The hard work of more than 40 West Virginia University students involved in EcoCAR3 paid off with a number of awards at the end-of-year awards banquet held recently in Seattle, Washington.

EcoCAR 3, a four-year competition sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, General Motors and Argonne National Laboratory, challenges 16 university teams to redesign the Chevrolet Camaro into a hybrid-electric vehicle. Students must reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, while protecting the environment and saving American families and businesses money at the pump without compromising performance, safety or consumer acceptability. The banquet was held to recognize teams’ first-year efforts.

The team from WVU earned six awards and brought home more than $12,000 in prize money, which will be used in future years of the competition.

The team’s faculty advisor, Andrew Nix, assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, was named Faculty Advisor of the Year. The award is given to the advisor who demonstrates exceptional leadership and challenges their students to work harder each day.

“EcoCAR 3 has been one of the most challenging professional and educational endeavors I have ever embarked on,” said Nix. “To be recognized and nominated by my students and judged along with my peers to receive this award is very special to me.”

Jordan Feight, modeling and simulation team lead, finished third for the Excellence in Leadership award.

“Winning a leadership award was truly an honor,” Feight said. “As a senior, I knew that I would only have one year to guide the team and leave an impact on it. I used that limited time as fuel to fire my work ethic and to inspire others around me to work even harder.”

The team also received top honors for earning a perfect score on their facilities inspection, which took place earlier in the year.

Three of the awards were earned in the field of communications including Best Sponsor Collaboration Video, second place for Communications Outreach Presentation and third place overall in Communications.

The WVU team will continue to work throughout the summer to prepare for the second year of the competition.

-WVU-

cb/06/26/15

CONTACT: Mary C. Dillon, Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources
304.293.4086, Mary.Dillon@mail.wvu.edu

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