On March 8th, The Ohio State University Department of Materials Science and Engineering honored five welding engineering students at its annual Undergraduate Student Banquet. EWI was pleased to sponsor one of these awards. The first-ever EWI Award for demonstrating “a passion for the advancement of welding and manufacturing technology through exceptional research accomplishments” was presented by EWI VP of Human Resources Mark Matson to senior Bryan Drescher.
The OSU Welding Engineering Alumni Association, represented by EWI Senior Project Manager Nancy Porter, also presented four awards to students in the Welding Engineering Program. Two of these awards, newly established this year, are named in honor of EWI Associates with longstanding ties to the university and the program — Karl Graff and Harvey Castner. Both attended the ceremony to present their named awards.
Graff served on the faculty at OSU for many years and chaired its Welding Engineering department before founding EWI in 1984. As EWI’s Executive Director from 1987-2000, he oversaw EWI’s growth from a small start-up to a world-leading organization in materials joining and allied manufacturing technologies. Today Graff continues his research at EWI in high power ultrasonics.
Castner, himself an alumnus of the OSU program, has been a practicing welding engineer and engineering manager for more than four decades. He has held several positions during his long career at EWI including VP of Government Programs and Director of the Navy Joining Center. He is currently Senior Project Manager for Government Programs.
Congratulations to the winners of the OSU Welding Engineering awards!
- Peter Eckley, winner of the Harvey Castner Award
- Logan Rohaley, winner of the Karl Graff Award
- Nicole Brown, winner of the John Lippold Award
- Zachary Wright (current EWI intern), winner of the Doug Rhoda Award
- Bryan Drescher, winner of the EWI Award