2025 Commencement
Spring 2025: Cheers to the Aerospace and Ocean Engineering Grads!
Graduates and their families are invited to celebrate at a Commencement Reception on Friday, May 16 - more detailed information to come. We will be in a tent on Norris lawn, close to Patton Hall. Light refreshments will be served, and the department will be announcing the Excellence in Design of Aerospace and Ocean Vehicles and Systems awards, including Prizes for Air, Ocean, Space and Launch Vehicle Design.
Celebrate our Hokie graduates all month long! Head over to the department social channels, where we will be sharing student photos and post-graduate plans.
Class of 2024: Outstanding Senior
Patrick Corrigan has been named the 2024 Outstanding Senior for the Aerospace and Ocean Engineering department.
A salute to our senior AOE Ambassadors!
Scores of our students serve as ambassadors for the department. Throughout the academic year, they conduct tours for prospective students and families, assist with majors fairs and open houses, and represent the department at various events on campus. Congratulations to our senior Ambassadors, and thank you for your dedicated service!
Tatum Butler
Patrick Corrigan
Chenming Fan
Lila Hutchison
MaKenzie Kidd
Nathan Rand
Tamim Wadud
Holly Whetzel
2024 Senior Superlatives
The Craig Woolsey Award: Most likely to be in the gym - Dale Lefebvre
The Todd Lowe Award: Most likely to remain at Virginia Tech forever - Garrett Asper
The Clutch Award: Teammate who saved the day - Saumith Gundapuneedi
The Beamer Award: Most likely to be in North End Zone next football season - Rafael Garcia-Rodriguez
The Elon Musk Twitter Award: Most likely to be the class clown - Max Wattowa
The Overbooked Award: Most likely to be in two meetings at once - Lucy Waite
The Stealth Bomber Award: Least likely to be seen in person - Jonathan Pokrant
The Hiring Manager Award: Most likely to Rep the organization that hired them - Nathan Rand
The Ashton Kutcher Award: Least likely to use their engineering degree - Chloe Gaylor
The Eric Paterson Award: Most Likely to be Eating Food in the ASDI - Sujay Venuganti
The Crawler Award: Most likely to be downtown - Randi Byars
The Usain Bolt Award: Most likely to ask for homework help ten minutes before it’s due - Thomas Klein
The William Devenport Award: Best Mustache - Nick Keddy
The Insomniac Award: Most likely to never sleep - Nathan Mullins
15. The Kardashian Award: Most likely to have a reality TV show - Erika Hausladen
The Breakfast Club Award: Most likely to be asleep in class - Aidan Cuadra
The Warfighter Award: Most likely to be thanked for their service - Patrick Corrigan
The AWOL Award: Most likely to call out a professor - Chenming Fan
The Lockheed Martin "we didn't mean to crash into Mars" Award: Most likely to get the basic algebra/units wrong - Tamim Wadud
The Groupme Award: Most Talkative on Groupme - Isabella Panek
The Maverick & Goose Award: Most inseparable dynamic duo - Garrett Asper and Cora Meno
The Intro to Aero Award: Most likely to name the airplane flying by - Sophia DiRoberto
The Gulfstream Award: Most likely to fly first class - Abrar Syed
The Air Traffic Controller Award: Least likely to get stressed out - Jeremy Payne
The Brayton Cycle Award: Most likely to have a laptop that sounds like a jet engine - Nathan McMullan
The Amelia Earhart Award: Most likely to be flying - Bren Findley
The Red Ribbon Award: Most likely to have a “remove before flight” keychain - Matt Polanka
The Mach Award: Most likely to jump on the hypersonic hype train - Dale LeFebvre
The Orbital Debris Award: Messiest workplace - Lalit Adhikari
The Kevin Shinpaugh Award: Most likely to move off the grid - Reed George
The Mark Watney Award: Most likely to get stuck on Mars - Jack Spidalieri
The Sigourney Weaver Award: Most likely to fight an alien - Josh Amato
The Space Cadet Award: Most likely to zone out midconversation - Nick Turletes
The Supercomputer Award: Shinpaugh’s favorite - Tyler Rhodes
The Major Tom Award: Most likely to be lost forever in space - Orion Date
The Zookeeper Award: Best at Rhino - Spencer Melillo
The Houseboat Award: Most likely to live on a boat - Sammy Morrison
The Kevin Wang Award: Most likely to make you smile - Khadija ElBouchti
The Gray Hull Disease Award: Most Likely to spend a career working for NAVSEA - Jacob Zweifach
The Jethro Gibbs Award: Most likely to build a boat in their basement - Max Kates-Tate
The Yacht Club Award: Most likely to get sidetracked looking at pictures of luxury watercraft - Joe Bernsen
The Stefano Brizzolara Award: Best dressed - Hannah Squires
The Jack Sparrow Award: Most likely to go down with the ship - Winnie Cheung
The SSM Award: Most likely to drown in an Excel sheet - Ben Newby
The Gilligan’s Island Award: Most likely to get lost in the middle of nowhere - Winnie Cheung
The Symphony Award: Best at MAESTRO - Will Albertson
The Alan Brown Award: Most likely to go on a tangent about a sea story - Trey Gustafson
The Charlie Camarda Award: Most likely to become an astronaut - Peter Nelson
The Homer Hickam Award: Most likely to blow themselves up launching their rocket - TJ Taylor
The SpaceX Award: Most likely to never leave the ASDI - Michael Plano
The Goddard Award: Most likely to have a breakthrough discovery - Chenming Fan
The Hidden Figures Award: Most likely to have a lasting impact - Lucy Waite
Chalk Award: Jinxed with technology - Alan Brown
Most likely to outsource a lecture - Luca Massa
Most Approachable - Shane Ross
Most Quotable - Pat Artis
Alan “Zoom Now?” Brown