April ’25 Awards & Recognitions

Congratulations to Firehiwot Gurara, one of the founding SLC members, for graduating with her PhD in December from Cornell University.

She was also selected as 1 of 30 awardees of the Inflection Award, given to the top young scientists in the world for their work on breakthrough solutions to climate change.

Check out her LinkedIn post for photographs and additional information.

Congratulations to Purdue Ph.D. student Kenny Chandra Wijaya, and co-authors Dr. Prasanna Humagain and Dr. Nadia Gkritza for their most recent publication “Public Preferences for Stationary Wired and Dynamic Wireless Electric Vehicle Charging Technologies.” Their work is currently published in Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment!

Click here to read the publication!

Purdue University LSCCE graduate student Lyndsey Harris has been selected by the Indianapolis Women’s Transportation Seminar Chapter as the recipient of the Helene M. Overly Memorial Scholarship. The scholarship is awarded annually to inspire and support women who aspire to pursue a career path in transportation. Way to go Lindsey!

Foeday Zinnah, USU Engineering Education Ph.D. student, and faculty mentor Dr. Angela Minichiello presented their research findings on “The Role of Non-Degree Credentials in Developing a Sustainable Workforce in Electrified Transportation Infrastructure” at the Intermountain Sustainability Summit on March 20, 2025. Congrats!

Sajid Hasnat recently had the honor to win ‘Master’s Researcher of the Year 2024’ award at a college level at Utah State University and has been nominated for the corresponding university level award. Prior to that, he also won the same prize at a departmental level. Congratulations Sajid!

A team of students and faculty from ASPIRE at Utah State University has been accepted to participate in the final event of the International Future Energy Challenge (IFEC), which will be held in Taiwan this summer. Out of the twelve teams that participated in the semifinals in March, the USU team is one of eight that were selected to participate in the challenge final competition, with this year’s topic being creation of an isolated DC-DC converter with a fast transient response and low noise level.

Khurram Afridi was promoted to Full Professor as of November 1, 2024. This is great news! Congratulations Khurram!

We would like to congratulate Prof. Hongjie Wang for receiving tenure and promotion to Associate Professor. Congrats Hongjie!

Last year, Scott Trimboli was  promoted to full Professor and has recently been selected to be Chair of the Department of Electrical and  Computer Engineering at UCCS, effective 1 July 2025. Congratulations Scott!

We are thrilled to announce that Nadia Gkritza graduated from the ELATES at Drexel program! Nadia has had the chance to be part of a supportive and dynamic learning community. She’s had the privilege of collaborating, sharing ideas, and growing a lot. Congratulations Nadia!

Greg Droge received tenure and promotion this month at USU! Congratulations Greg!

As another school year closes out, we’d like to congratulate Emma Mecham for her promotion to Professional Practice Associate Professor in USU’s School of Teacher Education and Leadership! This is only the most recent of her achievements and recognitions for faculty excellence at USU. Congratulations Emma!

Brandon Allen is the new Pathways Project lead with Jennifer Ramos-Chavez as co-lead. Congratulations Brandon! Brandon is an Assistant Research Professor at Purdue University. He earned his PHD in Agricultural Sciences Education and Communication. Brandon has been with ASPIRE for the last 2 years as the Director for Diversity and Culture of Inclusion.

Sivaranjani “Siva” Seetharaman is the new co-lead for System of Systems. Congratulations Siva! Siva earned her Postdoctoral Fellow in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Siva is an Assistant Professor at Purdue University.