Category: Alumni Spotlight

Every time Texas-based tech executive Steve Blum returns to his beloved alma mater in swampy Florida, he can’t help but smile.  

Farimah Farahmandi, Ph.D., Walden C. Rhines Endowed Professor for Hardware Security and associate director of the Florida Institute for Cybersecurity, has received UF’s 40 Under 40 alumni award. In April, Farahmandi will also receive the Distinguished Young Alumni Award from UF’s Department of Computer & Information Science & Engineering.  

For Hugo Ortega, a UF engineering-alumnus-turned-yacht-captain and reality star, being on Below Deck is a real-time test of the systems thinking and problem-solving skills he learned as a materials science major.

ISE supporter and former CEO made substantial impacts in the College of Engineering

Engineering alumnus and donor Neil Shopke was known for his generosity and ingenuity.

Growing up in Gainesville with a professor father, Pegeen Hanrahan adored going to the University of Florida Engineering Fair each year. It was a beloved family tradition that shaped her love of engineering and, certainly, the Gators.  

When University of Florida graduate Andres Espinosa isn’t optimizing supply chains, diving into transportation research or fine-tuning an artificial intelligence model to compose video game music, he often can be found on the pickleball court or strumming his guitar.

David Wantman, co-founder of a successful South Florida-based consulting, planning, surveying and design firm and 1990 UF engineering graduate, has been selected as a Distinguished Alumnus from the University of Florida.

When Dr. Sagid Salah (B.S. ’58, M.S. ’60, Ph.D. ’64) first arrived in Gainesville in 1954, he was 21 years old, had just survived nearly four years as a prisoner during the Korean War, and was technically stateless. He spoke English thanks to a Catholic priest and a missionary who had tutored him in the prison camp but had no high school diploma. What he did have was persistence, curiosity and an unshakable belief that education could open the door to a new life. 

UF mechanical engineering graduate Diego Acevedo’s grand life – from kite surfing in his Aruba neighborhood to three engineering degrees from three countries – stems from curiosity and a bit of restlessness.