Four from MechSE named Outstanding Advisors

Each year, the Engineering Council recognizes the top 10 percent of advisors across all disciplines of engineering. The Outstanding Advisor Award is chosen by undergraduate and graduate students in engineering.

This year, four from MechSE were awarded with this honor: Undergraduate Programs Coordinator Missy Biehl, Professor Geir Dullerud, Academic Advisor Stephanie Ott-Monsivais, and Associate Professor Sanjiv Sinha.

“To see our faculty and staff adding value to our undergraduates’ experience in a person-to-person way, and with such high priority that our students recognize their commitment to advising, is really heartening. I think they earned this recognition by consistently providing sound and helpful advice to students and surpassing our already high expectations. I’m really impressed by their dedication to serve our undergraduate mission, because we are all here, in part, to assist our nearly 1,000 undergraduates,” said Professor Tony Jacobi, MechSE department head.

Biehl has served as an academic advisor in the MechSE department for just over five years. She helps to coordinate department and student-led events, and facilitates and encourages student involvement in undergraduate programs. “I truly love my job and I am so proud of the students in our department!”

Dullerud, the W. Grafton and Lillian B. Wilkins Professor in MechSE, received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering from University of Toronto, and a PhD in information engineering from Cambridge University. He is a research professor for the Coordinated Science Laboratory and an affiliate of the Department of Computer Science. He has also been included in the List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by Their Students e numerous times during his tenure.

Ott-Monsivais is a MechSE PhD candidate, and has been with the MechSE department for a long time, as she was an undergraduate student at Illinois, and began working as an Academic Advisor for MechSE in August 2017. “I really appreciate that every student is unique and during each advising session I like to make sure the students I meet know all of the various class options/support services/life opportunities they have available so they can create a path that leads them where they want to be.”  Sinha received his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, and an MS and PhD in mechanical engineering from Stanford University. He was an Assistant Research Engineer for the Department

of Mechanical Engineering for the University of California, Berkley before he joined MechSE in 2008. He has been named to the List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by Their Students several times.

They will receive their awards at the College of Engineering Faculty Awards Ceremony on Monday, April 23.