Third Annual IMSE Awards Banquet Celebrates Students
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Tag: Banquet
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COE Thanks Dr. Chen with Reception
on The College of Engineering hosted a reception in honor of Dr. Victoria Chen to thank her for her two-year service as the Interim Chair of the IMSE Department. Dr. Chen stepped in as the Interim Chair in 2012 when Dr. Don Liles retired as the chairperson. The IMSE Department hired Dr. Paul Componation as the new Chair in July. Under Dr. Chen’s leadership, the department has grown in the number of students enrolled and in the amount of research funding received. Current and former students, along with faculty, staff, and Dr. Chen’s family attended the reception on July 18. It was held in The University Club on the the campus of The University of Texas at Arlington.
Photos of the event can be viewed on the IMSE Department’s Facebook photo album: Dr. Chen Thank You Reception.
IMSE Celebrates Graduates and Award Winners
on The IMSE Department celebrated graduates from the Summer, Fall, and Spring semesters as well as award winners with a banquet Thursday evening. The event began with a reception as Advisory Board members, faculty, staff, and honorees and their friends arrived at the banquet inside the Hospitality Suite at UT Arlington’s College Park Center. A catered meal was served after the reception as guests took their seats for dinner.
After the meal, Dr. Chen introduced IMSE alumna and co-founder of TransSolutions, LLC Gloria Bender, as the keynote speaker. She spoke about the importance of getting your degree and giving back to the community and how IEs could use their degrees to serve.
After the keynote address, Dr. Brian Huff recognized the members of the Alpha Pi Mu Industrial Engineering Honor Society. The attendees gave the members in attendance a round of applause.
The first award given in the evening was the G. T. Stevens, Jr. Endowed Alumni Scholarship which was established in 1998 to honor the IMSE Department’s former Chair. This year’s recipients were April Shortt (Junior), Ting Xiao (Senior), and Ezeh Perpetua Ebere (Graduate).
Next, Dr. Bill Corley presented the Elinor Pape Endowed Scholarship Award, which was established in 2006 to honor the Professor Emeritus’s service and dedication at UT Arlington. The award winners were Cynthia Rodriguez (Junior), Gustavo Robles (Senior), and Vikas Hinge (Graduate).
The next two scholarships were established by IMSE alumnus Keith Weiss. Keith and Carolyn Weiss were on hand to award Dylan Slick with the Keith and Carolyn Weiss Industrial Engineering Scholarship, which is given to deserving Industrial Engineering undergraduate students who are working to support their education. Slick works as a Resident Assistant at UT Arlington Apartment and Residence Life. The Weiss Family Endowed Scholarship is an award distributed by the UT Arlington Alumni Association to award a junior or senior undergraduate who have been working to support their education. This year’s recipient was Greta Leza who works at Airbus Helicopters, Inc. (formerly known as American Eurocopter).
The next award given, the John and Pat Priest Family Endowed Scholarship, is the IMSE Department’s newest endowed scholarship. It was established by current IMSE professor John Priest and his wife in 2013. This year’s winner was Colin Brisco.
The next two scholarships were awarded by the RFID and Auto ID (RAID) Labs. Dr. Erick Jones presented the awards to the winners. This year’s recipient of the RFID and Auto ID Labs Research Excellence Scholarship, which recognizes students for his/her excellence in RAID research and published work, was Harrison Armstrong. His research paper, “A Framework for Detecting Hazardous Events Occurring in Transit with AutoID Technologies” was accepted by IIE Sensors in March 2014. The RFID and Auto ID Labs Outstanding Research Scholarship recognize students conducting outstanding research in RAID Labs. This year’s recipients were Mewan Wijemanne (Undergraduate) and Ryan Dietrich (Graduate).
The Institute of Industrial Engineers (IIE) Outstanding Student awards recognizes outstanding scholarship, leadership, and service to the IE profession. This year’s recipients were Cynthia Rodriguez (Junior) and Rachel Machbitz (Senior). After receiving their award, they were joined by previous Outstanding IIE Award winners.
The final award presented in the evening was the Texas Industrial Engineering Lifetime Achievement Award, which was created in an alliance between the Industrial Engineering departments at Texas public universities including UT El Paso, Texas A&M, Texas Tech University, the University of Houston, and Lamar University. Awardees are alumni selected by these universities based on the impact of their career on society. Gloria Bender presented the honor to this year’s awardee, Gloria Maceiko. Maceiko founded DirectNu Energy in 2009 with a vision to develop Energy Independence for commercial entities, nationally and globally, by focusing on solar and wind project development. She serves as its CEO and manages multimillion dollar projects from concept to contracts and worked over 25 years with high tech companies in Silicon Valley. She was also at the forefront of trend setting startups.
The wonderful evening concluded with a few brief comments from our graduating seniors and a final congratulation to award winners and graduates of the past year.
Pictures of the event will be posted on our Facebook page soon!
IMSE Department Celebrates First Annual Awards Banquet
on On May 2, 2013, the IMSE Department celebrated the inaugural Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering Banquet by honoring graduating seniors, award winners, and scholarship recipients. Attendees included our Advisory Board members, former and current faculty members, as well as our current and former students and their families. The gala began with a reception and delicious catered dinner inside the San Saba Room at the University Center. Jim Crites, Executive Vice President for the Operations Division of the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, presented the keynote address to graduating seniors. His speech urged the soon-to-be graduates to use their IE degrees to help find solutions to real-world problems. As he stated, only IEs have the gift that can be utilized to find efficiency while optimizing profit margins, citing numerous problems that industrial engineers have resolved in the airport industry. Crites explained how skills gained from an IE degree can solve real-world problems because IE are trained to think on a multi-dimensional level.
Following the keynote address, Interim Chair Dr. Tory Chen presented the endowed scholarship winners. The first scholarship awarded was the G.T. Stevens, Jr. Endowed Alumni Scholarship, which was established in 1998 to honor our Chair Emeritus. The award is given to outstanding Industrial Engineering students. This year’s recipients were Senior Luke Brigmon and Junior Anna Mai.
The next award, the Elinor Pape Endowed Scholarship, was established in 2006 to honor Dr. Pape’s service and dedication at UT Arlington as a member of the IE faculty. The Professor Emeritus was on-hand to present the scholarship to award winners Holly Lane, a senior, and Angel Decena-Guzman, a junior.
The final two scholarships that were presented were established by alumnus Keith Weiss. This year’s awardee for the Keith and Carolyn Weiss Industrial Engineering Scholarship was Harrison Armstrong. The Weiss Family Endowed Scholarship in Industrial Engineering was awarded to Ashvin Thomas.
After the scholarships were presented, Dr. Jamie Rogers presented the Industrial Engineers Outstanding Student Awards to Outstanding Senior, Adam Achkantana, and Outstanding Junior, Walter Joseph Multhur.
The last IE award presented was The Texas Industrial Engineering Lifetime Achievement Award which was created in alliance between Industrial Engineering departments at public universities that include UT Arlington, UT El Paso, Texas A&M University, Texas Tech University, the University of Houston, and Lamar University. These universities select awardees based on the impact of their career on society. This year’s winner was alumnus, Mr. George Pickett, for his long career as an IE and his innovations in the founding of Atlantic Southeast Airlines which was acquired by Delta Airlines in 1999 and survives today as ExpressJet, the world’s largest regional airline carrier.
Finally, the evening was capped with a big surprise as Dr. Jamie Rogers honored Dr. Don Liles with a plaque for excellence in service for more than three decades as a faculty in the IMSE department. All the attendees gave him a well-deserved standing ovation as he received his award. Dr. Liles served as Chair of the department from 1998 to 2012 and remains at the university as Professor and Academic Advisor for the Engineering Management and Systems Engineering programs.
The event was a wonderful success as the IMSE Department got to honor their graduating seniors and award winners for the first of what will hopefully become an annual event.
Check our 2013 IMSE Banquet Photo Album on Facebook!