Congratulations to the 2018 ACE Alumni Award Winners
The 2018 Alumni Awards luncheon and ceremony took place today, Friday, April 20 in Hermann Hall. Five of the 12 alumni awardees earned their degrees through the Armour College of Engineering.
Alumni Medal
The Alumni Medal honors distinguished service to the university by alumni who have displayed the qualities of the Collens Merit Award, Alumni Service Award, and Professional Achievement Award. This is the highest honor bestowed by the Illinois Institute of Technology Alumni Association.
Victor A. Morgenstern
This year’s recipient is Victor A. Morgenstern (CHE ’64). Morgenstern began his career as a patent attorney and then spent more than four decades in the investment business. He served as principal and chairman of Valor Equity Partners from its inception until 2012 and is currently senior advisor. Valor’s investments cover restaurants, health services, beauty supplies, and innovative manufacturers such as Tesla Motors and SpaceX. Before Valor, in 1976 Morgenstern was founding principal of Harris Associates and served as president, chief executive officer, and chairman. He also serves as managing partner of Resolute Partners, a private family investment partnership. Prior to his entry into the investment business, Morgenstern was admitted to the Maryland and District of Columbia Bars and the United States Court of Customs and Patent Appeals as a patent attorney.
Collens Merit Award
The Collens Merit Award is awarded to an individual nominated by the staff and/or faculty who has demonstrated outstanding commitment to the future of Illinois Institute of Technology through philanthropic contributions paired with involvement in his or her gift.
Joel D. Krauss
This year’s recipient is Joel D. Krauss (MATH ’71). Prior to his retirement in 2017, Krauss had been founding principal at Market Strategy Group since 2005, a role in which he advised organizations and executives on initiatives focused on achieving profitable growth. In 1985 Krauss co-founded OmniTech Consulting Group, which he sold to Diamond Cluster International in 1999. In addition to providing general scholarship support, Krauss established the Marvin and Elaine Krauss Scholarship Fund in 2011 in honor of his father. He and his wife, Sophia, often meet with their College of Science scholars to discuss their plans for the future.
John J. Schommer Honor I Award
The John J. Schommer Honor I Award is awarded to alumni who excelled in both leadership and performance as student athletes at Illinois Institute of Technology and who also went on to achieve significant success after graduation.
Michael W. Mikula
This year’s recipient is Michael W. Mikula (MET ’91, M.S. MME ’93). Mikula joined Ford Motor Company in 1993 as a process engineer and was selected to participate in its prestigious four-year Manufacturing Leadership Program in 1997. He then held a series of management positions at Ford, overseeing the $1.6 billion overhaul of manufacturing processes at four different plants to introduce Ford’s EcoBoost engine in 2006 and helping Ford’s Van Dyke manufacturing plant increase production from 800,000 units to 1.8 million units per year from 2009 to 2012. In October 2017 Mikula was named global chief engineer for manufacturing system and infrastructure at Ford. In this role he oversees the manufacturing processes for engines, transmissions, axles, batteries, and motors across the globe, playing a critical part in the introduction of next-generation electrical and hybrid technologies.
Mayank Kashyap
The third recipient is Mayank Kashyap (Ph.D. CHE ’10). Kashyap made a splash with his doctoral dissertation by solving a problem in fluidization that had mystified scientists for half a century: understanding the reason for extremely low Sherwood numbers of fine particles in fluidized beds. Kashyap discovered that the fine particles were actually forming clusters, and that if the clusters could be reduced, fluidization would improve significantly. In addition he discovered how to increase solids concentration in the core of fluidized bed risers to produce more gasoline from crude oil. Kashyap’s findings drew major attention and won him the 2012 George Klinzing Best Ph.D. Award in Particle Technology from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE). Upon his graduation in 2010, he joined Ascend Performance Materials, where he helped the company save $8.5 million a year by producing greater amounts of the chemical acrylonitrile from propylene, winning three company awards for his work. In 2014 at the age of 33, Kashyap became one of the youngest lead scientists at Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC), where he produced several fluidization plans with potential benefits of $60 million per year, winning two more company awards as well as a promotion to become one of SABIC’s youngest staff scientists.
Professional Achievement Award
The Professional Achievement Award recognizes outstanding achievement in any professional field. This award honors alumni whose achievements in their fields have brought distinction to themselves as well as credit to Illinois Institute of Technology.
Charles J. Carter
One of this year’s recipients is Charles J. Carter (Ph.D. CE ’09). In 2016 Carter became the first person to be promoted internally to president of the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) in the organization’s 100-year history. The AISC sets the standards to which all steel buildings in the United States are designed and constructed. Carter joined the AISC as a staff engineer shortly after completing his master’s degree and began working with seasoned engineers, construction experts, and academics from across the country. In the 1990s he pioneered the online publication of AISC’s millions of pages of educational documents on steel, helping to grow the organization’s membership from 1,500 to more than 30,000 today. He also helped to develop the AISC’s first Seismic Design Manual for earthquake-resistant buildings; oversaw production of a unified Steel Manual covering both Allowable Stress Design and Load and Resistance Factor Design; and led the reformation of the AISC Code of Standard Practice. In conjunction with his role at AISC, Carter sits on many national committees, including those of the American Society of Civil Engineers and the Structural Engineering Institute.
