Dear faculty, students, and friends,
I want to thank you for a truly amazing year at the Department of Engineering Education. I write these words just days after the graduation of our fifth Ph.D. student. I want to congratulate Drs. Edwin Marte, Jabari Wilson, Jasmine Smith, Dennis Parnell Jr. and Gadhaun Aslam.
This year also marked the 31st class of Integrated Product and Process Design, better known as IPPD. We have much to be proud of this year.
In this newsletter, we celebrate a few of fall’s accomplishments, students and faculty.
We explore a fascinating and quite relevant project from Professor Sindia M. Rivera-Jimenez, Ph.D., who is using her $536,000 National Science Foundation award to examine how transfer students navigate challenges and adapt during their transition into engineering at a university.
You will read about another EEd faculty member whose work in mentoring is also making a big difference for engineering students: Instructional Associate Professor Andrea Goncher Sevilla, Ph.D.
Fresh off winning UF’s AI Educator of the Year award during UF’s AI Days, Andrea Ramirez-Salgado, Ph.D., discusses the opportunities and challenges of teaching about artificial intelligence in 2025.
Another interesting faculty story spotlights John Mendoza-Garcia, Ph.D., whose outreach work with C.W. Norton Elementary School earned him the school’s Volunteer of the Year Award.
There are profiles of Ph.D. student Hassan Tanvir and master’s student Matheus Kunzler Maldaner. Both are making their marks on and off campus, from research to mentoring to AI intelligence systems.
We also celebrate a team of innovators from EEd, led by our own Amanpreet Kapoor, Ph.D., in collaboration with the Department of Computer & Information Sciences who created a talk-of-the-town tool that’s transforming the way students learn to code. Called Edugator, this AI-enabled tool for teaching engineering and computing education was developed to support instructors of introductory computing courses by simplifying how they create and deliver interactive content.
Oh, and this AI-enabled tool also won the 2025 Florida TaxWatch Government Productivity Award in September in Tallahassee.
EEd has enjoyed a busy and rewarding year. We have more great stories to share and look forward to sharing additional notable achievements and growth in 2026. Thank you for your support, time and energy.
Go Gators!
Sincerely,
Idalis Villanueva Alarcón, Ph.D.
Chair and Professor, Department of Engineering Education