The Department of Aerospace Engineering honored ten graduating seniors in the Fall 2023 commencement with department academic awards. Both Academic Excellence and Overall Achievement honors were conferred. All are pictured below with Professor and Interim Chair Partha Sarkar.
Academic Excellence Awards
Chase Field served as a department peer mentor and completed an internship with ICEYE US (an earth observation company),Tenneco and Honeywell International, and will be employed by Honeywell Aerospace as a systems engineer.
Cooper Lind has been part of Alpha Lamba Delta and Tau Beta Pi engineering honor societies. He participated in a co-op with the Timken Co. and will begin employment there in the product engineering department.
Jessica Melville completes her undergraduate education as part of the Iowa State University honors program and as a member of the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society. She served as outreach chair and corporate relations director of the Iowa State chapter of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE). She also took part in the SWE Collegiate Leadership Institute and participated in undergraduate research in AerE. She completed internships with Collins Aerospace and Spirit AeroSystems and will be employed by Spirit following graduation.
Overall Achievement Awards
Andrew Barloon was active in Iowa State’s Cyclone Rocketry student organization, serving as high altitude research vehicle lead, and was Honeywell contract project lead and organization president. He participated in internships with Collins Aerospace and Blue Origin and will become a structural design engineer with Blue Origin after graduation.
Ellie Diersen participated in a study abroad program at Brunel University in England. She was part of the College of Engineering honors program and was part of the Tau Beta Pi engineering honor society, where she was a small group leader; and was a member of the Alpha Lambda Delta Phi Eta Sigma national honor society. Ellie was part of Iowa State’s Women in Science and Engineering organization and the university’s Society of Women Engineers chapter and was a team leader with the department’s OpenUAS program. Extracurricular activities included participation in the Cyclone Marching Band. She was a Collins Aerospace student ambassador, completed both a co-op and internship with Collins and will go to work there following graduation.
Bradenn Droegmiller was part of the university honors program, the Tau Beta Pi engineering honor society and ISU’s Cardinal Key honor society. He was part of the propulsion team with the Cyclone Rocketry student organization, strategy manager with the PrISUm solar car team and was an energy research assistant through the university honors program. Bradenn was active with the Farm House Fraternity, SolidWorks, CAD Club and the Cardinal Space Mining group. He was an Engineering ambassador and an Aerospace Engineering peer mentor. Following graduation he will serve as a research and development engineer at Northrop Grumman in nondestructive inspection systems development.
Victoria Fleming was named the College of Engineering Outstanding Senior representing the Department of Aerospace Engineering for the fall 2023 commencement, in addition to receiving the department’s Overall Achievement award. She participated in a study abroad program at Politecnico di Torino in Italy and will take part in a study abroad in Australia in the winter of the 2023-24. She was vice president of the ISU Diving Club, secretary of the university’s Society of Women Engineers chapter and was a dorm floor treasurer. She was involved in Unpiloted Aerial Systems research at Iowa State. Victoria completed internships with The Boeing Company, Collins Aerospace and Lockheed Martin and has been hired by Lockheed Martin for work on its F-35 Lightning II program.
Evelyn Moyer was part of a study abroad program at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and completed internships with Altec, Inc., Honeywell Federal Manufacturing & Technologies and Woodward, Inc. She took part in the department’s OpenUAS program and was president and intramural chair of the Sadler House. After graduation she will work for Relativity Space as a nondestructive testing engineer.
Joseph Schendel completed internships with Altec, Inc. and Collins Aerospace and was part of the Tau Beta Pi engineering honor society, where he served as president and vice president. He also served as the program leader for first year engineering honors students. Following graduation he will begin employment at Collins Aerospace.
Hunter Underwood has been part of the Sigma Gamma Tau aerospace engineering honor society and the Alpha Lamba Delta honorary leadership society. He was active in the department’s Make To Innovate (M:2:I) program, where he received the Project Whisperer Award, the Most Improved Project Award and the TA Choice Award; and was the operations lead for the M:2:I RASC-AL team. Hunter was also involved with the NASA-sponsored Micro-G NExT student design program and was part of an experimental design certificate. He was honored with a College of Engineering award for best outreach event, and was on the College of Engineering Dean’s List on several occasions. The Cyclone Rocketry student organization, Stand-Up Comedy Club, Society of Automotive Engineers chapter, ISU Ski & Snowboard Club and ISU Baseball Club all saw participation by Hunter. Internships were done with Collins Aerospace and the NASA Johnson Space Center. He will begin work for Collins Aerospace and will be pursuing a master’s degree at Iowa State.