PNW students earn recognitions during spring competitions
Several Purdue University Northwest student organizations under the auspices of the College of Engineering and Sciences participated in regional, national and international competitions during late spring 2025, earning awards in recognition of their academic talents and collaboration.
PNW student organizations provide members engaging opportunities to transfer the lessons they gain in the classroom into hands-on learning experiences, including occasionally in competition with college students from around the country.
“We are incredibly proud of our students,” says Harvey Abramowitz, professor emeritus of Mechanical Engineering and an advisor for PNW’s NASA Rover Club. “These experiences do not just build academic skills – they build confidence and set students up for success in their careers.”
Read more to learn how PNW students demonstrated excellence in their specializations.
These experiences do not just build academic skills – they build confidence and set students up for success in their careers.
Harvey Abramowitz, professor emeritus of Mechanical Engineering and an advisor for PNW’s NASA Rover Club
Civil Engineering students will make third consecutive national appearance in surveying competition
PNW Civil Engineering students with the university’s American Society of Civil Engineering (ASCE) chapter achieved several top finishes at the 2025 regional Indiana-Kentucky ASCE Student Symposium, hosted at the University of Notre Dame.
PNW students in the Utility Engineering and Surveying Institute (UESI) surveying competition once again earned a first-place finish. This qualifies PNW’s surveying team for a third consecutive national competition appearance, which will be in late June 2025 at California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo. The surveying competition involves the application of civil engineering principles with field equipment to complete several assignments, simulating a real-world professional scenario.
Students earned fourth place overall in the Concrete Canoe competition and fifth place overall in the Steel Bridge competition. Concrete Canoe tasks student competitors with understanding water displacement in designing and paddling a canoe constructed with an effective concrete mixture, while Steel Bridge involves the development and fabrication of a scale-model steel bridge able to carry 2,500 pounds.
NASA Rover Club wins “most improved” award at international challenge
Students from PNW’s NASA Rover Club earned international recognition at the 2025 NASA Human Exploration Rover Challenge (HERC) held at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The team was awarded Most Improved Performance Award – Human-Powered at the 31st annual event.
The award recognizes the team that demonstrates the greatest ability to adapt and improve their rover’s performance during the competition, highlighting the team’s problem-solving skills and ability to learn and adapt under pressure. For the PNW team, the competition also served as their senior design project.
Purdue University Northwest’s NASA Rover Club competed in the NASA Human Exploration Rover Challenge (HERC) held at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, picking up the Most Improved Performance Award – Human-Powered recognition.
“This project offers students a true hands-on engineering experience,” says Shengyong Zhang, associate professor of Mechanical Engineering. “It’s about solving real-world problems that don’t have one right answer. Students learn how to design, analyze, fabricate and test a rover while developing critical soft skills in communication, collaboration, teamwork and time management.”
The NASA competition mirrors the professional engineering process. Teams must submit a proposal in the fall before being accepted to compete. Once selected, they must design, build and race a human-powered rover across a half-mile course featuring ten obstacles.
PNW’s five-member team of fourth-year mechanical engineering students completed the course in 3 minutes and 43 seconds, finishing a full 30 seconds ahead of the next closest team.
The award also came with a $500 prize, which will help fund next year’s rover.
Computer Science students compete at quantum hackathon
Four PNW Computer Science students with the Quantum Club traveled to Yale University to join the 2025 YQuantum Hackathon, taking opportunities to soak up expert perspectives in quantum computing and participate in friendly competition with peers.
PNW Computer Science students, from left, Shawn He Yuxun, Ariel Trusty, Josh Srinivasan and Jesse Dance take a photo together while visiting Yale University for the 2025 YQuantum Hackathon. Dance achieved an overall third place team finish with a separate group at the competition.
The event, which is sponsored by the Yale Quantum Institute, tasks student participants with networking and forming teams in order to tackle nine challenges across quantum advancement and application. PNW Computer Science student Jesse Dance connected with four other student peers at the hackathon and collectively achieved an overall third place team finish with them.
The YQuantum Hackathon is an internationally recognized event bringing together top talent and perspectives to introduce and reinforce quantum computing technology fundamentals for college students.