Dayton Engineer

By Karen Updyke, School of Engineering

The University of Dayton School of Engineering Vision Awards recognize the innovation, creativity, entrepreneurial thinking and outstanding performance of our faculty and staff for their work as it relates to our School's values of community, innovation, excellence, and engagement and service. Four Vision Awards are presented annually: Community, Innovation, Scholarship, and Engagement and Service.

2022 Vision Award for Excellence in Community — Scott Schneider

Several who nominated Scott Schneider for excellence in community detailed the myriad of ways that he has led, and continues to lead, in the Marianist spirit.

In particular, Schneider consistently models characteristics of inclusive leadership such as deeply listening to others, soliciting and elevating voices that are often overlooked, and acting with humility. These leadership qualities are evidenced in his recruitment of diverse students and faculty, reflective decision-making that utilizes subsidiarity, contributions to unifying two departments, guiding that unified department in its vocation to better serve the community, and intercultural mentorship of students. Additionally, Schneider engages in community-engaged, experiential learning throughout his career and continues to advance community-engaged learning for the common good as the inaugural Ethos Professor for Leadership in Community. When there was a need, Schneider selflessly answered the call to serve and lead the Department of Engineering Management Systems and Technology again, while also serving in his new role in The Ethos Center. His commitment to the Marianist traditions of community and inclusion and to the School of Engineering are greatly appreciated.

Congratulations on this recognition, Scott Schneider, and thank you for your contributions to the School of Engineering!

2022 Vision Award for Excellence in Engagement and Service — Kim Bigelow and also to the team of Mary Harbach and Rachael Kiplinger

Kim Bigelow’s nomination detailed numerous amazing ways that she continually demonstrates servant leadership.

The impact of her servant leadership is strongly evidenced in her scholarly activities, student mentorship, teaching practice and profession. Bigelow has served as a mentor to over one hundred undergraduate engineering students and has helped them to develop into servant leaders. Her nominator wrote: “Dr. Bigelow has created an environment where her students can be completely responsible for bringing their ideas to life and in turn impacting others in doing so.” For instance, she mentored and empowered two multi-ethnic engineering students in her lab to create a Black Biomechanics Speakers Series, and another student researcher whom she mentored created the “Adaptive Toy Event.” Bigelow develops the capacity of others to be servant leaders. She has made significant contributions to broadening the participation of multi-ethnic and women students in engineering through your teaching, scholarship and service. Her commitment to servant leadership in the School of Engineering and the profession are greatly appreciated.

Congratulations on this recognition, Kim Bigelow, and thank you for your contributions to the School of Engineering!

The nominators of Mary Harbach and Rachael Kiplinger highlighted how they willingly demonstrated servant leadership by navigating a challenging and uncertain engineering workforce during a leadership transition within the Engineering Co-op Office. During this transition, the Harbach / Kiplinger team worked creatively to sustain and adapt the engineering cooperative education program and its students, industry relationships, and curriculum. By reading the signs of the times and responding through adaptation and change, they affirmed the Marianist traditions with their tremendous engagement and service to the co-op program and strengthened this pivotal experiential learning opportunity. Your commitments to servant leadership in the School of Engineering and the profession are greatly appreciated. 

Congratulations on this recognition, Mary Harbach and Rachael Kiplinger, and thank you for your contributions to the School of Engineering! 

2022 Vision Award for Excellence in Scholarship — Kiego Hirakawa

Keigo Hirakawa received strong nominations for this award, which highlighted how his scholarly contributions increased the prominence of the University of Dayton’s research in vision systems.  In particular, the influence and impact of your research on digital camera technology; your publications in top-tier journals within your discipline; best paper awards; several invited keynote presentations at premier international conferences; government and commercial sponsored research; and most importantly, your quality and direct mentorship of students is to be commended. Additionally, your nominators noted that your innovative research is exceeding the frontiers of what can be accomplished in computational imaging devices, and within the field of computational imaging, your citations exceed 2600. Above all, your stellar scholarship has been accomplished in the Marianist spirit of collaboration and authentic care for students and colleagues.

Congratulations on this recognition, Keigo Hirakawa, and thank you for your contributions to the School, the University, your profession and society!

2022 Vision Award for Excellence in Innovation — Erick Vasquez

The nomination for Erick Vasquez included letters of support from colleagues and students, describing his novel, high-impact pedagogical contributions that foster student learning, engagement, development and success. Vasquez demonstrates leadership in teaching by implementing a variety of best practices such as collaborative learning, active learning, open-ended, problem-based learning and community engaged learning. One nominator wrote: “His innovative pedagogical and scholarship endeavors mirror his values of continuous improvement, service for the common good and true care for others.” His collaborations with the Ethos and Visioneering Centers established reciprocal partnerships with the Rich Earth Institute and the Greene County Environmental Service Division, while augmenting an experiential, hands-on laboratory with innovative entrepreneurially-minded learning. 

Notably, as Vasquez advanced his teaching practice, he also enhanced engineering education, inspired student success and vocation, and positively influenced the pedagogy of colleagues through his scholarship of teaching, learning, and mentorship. Vasquez published several peer-reviewed articles and conference papers on scholarship of teaching and learning with the Journal of Chemical Engineering Education, ASEE, and the KEEN National Conference. His innovative pedagogy also earned him recognition as a KEEN Community Catalyst from the KEEN Network, and his conference presentations and Engineering Unleashed Card are well regarded. We look forward to his future advancements in engineering education and student success with his recently awarded NSF Research Initiation in Engineering Formation grant with Scott Schneider, which focuses on understanding student development of intercultural competence from different pedagogical methods. His commitment to student learning and to the School of Engineering are greatly appreciated.

Congratulations on this recognition, Erick Vasquez, and thank you for your contributions to the School of Engineering!

 (pictured l-r: Mary Harbach, Rachael Kiplinger, Scott Schneider, Kim Bigelow, Keigo Hirakawa and Erick Vasquez)