On Friday May 11, 2017 at 12:00 PM in The Reynolds Coliseum, the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering welcomed family and friends of our Spring 2018 graduates. We celebrated the hard work and dedication of our 13 graduating doctoral, 54 master, and 224 bachelor degree students.
Our aerospace commencement speaker was Dr. Whitney Lohmeyer. Lohmeyer graduated from NCSU in 2011 with a B.S. in Aerospace Engineering. During her last year of graduate school, Dr. Lohmeyer started working at Google as a hardware engineer on a project that transitioned outside of Google in 2015, and is now known as OneWeb. She has worked as a Systems Engineer for OneWeb for the past five years, and in addition to her technical responsibilities, has represented the company at the United Nations International Telecommunications Union and the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.
The mechanical commencement speaker was Dr. Gregory Washington. A professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and the Stacey Nichols Dean of the Henry Samueli School of Engineering at the University of California Irvine, Dr. Washington received his BS, MS, and PhD degrees from NC State. He has been involved in multidomain research for the last 20 years and is the first African-American Dean of Engineering at any of the University of California campuses. Additionally, Dr. Washington has served on several advisory boards including the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board and the National Science Foundation Engineering Advisory Board. He currently serves as the Vice Chair and Chair Elect of the Engineering Deans Council, the largest organization of Engineering Deans in the US.