were then combined into one final submission.

For the project, Tarrant County College Student Success Center, students were tasked with completing a design for a student success center on the Tarrant County College campus in Fort Worth, Texas. The teams faced many design challenges, including providing resiliency to handle natural disasters, emergency planning utilities, and overall building performance enhancements. The jury praised the Durham School’s project for its integration of students, faculty, and professional engineers on a complex, realworld project.

The Durham School’s team design won the Grand Prize in 2022, 2019, and 2016 with secondary awards ($10,000) in 2021 (for the 2020 class), 2018, and 2015. The 2020 award was canceled due to COVID-19.

SHOW OFF ENGINEERING PRIDE SHOW OFF Your ENGINEERING PRIDE

with new clothing and gear from the Nebraska Engineering E-Store.

Featuring t-shirts, polos, sweatshirts, pullovers, jackets, hats and more.

University of Nebraska–Lincoln College of Engineering P.O. Box 880642 Lincoln, NE 68588-0642 engineering.unl.edu