Lassonde Awards Ceremony 2020
On October 19, 2020 the Lassonde School of Engineering hosted its first virtual Lassonde Awards Ceremony. Lassonde is home to an extraordinary community of dedicated students, innovative researchers, and committed staff. This ceremony recognized the many achievements across the school in the 2019-2020 academic year. The ceremony was hosted by Dean Goodyer and welcomed many special guests, including President & Vice Chancellor, Rhonda Lenton, Julie Lassonde from the Lassonde Family Foundation, award donors, students, faculty, and staff.
During the ceremony, Lassonde was thrilled to announce CaseWare as the Co-Op Employer of the Year. CaseWare develops software solutions to support organizations with financial, auditing reporting and data analytics. Over the past two years, CaseWare has hired 18 co-op students from Lassonde offering them a rewarding and challenging work placement experience.
The ceremony featured a spotlight talk from Josephine Morgenroth, PhD candidate in the Department of Civil Engineering working under the supervision of Dr. Usman Khan and Dr. Matthew Perras. Josephine is a recipient of many awards including the Carswell Scholarship, NSERC Post-Graduate Scholarship, and Ontario Graduate Scholarship. As a result of these awards, Josephine has been able to focus on her research pursuits in applying machine learning to rock engineering practice in order with the goal of creating safer and more economical development of underground infrastructure.
Lassonde welcomed back alumna Farzia Khan (BSc, ‘17) to speak about the newly established Farzia Khan Champion for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Prize. Farzia reflected on her own experience at Lassonde and how the community motivated her to give back and support the next generation of students. With this award, she hopes to encourage students at Lassonde to become inclusive leaders, value diversity, and create equal opportunities for everyone.
For the first time, during the ceremony guests were able to learn more about each student award recipient and hear firsthand how student awards and scholarships have impacted their education. Many of these awards and scholarships would not be available to students without the support of Lassonde’s donors. Thank you to all the individuals and organizations that support student success at Lassonde.
To see the full listing of award recipients, see the event program.