Question of the Month
This issue of E-News celebrates a few of our graduating students. As they and others leave U.Va. to pursue further study or to begin their professional careers,
What advice to you have to offer them?
I look forward to hearing from you,
Jim Aylor, Dean
Timothy Higgins, Andrew Andreae and Jessica Ungerleider, fourth-year students who comprise the HD MicroSampling Team, won three business plan competitions in two days this May for their design of a virtually painless way to take blood samples. The team split up to compete and win the Jefferson Entrepreneurship Team Competition at U.Va., and the people’s choice award at the Charlotte Venture Challenge the same day. The next day the team competed and won the grand prize at the Governor’s Business Plan Challenge in Richmond. Previously the team won first place in the SEAS Entrepreneurial Concept Competition and second place at the U.Va. Entrepreneurship Cup. (More)
Two graduating fourth-year students will use a Davis Projects for Peace award to help educate poor and oppressed women in Tanzania. Lacey Williams is a biomedical engineering major and Carolyn Pelnik is a major in engineering science and public policy. Pelnik is also a first-year student in the accelerated Master of Public Policy program in the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy. Also, she was recently named as one of the 2013 SEAS Outstanding Students of the Year. (More)
Three fourth-year biomedical engineering students are researching new design approaches for coils used to treat aneurysms in the brain. Students Brian Griffin, Molly Jenner and Shipra Maheshwari received an undergraduate research grant from Human Focused Testing, a commercial research-assistance firm, to develop a model that will enable, for the first time, in vitro testing of the effects of coil design and aneurysm geometry on cellular responses to coil embolization. The students are working with Brian Helmke, associate professor of biomedical engineering, and Dr. Avery Evans, professor of radiology, neurology and neurological surgery in the School of Medicine. (More)
Jeff O’Dell’s goal as an engineer is to make life better for soldiers, and he knows how to do that from the inside. O’Dell is a soldier. He also is a fourth year mechanical engineering student who has devoted his undergraduate research career to developing better armor – for the body and for vehicles – while serving in the 278th Armored Cavalry, a unit of the Tennessee National Guard. O’Dell’s four-year degree has taken six years to accomplish, but he has no complaints. He is devoted to the military – a 10-year career, so far, that began as a four-year regular Army commitment beginning in 2003 that included a posting in Alaska and a tour in Iraq. (More)
Civil and environmental engineering fourth-year undergraduate Rowan Sprague used a 2012 Harrison Undergraduate Research Award to support research on how to protect honeybees from small hive beetles. Though she has not yet built a successful beetle trap, and she discovered the beetles are a lot smarter than she thought they were, she continues to be interested in the intersection of engineering and agriculture. Next, she hopes to study ecological engineering in New Zealand to research ways to manipulate agricultural systems to benefit honeybee populations. (More)
Taylor C. Demeter, a fourth-year chemical engineering student with a minor in engineering business, has apparently discovered ways to add more hours to each day in order to attend to all his many interests. He served as the director of the U.Va. Student Chapter of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers and founded the chapter’s Corporate and Alumni Relations Committee, and was involved in the Biomass Test Burn Research Group. He also was co-chair of the Hereford College Student Senate, worked as a U.Va. Transit bus driver and volunteers as a firefighter for the Seminole Trail Volunteer Fire Department in Albemarle County for roughly 20 hours a week. (More)
Of Note
The undergraduate population next year is expected to be 2,507 students, up from 2,462 last year. Ninety seven percent of incoming students are in the top 10 percent of their high school class. Thirty-three percent are female. The combined SAT score for incoming students is 1410.
