The Ivan B. Rahn Education Award, established in 1995, recognizes distinguished contributions to the educational activities within SME and is open to all SME members who have shown long-term interest in and have significantly contributed to SME activities relating to ABET, student affairs, continuing education, professional registration and/or the Council of Education.

Sweigard has been active in all aspects of mining engineering education over the past three decades. In addition to his roles as associate dean, professor, and former chair of the Department of Mining Engineering, he has a prominent role at ABET and has served or chaired nearly all the mining engineering education committees at SME.

Sweigard earned a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Drexel University in Philadelphia and received a master’s degree in geology and a Ph.D. in mining engineering from The Pennsylvania State University. Sweigard has served as associate dean at the University of Kentucky since 2007, and was recently named dean of engineering at the University of Memphis in Memphis, Tenn. and will assume that position in June of this year.

Dr. Joe Sottile

Rick Honaker, chair of the Department of Mining Engineering, has announced professor Joseph Sottile is the 2012 recipient of the Stephen McCann Award for Excellence in Education. The award is issued by the Pittsburg Coal Mining Institute and Sottile was selected at a recent meeting.

“Dr. Sottile has dedicated his professional career to ensuring the delivery of quality education for the students in our program and the students taking his courses,” said Honaker. “It is a much deserved award.”

Sottile has been on the College of Engineering faculty since 1991. He holds a joint appointment with the Department of Mining Engineering and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Sottile has served as the Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Department of Mining Engineering since 2000.

The MEC Award recognizes the outstanding efforts of a SME Student Chapter on a college campus and their faculty advisor for their accomplishments in community outreach and mining/mineral education to serve the mission of the MEC. The UK chapter received the award on the basis of their outstanding efforts in educating the community about the importance of mining, their participation in various community fundraisers and their outreach activities which included the National Science Conference (NSTA), Boy Scouts of America and many more.

Winners of the SME Outstanding Student Chapter Contest are chosen based upon their activities and events held throughout the school year. UK’s student chapter will be presented with the award at SME’s annual meeting, to commence this February in Denver. They will receive a $500 cash award, a certificate of recognition and a ticket to the awards banquet at the SME annual meeting.

“Congratulations to the student chapter, the officers and faculty advisor Kyle Perry,” said Honaker. “I especially thank Katie Gardner for her outstanding leadership and hard work.”

Gardner, who served as the chapter’s president last year, was elated by the news.

“We are extremely excited to have won this award as it reflects the hard work and dedication by the students involved.”

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The purpose of the event is to simulate an actual underground mine disaster, giving rescue teams a chance to stay sharp in the event of an actual emergency. Fifty-seven mine rescue teams from 10 states will compete.

The contests will be held at the Lexington Convention Center Heritage Hall, beginning at 8:00 a.m. each day. The public is welcome to attend. Visitors are also encouraged to visit Ginny, who is thought to be the world’s first dog specifically trained for coal mine search and rescue. The brindle-colored Dutch Shepherd possesses a vertical jump of six feet and is trained to search for missing, trapped, injured or unresponsive humans in unstable conditions or confined areas.

For more information contact:

Geaunita Caylor

cell 859-494-1621

gcaylor@engr.uky.edu

For many students, selecting a major is an intimidating proposition. What if I end up disliking what I chose? Will I be doomed to a career in a field I can’t stand or, worse, one that is increasingly obsolete? Such questions are not uncommon and even selecting a highly-marketable major like engineering doesn’t fully resolve the quandary. After all, there are numerous disciplines within the broad field of engineering and even more particularized specializations within each discipline. Should I investigate aerospace applications for engineering or try my hand at new network solutions? It can be overwhelming.

How can students evaluate their numerous options in a way that takes into account their interests, life experiences and educational opportunities? Members of the faculty in the UK College of Engineering have related the various ways in which they discovered what they wanted to immerse themselves in for the rest of their professional lives. We have organized their reflections into five categories.

BE CURIOUS: David Puleo, Director, Center for Biomedical Engineering

For most of his youth, David Puleo wanted to be a surgeon; however, upon entering high school, he realized his strong interest in medicine was matched by an equal fascination with technology and engineering concepts. One day, while reading, he came across the words “biomedical engineering.” Intrigued, he began to conduct research and discovered an organization called the Biomedical Engineering Society. He wrote them, asking, “What is biomedical engineering and where can I study it?” After examining the literature they sent him, Dr. Puleo knew the career path he wanted to take. “Biomedical engineering was the marriage of the medical and the technical that I had wanted,” he says. “And it still offered the potential to go to medical school if I ever desired to pursue it.”

Following your curiosity can lead you into new fields and communities you might not have known existed. With the wealth of information available through internet research, it has never been easier to discover previously unknown career opportunities.

REFLECT ON YOUR BACKGROUND: Nikiforos Stamatiadis, Professor of Civil Engineering

Growing up in Greece, Nikiforos Stamatiadis was fascinated by public transportation. The ability to accommodate large groups of people within a networked infrastructure drew him to study transportation engineering. During his undergraduate studies in Greece, he helped develop efficient bus routes and systems. Upon beginning a graduate program in the United States, he quickly discovered that, broadly speaking, the U.S. doesn’t rely on public transportation. As a result, he shifted his attention to other aspects of transportation engineering, such as driver licensing, driver education and highway safety; those issues, like public transportation, affect thousands of people every day. “At the end of the day, if I design a safe highway that serves the needs of the community, accommodates mobility concerns and is conscientious of our impact upon the environment, I consider that time spent very rewarding.”

When connecting your experience to possible career options, don’t overlook your childhood, adolescence, geographical location, hobbies, etc. They may provide clues as to what subjects naturally keep you interested.

ACCUMULATE EXPERIENCES: Christine Trinkle, Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering

Christine Trinkle obtained B.S. and M.S. degrees in mechanical engineering right here at UK, but it wasn’t until she was pursuing her Ph.D at Cal-Berkeley that she began to see the shape of her future research. She recalls, “When I went to Berkeley, my interest wasn’t on the biological side, but one day I decided to grab some coffee and head to a talk with some friends. It was on the interface between the mechanical engineering side and the needs in the medical, pharmaceutical and biological areas. I remember sitting in this talk and thinking, ‘This is amazing! This is such an interesting and unique part of mechanical engineering that I had never seen before and had never guessed was there.’”

Attending lectures, visiting trade shows and taking advantage of student travel opportunities to annual conferences is a great way to accumulate experiences, some of which will influence your course of study and future vocational choices.

SEEK OUT PROFESSORS WHO LOVE THEIR WORK: Braden Lusk, Assistant Professor of Mining Engineering

Like most young boys, Braden Lusk enjoyed setting off fireworks and creating small explosions, but never planned on becoming a professional blaster until he sat in professor Paul Worsey’s blasting seminar while an undergraduate student at Missouri-Rolla (now Missouri S&T). Lusk recalls: “Paul came in and played a video called ‘Dance of the Detonators.’ It was nothing but mine blasts set to classical music. The whole time, he was in the back of the room, laughing like he had never seen it before, and I thought, ‘Man, this is crazy…I’ve got to do this!’” As a result, Lusk began taking as many of Dr. Worsey’s classes as he could.

Most professors relish the chance to work with students on research—especially undergraduate students. Take advantage of office hours and other opportunities to connect with professors. The satisfaction they find in their research may become infectious.

SEIZE OPPORTUNITIES: Thomas Novak, Alliance Coal Chair Professor of Mining Engineering

After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, Tom Novak was recruited by the U.S. Bureau of Mines in Pittsburgh, where he first began to research mine safety. While with the Bureau, an unforeseen opening emerged. “The Bureau of Mines offered a program where I could earn a graduate degree while working for them. I already had an electrical engineering background, so I got a master’s degree in mining engineering from the University of Pittsburgh,” he recalls. After that, the educational opportunities continued to present themselves. “Once I had my master’s degree, Penn State contacted me about being an instructor of their mining technology courses. In return, I got time off to pursue my Ph.D. coursework and research. I jumped at that chance.”

Novak chuckles when he thinks about his diverse professional experience. “There’s really no such thing as long-range planning,” he says. “If, when I was in high school, you would have told me I would be a university professor for over 30 years, I would have said you were nuts! But I took advantage of opportunities when they were there.”

One aspect of the grant involves researching high wall stability and the effects of ground vibrations upon it—typically due to blasting. The team, led by Dr. Perry, plans to monitor high walls (any vertical face at a mine) for displacement and correlate it with ground vibrations that might have caused the movement. Aided by seismographs, blast records and a laser scanning able to create a point cloud of the wall, Dr. Perry will be able to create a model able to inform mining engineers about the vulnerability of their high walls relative to their blasting amplitude.

The other part of the grant is intended to investigate the benefit of LED lighting technology in underground coal mines. LED lights have the potential to give engineers a different picture of what they see compared to normal incandescent or halogen lighting. The team will incorporate a bank of LED lights onto roof bolting machines and determine if the different quality of light allows technicians to identify places where extra roof bolts are needed.

“Both parts of the grant are designed to increase the level of safety at underground and surface mines,” says Dr. Perry. “We hope our findings on high wall stability and LED lighting can prevent any unfortunate and unnecessary accidents.”

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