Persistence of Personal Achievement

At the heart heart of Rose-Hulman’s excellence are its people—the faculty, staff and students who together create an exceptional educational environment and experience. Their talents and impact are not exactly a secret, as the institute’s people regularly earn national honors for their educational quality and innovation, their research endeavors, and the way that they inspire and support all involved in teaching and learning science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The list of their honors, recognitions and grants is long and impressive. Here are just some of the highlights from the past year or so.

Carlotta A. Berry, PhD, the Dr. Lawrence J. Giacoletto Endowed Chair for Electrical and Computer Engineering, is on a roll with national teaching honors related to her efforts as an undergraduate robotics educator. She most recently earned the Society of Women Engineers’ Distinguished Engineer Educator Award. She also has been named the recipient of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers’ 2023 Undergraduate Teaching Award. Dr. Berry earned the 2022 Distinguished Educator Award from the American Society of Engineering Education’s Electrical and Computer Engineering Division. And she was chosen as one of the first group of college educators participating in the Open Source Hardware Association’s new Trailblazer Fellows Program—the grant is to help her work with Rose-Hulman students incorporating open-source hardware resources into academia.

APRIL 21, 2022

Hannah Snider and Nathan Hurtig were named prestigious Goldwater Scholars for their significant contributions in national research projects. The institute has had 14 Scholars since 2004.

APRIL 26, 2022

A $644,873 grant from Lilly Endowment Inc.’s Indiana Youth Programs on Campus initiative is supporting students from historically underrepresented groups in higher education to attend the institute’s summer camps.

APRIL 28, 2022

Academic quality, affordability and strong career prospects ranked the institute 20th in The Princeton Review’s best value private college list, as well as No. 1 for internships and No. 6 for career services.

APRIL 29, 2022

For the fourth straight year, Rose-Hulman earned Tree Campus Higher Education honors by the Arbor Foundation for its commitment to effective urban forest management and conservation goals.

MAY 4, 2022

Nearly 100 student projects were featured in The Rose Show—”Rose-Hulman’s rendition of The World’s Fair—which featured a variety of sustainability solutions, mobility devices and software applications.

Several Rose-Hulman faculty also have earned recognition from Kern Family Foundation and the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network. Kosta Popovic, PhD, assistant professor of physics and optical engineering, earned recognition as a 2021 Engineering Unleashed Fellow. Professor Julia Williams, PhD, will use a Kern Family Foundation grant to support efforts to connect engineering professional societies and the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network. A three-year grant is supporting the work of civil and environmental engineering Associate Professor Michelle Marincel Payne, PhD, and chemical engineering Associate Professor Irene Reizman, PhD.

Emma Dosmar, PhD, assistant professor of biomedical engineering, is an advocate for the concept of “ungrading,” which she sees as an attractive and motivating alternative to traditional grading techniques. Her work has landed funding through a grant program launched by online learning platform Course Hero. The program aims to encourage new ideas in digital pedagogies along with social change STEM education. The grant will help her explore ungrading techniques in her first-year MATLAB course, as well as project-based learning practices in other STEM courses.

The Fulbright program is a highly esteemed international academic exchange program, and Rose-Hulman has been recognized as a leader producer of Fulbright participants. This past year, mathematics Professor Manda Riehl, PhD, was chosen for a Fulbright Faculty Scholar opportunity to collaborate with professors at Costa Rica’s Universidad Nacional. The opportunity includes helping academic professionals in Costa Rica develop a Math for Computer Science course and working with students in their calculus studies. Dr. Riehl is also slated to co-teach courses at the Costa Rican university for three months during the 2023-24 academic year.

The William H. Corcoran Award is an American Society for Engineering Education honor recognizing outstanding scholastic achievement in chemical engineering education. Daniel Anastasio, PhD, associate professor of chemical engineering, earned the honor by co-authoring an article in the Chemical Engineering Education journal that was named the year’s most outstanding. “Revealing the Decision-Making Processes of Chemical Engineering Students in Process Safety Contexts” resulted from research into experiential process safety training.

Faculty members aren’t the only ones landing recognition for work in prominent research projects. For example, Noblitt Scholars Nathan Hurtig and Hannah Snider were recognized as Goldwater Scholars, which is the preeminent honor for

MAY 5, 2022

A $2 million gift from alumnus John Swearingen and his wife, Anne, has established the Department of Chemical Engineering’s first endowed faculty professorship, along with supporting lab and technology modifications.

MAY 10, 2022

Math professor Manda Riehl, PhD, is the institute’s latest Fulbright Faculty Scholar, working with faculty colleagues and students in Costa Rica. Rose-Hulman was recognized as a top producer of Fulbright Scholars.

2021-22 TIMELINE OF ACHIEVEMENTS

MAY 12, 2022

The women’s golf team placed 21st at the 2022 NCAA Division III national championship in its second straight appearance. Junior Precious Saelee had a 72nd-place individual finish to lead the team.

MAY 13, 2022

The men’s tennis season team played in the NCAA Division III tournament for the seventh straight spring after winning the HCAC championship. The program has won 57 of its last 59 league matches.

undergraduate students pursing degrees in the natural sciences, engineering and mathematics. The institute has had 14 students earn this distinction since 2004, and it’s the second year in a row that Rose-Hulman students have been honored.

Meanwhile, when they were undergraduate computer science majors, 2022 graduates Zeming (Eric) Chen and Qiyue (Bert) Gao gained the spotlight as research partners in the field of artificial intelligence and natural language processing. They co-authored multiple conference papers about their research into understanding how machines can achieve cognitive abilities similar to humans.

Cary Laxer, PhD, professor emeritus and former head of Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, was honored as an ABET Fellow. Dr. Laxer was spotlighted for longtime contributions to training, for work in incorporating the computer science model curriculum into ABET accreditation criteria, and for helping the organization transition to virtual accreditation visits. Dr. Laxer’s 2021 honor was the second in a row for a Rose-Hulman faculty member—in 2020, that same spotlight was on Patsy Brackin, director of the engineering design program.

Dr. Kim Tracy has been named a “Distinguished Speaker” by the Association for Computing Machinery. Among his areas of expertise is software history, about which he authored a text for ACM Books. Rose-Hulman faculty have earned honors for not just educating but inspiring others. For example, Tracy Weyand, PhD, assistant professor of mathematics, is dedicated to building communities where women in mathematics thrive and feel welcome. Dr. Weyand’s efforts, including voluntary service to the national Association for Women in Mathematics, earned a Service Award from the organization.

Meanwhile, Kevin Sutterer, PhD, was presented the Thomas A. Morris Engineering Leadership Award at the Annual Conference of the Indiana Society of Professional Engineers. It’s an award honoring a Professional Engineer who has been both a successful engineering leader and a positive role model for other engineers.

And Kevin Lanke was honored for promoting the ideals of being a student-athlete and ongoing service to the Academic All-America program. As associate athletic director for communications and public relations at Rose-Hulman, he earned the 2022 Lester Jordan Award from the College Sports Information Directors of America. Lanke, a 1997 alumnus, is that organization’s core committee chair for the Academic All-America program, supervising a committee of 150 members from NCAA Division I, II and III schools, NAIA schools and the College Division, focusing on that program’s publicity, operations and new media efforts.

MAY 19, 2022

Comedian Hasan Minhaj presented a donor-sponsored private campus show to reward students, faculty and staff for successfully achieving COVID-19 vaccination goals.

MAY 20, 2022

The Athletic Department captured the HCAC men’s all-sports trophy, while placing third in women’s sports—to place a close second in the league’s Commissioners Cup standings.

MAY 28, 2022

The Class of 2022 culminated its challenging college careers by earning 385 degrees at Commencement. Northeastern University Chief Inclusion Officer Karl Reid, PhD, addressed the graduates and joined alumnus/trustee David Hannum in receiving honorary degrees.

JUNE 14, 2022

Swimmer Colin Beach and baseball player continued Rose’s string of 37 straight years with at least one Academic All-American. Beach was a second-team selection;