NEWS

Louisiana Tech College of Engineering and Science students participated in the Third Annual Engineering and Science Day Poster Contest. For the contest, teams submitted posters that represented their senior projects.

Competing teams were nominated by their programs to be on “The Senior Projects Dean’s List” and to represent their programs in the contest, which was judged by seven industry professionals.

Pictured are members of the winning team with Dr. Henry Cardenas.

Representing the Civil Engineering Program, Dillion Benoit, Tristan Drummond and Katie McLain won first place in the Engineering Division and, ultimately, “Best in Show” for their poster “AFS Logistics Office Complex.” The poster describes the project in which the students designed a three-story office complex, two parking lots and a major retaining wall to support one of the parking lots. To successfully complete the design, the civil engineering majors performed structural analysis, steel design, reinforced concrete design, foundation design, retaining wall design, pavement design, and examined water resources. The students used the limited information they were provided and professional standards and specifications to create a functional design. They were guided in their work by faculty advisor, Dr. Shawn Sun.

The first-place award for the Science and Math Division went to Chemistry students Andrew A. Brown, Lauralee D. Sylvain, Brandon J. Cooper, Riley E. Cooper, Jackie L. Ashley, Kelsey E. Schellinger, and Logan J. Durden for their project presentation on “Lanthanide Coordination Chemistry for Light Emitting Diodes.” The project focused on improving light-emitting diodes, otherwise known as LEDs used to light signs and phones. Faculty advisor Dr. Elisabeth M. Fatila helped guide their work.

“The senior design project serves as the culmination of everything that we have learned at Louisiana Tech as students,” Benoit said. “It provides a great opportunity for us to apply what we have learned to a realistic project. In the case of our project, the end product was already designed and built in the real world, so it has been a gratifying feeling to design for a project that actually came to pass. It would be interesting and a learning experience in itself if we could compare our student design to the design produced by the professional engineers who worked on the project.”

Dr. Henry Cardenas, associate professor of mechanical engineering, who organizes the competition each year, says that the competition provides students with the opportunity to show off their projects ahead of the Senior Projects Conference and allows potential engineering and science students to get a broad sense of what a Louisiana Tech Engineering and Science education is.

“The contest is staged to promote excellence and showcase great work,” Cardenas said. “It is run during E&S Day in order to inspire future scientists and engineers by letting them see the fantastic work these talented students are doing – and utilizing to impact the regional and national economy.  The impact of these Tech-trained students and just a few privately sponsored projects is tremendous.  In just the Mechanical Engineering program, the sponsors from the 2018 class are projecting economic benefits to our region that will exceed $30M within the next 4 years. Similar impacts are anticipated for the class of 2019 that will be fully showcased on May 10^th.”

“This experience allowed us to build valuable confidence in our abilities at a time when we prepare to enter the professional workforce,” Benoit added. “We are grateful to Dr. Wang for his help and encouragement for the duration of the project, and we are also thankful to Dr. Sun who guided us as senior design advisor. With their support and encouragement, our experience has been both instructive and positive.”

The Senior Projects Conference will be held May 10. Opening remarks will be in University Hall at 1 p.m.  Posters from all of the “Dean’s List for Senior Projects” will be available for viewing at that time. Following opening remarks, seniors from all COES majors will present their capstone projects in buildings across the College. The conference is free and open to the public.