Menu
The 2024 Duncan Fraser Award Committee along with the IFEES Executive Committee is pleased to announce Daniel B. Oerther as the 2024 Award recipient.
Dr. Oerther redefined the practice of environmental engineering as solving the problems of planetary health. A pioneer in convergence research, Dan’s leadership of interprofessional education at the interface of engineering and nursing to produce V-shaped professionals – those who span disciplines to solve grand societal challenges – is transforming engineering education around the world. As a three-time Fulbright Scholar, he’s taught in India, Brazil, and the United Kingdom, where he is a Chartered Engineer and a Chartered Environmentalist. In the United States, Dr. Oerther leads the environmental engineering and science profession as the Executive Director of the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists.
The 2024 Global Award was presented at the IFEES annual awards dinner during the World Engineering Education Forum (WEEF) in Sydney, Australia from December 2 – 5, 2024. The award recipient will receive a one-time monetary prize of US $1,000, an award, a travel stipend for an economy round-trip ticket, and lodging at our WEEF 2024 conference hotel in Sydney.
The latter days of apartheid were the backdrop for the beginning of Fraser’s career. In an increasingly diverse classroom, Fraser was devoted to the success of all students–particularly those from poor educational backgrounds. After a series of trial and error early in his career, Fraser successfully adapted methods that he learned through the literature on minority engineering programs in the USA to develop collaborative study groups, which led to a breakthrough with his students.
Soon after, Fraser was invited to design the UCT’s engineering programs and helped overhaul the curriculum. He became a mentor to many academic staff members and spearheaded the UCT’s Centre for Research in Engineering Education. Fraser’s work expanded beyond South Africa’s borders following a fortuitous meeting with FUnso Falade at the Global Congress on Engineering Education in Poland in 1998. Together, they began the formation of the AEEA, which was formally established in 2006. Two years later, the UCT became the first institution to hold an IFEES Summit in Africa, which deepened the relationship between IFEES and the AEEA. Fraser would have been proud to see the progress in engineering education in Africa. Those who knew Fraser often commented on his humility, which was inspired by his spiritually-driven character. For Fraser, any glory achieved goes to God; he felt that his passion for Africa, for students and for engineering education were gifts from God. This is what made Duncan Fraser an excellent educator, who cared more for the empowerment of students than his own position of power. 
Dr. Cukierman’s remarkable career spanning over four decades is marked by his unwavering commitment to STEM education and engineering innovation. His parallel career as an Electronic Engineer and entrepreneur, along with his pivotal contributions to networking systems, showcases his multidimensional impact. His global leadership, from chairing the Microsoft Research Latin-American Advisory Board to his roles in iNEER, GEDC, IFEES, and IGIP, has elevated engineering education on a grand scale.
Dr. Uriel Cukierman has dedicated himself to STEM education since his earliest youth. He was only 21 years old when he began his teaching experience in a technical vocational school. He developed, in parallel, a very prolific professional activity, first as an electronic technician and, later on, as an electronic engineer; this activity fed his pedagogical practices with solid technical grounds. He was always interested in linking the practical engineering profession with the technical aspects learned by his students in classrooms and labs. This early education activity led to a very prolific academic life spanning 42 years at the secondary (high school), undergraduate and graduate levels, both in public and private institutions, and which promises to continue for many years to come.
His beginnings occurred in a public technical vocational school and then continued in an international education organization (ORT) in which he was appointed to create and direct the Electronic Department. During these years, Uriel developed a parallel and part time professional activity as an Electronic Engineer and entrepreneur, founding a small private firm specialized in multimedia which, during those years, was a technological boom.
During this period of time, and while he was still an engineering student, he began his academic activity at the university as a student teaching assistant. In this position, he was voted by his peers to represent them in the Department Council. Uriel earned his Professional Engineer Degree in 1988.
In 1993, after 12 years of continuous teaching in the secondary level, he resigned his previously mentioned position at the secondary school and decided to dedicate full-time to his own firm.
In 1997 he decided to dedicate himself entirely to the University life by performing both academic and professional activities there. The academic activity was mainly lecturing and, in his professional role, he led the creation of the University Data and Communication Networking System. It is important to notice in this point, that the National Technological University, in which he has been working for the last 38 years, is the biggest engineering university in Argentina with almost 80,000 students distributed in 30 campuses all over the Argentinean country. Hence, the Networking System previously mentioned is an important Wide Area Network (WAN) which supports several services such as Internet access, web and mail services, voice and video communications, etc. In this position he was the person in charge of connecting Argentina, for the first time ever, to the Advance Performance Network, namely Internet2®.
Eventually, Uriel became the ICT Secretary (position equivalent to vice-chancellor reporting directly to the Chancellor) since 2012, when he was appointed as the Engineering Dean at the private University of Palermo. During this period (1997-2012) he was the founder of the first National Educational Videoconferencing Network and the Global Virtual Campus, an LMS system that is still serving tens of thousands of students and faculties in all the UTN campuses. It was during this period that he also participated in the Executive Committee of the National Interconnection Network in the position of Secretary and also in the National Distance Education Network in the position of co-coordinator. Both networks serving the whole university system in Argentina.
In 2001 Uriel was selected as one of the seven LA members of the Microsoft Research Latin-American Advisory Board and, eventually, became its chair. This activity was probably the first important milestone in his involvement in engineering education in the international field. In 2006 he became a Leadership Council member at the International Network for Engineering Education and Research (iNEER) and, afterwards, a Technical Committee member of the Latin American and Caribbean Collaborative ICT Research Federation Virtual Institute. He has been a member of the GEDC Executive Committee between 2013 and 2016 and also a member of the IFEES Executive Committee between 2013 and 2019, including the position of President and VP of Capacity Building member.
Currently he is a member of the International Association for Engineering Pedagogy (IGIP) and the President of the Argentinian section of this organization. He is also a founding member of the Institute for Engineering Education in the Argentinian Academy of Engineering.
In 2012 he organized and co-chaired one of the most successful World Engineering Education Forums (WEEF) which took place in the city of Buenos Aires in Argentina.
In 2016 he founded the Center for Educational Research and Innovation (CIIE) at UTN and he has been its Director since that moment on. He is currently also a member of the Argentinean Engineering Deans Federation (CONFEDI) where he has had an active role in the development of the new engineering accreditation standard.
Uriel has also been appointed as a Research Professor at the University of New Mexico, USA. Also, recently awarded as “Distinguished Educator” by the IOEM, “Honorary Professor” by the Universidad Ricardo Palma in Lima, Peru and International Engineering Educator Honoris Causa and Senior Member by IGIP (Austria).
He has served as a lecturer in seminars, courses and other specialized activities throughout Argentina and around the world. Wrote and published several original technical documents in different newspapers, journals and magazines in Argentina and in other countries. Produced four books about Learning Technologies and Engineering Education, one of which was published by Pearson. Authored five book chapters and more than 70 academic and scientific papers in refereed journals and conferences. He is also the Editor in chief of the International Journal of Online and Biomedical Engineering (iJOE).
Dr. Singh has revolutionized electrical and computer engineering (ECE) education by engaging ECE students and community members around the world in humanitarian engineering projects.
Dr. Singh has become a recognized world leader in ECE-related humanitarian technology education. He was invited to serve as the Education Committee chair of the IEEE’s Special Interest Group in Humanitarian Technology (SIGHT) for 2017-2019, as 2020 Chair of the Assessment Training Ad-hoc Subcommittee, and as Vice Chair of IEEE’s Smart Village Education Committee for 2020-2021. He has also been asked to lead a Community of Practice in Technology-Based Quality Education for the IEEE Humanitarian Activities Committee (HAC) for 2021.
He has published over 35 papers, many with his students, at various IEEE international conferences presenting and sharing his work with fellow ECE faculty and community members. His innovative work in ECE-related humanitarian technology education has been supported through four course and curriculum development grants through Venture Well for a total of >$100,000. His humanitarian development project work has been funded through several grants with total funding of >$500,000 through various foundations and the IEEE HAC, SIGHT and Smart Village programs. He has successfully raised funding of >$150,000 to provide connectivity to the schools on the two most populated islands of the Galapagos archipelago – Santa Cruz and San Cristobal – and has directed his students to develop the web and server interfaces to store and access the educational resources posted on the servers. Furthermore, he and his students and those from ESPOL have conducted workshops on electronics and digital literacy on the Galapagos Islands to inspire the high school students to consider Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) careers. He has been particularly proactive in engaging female students in these projects.
His leadership and impact in humanitarian engineering education is well exemplified by his work with the Bluefields Indian and Caribbean University (BICU) in Bluefields, Nicaragua.
Dr. William Oakes is currently the 150th Anniversary Professor, Director, EPICS Program, and Professor, Engineering Education.
Professor William (Bill) Oakes is an internationally recognized leader in engineering education and community-engaged learning. He has dedicated his career to improving the ways students learn engineering and to integrating engineering education with engagement in underserved communities globally. He has directly taught over 9,000 students in courses ranging from core first-year courses to upper-level design courses, and honors courses. Prof. Oakes has conducted 117 workshops for teachers and faculty in 19 countries that engaged over 4,000 participants from 35 countries. Through his work in the Engineering Projects in Community Service (EPICS) program, he has impacted more than 18,000 students at Purdue University, more than 40,000 students through the EPICS Consortium, and more than 11,000 students through the EPICS in IEEE Partnership. Prof. Oakes is one of the founders of the School of Engineering Education at Purdue, which was the first engineering education school in the world. He has integrated his scholarship into education, publishing 120 refereed journal and conference papers on teaching, learning, and engagement, as well as 13 books and book chapters. He is an internationally known expert in teaching and engagement and sought-after speaker on community engaged learning.
Dr. Sheryl Sorby is currently a Professor of Engineering Education at the University of Cincinnati. Dr. Sorby has a well-established research program in spatial visualization and has been actively involved in the development of various other educational programs.
Dr. Sheryl Sorby is currently a Professor of Engineering Educaton at the University of Cincinnati. She was a Fulbright Scholar at the Dublin Institute of Technology in Dublin, Ireland conducting researh in engineering education and is a professor emerita of Mechanical Engineering-Engineering Mechanics at Michigan Technological University. She is the PI or coPI on more than $14M in grant funding, most for educational projects. She is the former Associate Dean for Academic Programs in the College of Engineering at Michigan Tech and served at the National Science Foundataion as a Program Director in the Division of Undergraduate Education for nearly three years. Prior to her appointment as Associate Dean, Dr. Sorby served as chair of the Engineering Fundamentals Department at Michigan Tech. In this capacity, she was responsible for the development and delivery of the newly adopted First Year Engineering Program at Michigan Tech. She received a BS in Civil Engineering, an MS in Engineering Mechanics, and a PhD in Mechanical Engineering-Engineering Mechanics, all from Michigan Tech.
Dr. Sorby has a well-established research program in spatial visualization and has been actively involved in the development of various other educational programs. She received her first grant from the National Science Foundation in 1993 to develop a course and course materials for helping engineering students to develop their 3-D spatial skills. She has received numberous follow-up grants from the NSF and the US Department of Education to further her work in developing and assessing spatial skills. Her spatial skills curriculum has been adopted by nearly 30 engineering programs across the U. S. In 2005 she received the Betty Vetter award for Research on Women in Engineering through the Women in Engineering Pro-Active Network (WEPAN) for her work in improving the 3-D spatial skills of engineering students. She received ASEE’s Sharon Keillor award for Outstanding Woman Engineering Educator in 2011. She is a Fellow of the Americaon Society for Engineering Education and is the current President of ASEE. She has published more than 150 papers in journals and conference proceedings and is the author of seven textbooks.
Dr. Sheryl was honored during our WEEF/GEDC 2020 Virtual Conference held November 16-19 and will be honored live during the WEEF/GEDC 2021 Conference in Madrid, Spain. As a recipient, she will receive US $1,000 to support her work and a commemorative medal. Her airfare, accommodations and conference registration are also included.
Dr. Sushma S. Kulkarni is the Director of Rajarambapu Institute of Technology in Maharashtra, India. She has 32 years of teaching experience in civil engineering programs and her areas of interest include concrete technology, TQM, quality circles, construction management, watershed management, OBE and women’s empowerment.
In recognition of her work changing the landscape of engineering education around the world, IFEES will honor Sushma Kulkarni (India) with the 2019 IFEES Duncan Fraser Global Award for Excellence in Engineering Education.
Dr. Sushma S. Kulkarni is the Director of Rajarambapu Institute of Technology in Maharashtra, India. She received her Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from Shivaji University in Kolhapur, India. She has 32 years of teaching experience in civil engineering programs and her areas of interest include concrete technology, TQM, quality circles, construction management, watershed management, OBE and women’s empowerment. Dr. Kulkarni has contributed to more than 85 research papers and has two patents provisionally registered (on “Pond Ash” and “Academics with ICT”). She has guided six Ph.D. students and more than 57 under-graduate and post-graduate student projects.
Dr. Kulkarni has visited universities around the world to study engineering education systems. In 2015, she was invited to be a jury member for the Airbus GEDC Diversity Award in Australia. She was also a keynote speaker at the Asian Engineering Education Conference in 2016 in China and was a panelist at GEDC 2019 Niagara Falls. She is also on the GEDC Executive Committee, has contributed to various professional boards including IUCEE and ISTE and is a fellow of the Institution of Engineers. Dr. Kulkarni won ISTE’s Best Engineering Principal Award in 2011 and the ISTE’s HRD Thinker’s gold medal.
She shares her experiences of her journey to becoming a prominent engineering leader in the new IFEES-GEDC book, Rising to the Top: Global Women Engineering Leaders Share their Journeys to Professional Success.
We are honored to announce that our Rising to the Top book series has added TWO new volumes!
Rising to the Top provides an intimate and inspiring look into the experiences that have shaped the lives and careers of women engineering leaders from around the world. By openly sharing their personal journeys in these pages, the authors hope to not only inspire the next generation of engineering leaders, but also provide valuable insight into the challenges facing women engineers around the world, and the opportunities that are theirs for the taking.