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South Dakota Board of Regents released fall enrollment figures for the state’s public universities and it brought great news for the Jerome J. Lohr College of Engineering. Undergraduate enrollment reached 1,507, an increase of 228 students since fall 2022, reflecting a steady increase of almost 18% in the last three years.

Kate Connor is only a junior at Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ, but she already is developing quite a resume. The most recent entry is the receipt of a $5,000 scholarship from the American Society of Concrete Contractors, which was presented to her and a student from Middle Tennessee State at the association’s banquet in Indianapolis Sept. 10. In April, she was notified that she was the recipient of a $10,000 scholarship from another concrete group.

Caden Fischer, of Menno, is in his first year of graduate school, pursuing a master’s degree in mathematics. After his junior year, he participated in Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ Experience for Undergraduates at Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ. That lead to him becoming a Future Innovator of America during his senior year. That lead to a summer fellowship at Los Alamos National Laboratory this past summer.

Three alumni of the Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences have received South Dakota Association of Career and Technical Educators Excellence Awards. Andy Jensen, Tanner Peterson and Charlene Weber were among eight award winners honored for their contributions in the classroom and student success.  

On there outside, Future Innovator of America Samara Overvaag looks like the typical 21-year-old SDSU student. But when she starts describing her research project that involves negative kinetic energy and ghost systems, one realizes she is quite unique.

Renaissance man could well describe William Karels. So could groundbreaker. At the close of the past school year, the mechanical engineering senior learned he would receive the Duane Hanson Scholarship, becoming the first Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ student to receive the $5,000 award from the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers. He also is only the second SDSU student to receive a scholarship from the international society of more than 50,000 heating, refrigerating and air-conditioning professionals. For the 2013-14 school year, Mitchell Hoesing received a $5,000 general award from the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers.

precision agriculture during the 2nd annual Precision Ag Camp at Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ, July 10-11. Sponsored by Titan Machinery and hosted by SDSU’s Department of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering, the camp drew primarily younger high schoolers from eastern South Dakota.

The Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ Robotics Club came home with best design honors after competing at the Vex Robotics World Championship in Dallas May 9-11. VEX competitions make up the largest and fastest growing robotics engineering platform in the world with divisions for elementary and middle schools, middle and high schools and VEX U for colleges and universities. This year’s Vex U game involved placing rings onto various stakes — some stationary and others mounted on mobile goals that could be moved to corner zones to either double the team’s points or result in negative scoring. In addition to winning the design award, the Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ entry placed 13th out of 54 teams in the math division, one of two divisions in the Vex U competition.

Ä¢¹½¶ÌÊÓƵ pharmacy students outdid themselves in the 2024 North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination. Dan Hansen, dean of the College of Pharmacy and Allied Health Professions, said 56 of the 59 Pharm.D. graduates took the exam in 2024, and all 56 passed on their first attempt, giving SDSU a 100% pass rate.

Selections for the third class of Future Innovators of America Fellowships have been announced by the Jerome J. Lohr College of Engineering.