CPULD's Mary Paz Alvarez wins Outstanding Teacher’s Assistant Award for 2022

CPULD is proud to announce that our graduate student, Mary Paz Alvarez was awarded the Outstanding Teacher’s Assistant Award for 2022. Mary has been with our department since 2019 when she was accepted as an M.S. student. Her research focuses on the interactions between plastic pails and pallets. Her results will be built into a commercial computer software which will allow companies to design safer and more sustainable unit loads by designing pallets specifically to optimize the plastic materials used in pails. Mary told us “now that I have successfully defended and published my master’s thesis, I have begun my work on my PhD, working side by side with the National Wooden Pallet and Container Association to create a finite element analysis model based on my previous work.”

But parallel to her research projects, Mary spends days each week as a Graduate Laboratory Manager coordinating the day-to-day operations and supervising the undergraduate students in the Pallet Lab. She has also assisted in the teaching of multiple undergraduate classes each semester, and she has been responsible for mentoring undergraduate student teams and guiding them through research projects. Her major professor, Dr. Laszlo Horvath told us that “Mary did a phenomenal job helping the students with their experimental setup, keeping them on track, and ensuring the accuracy of the generated data.”

To gain additional experience, Mary took on more than just teaching responsibilities. She has designed and taught multiple laboratories related to ISTA testing. She taught a module related to the effect of atmospheric conditions on packaging performance and developed a new lecture on the use of packaging standards. She was responsible for another module related to unit load interactions which included the development and administration of an exam to assess how well the students understood the topics she’d taught them. She has also worked to coordinate laboratory exercises, helped students during their industry-sponsored class projects, and graded exams and homework.

Regarding her teaching experiences, Mary told us, “My favorite class to help out with was global distribution since the students are not only learning incredibly relevant information, but they’re also working on projects that go into their permanent portfolios. I love seeing students experience the engineering design process - they have to sit down and think about where their packaging went wrong and how it could be better. Every year I’ve been impressed by how creative some of our students can be when they’re given an opportunity to show it off.”

And, in reference to her work with undergraduate student teams, Mary told us that “my role in their work is to be a point of contact and the person that trains them on equipment. More importantly, I am their mentor which means I am to be supportive and guide them through the research process. It has been fulfilling to see students succeed and understand the importance of their work while also having to work through the difficulties of research. I worked closely with my students since they began their research under my supervision and training. As time progressed and their comfort grew with the equipment, they earned their independence, and we began to work more closely as colleagues instead of a student and teacher. Mentoring students has been one of my favorite experiences since I am able to communicate with my students and spend more time with them more personally.”

According to Dr. Laszlo Horvath, “Mary completely exceeded our expectations by assisting the students during their design projects and mentoring them throughout the project. She both encouraged and helped the students. Despite her high workload, she did a great job, and the students highly praised her work and dedication. She is a natural leader and has been a great mentor for many undergraduate students.”

Mary is already active in the packaging community; she is a member of the International Safe Transit Association (ISTA). She has also successfully obtained two major industry certifications: ISTA CPLP Technician and Technologist levels, which are generally reserved for industry professionals with multiple years of industry experience. She is also committed to becoming the best teacher possible; thus, she has already completed the Future Professoriate certificate offered by the graduate school and is currently beginning coursework to earn an Engineering Education certificate. Mary is actively involved in two service fraternities, and she has been a graduate student coordinator for the Graduate Research Symposium. She is also motivated to give back to her community; thus, she teaches English every week for underrepresented students through New River Literacy.

Mary is also passionate about educating young kids about environmental topics. Through her service fraternities, Mary has helped local school teachers as well. She explained that “I have worked extensively with the Blacksburg public school system and parks system, mainly Kipps elementary school and parks around the New River Valley. My work with the elementary school revolves around general STEM education, so I go to the elementary schools and help science teachers with the hands-on activities that she has planned for her class. My fraternity also plans and coordinates STEM classroom days where we develop and teach our own lesson plans.”

Due to her outstanding research progress, Mary decided to continue her studies as a Ph.D. student under Dr. Horvath’s mentorship in order to achieve her final goal of becoming a faculty member at a major research university. Throughout all of these experiences, Mary believes that her coursework “led to me gaining a better understanding of higher education and what type of teaching strategies can help my students. Part of being a good teacher and mentor is being able to learn and change as time goes by to make sure that my students are succeeding and enjoying the coursework. I not only teach and mentor my students, but I am constantly looking at how to improve on my own skills to create better student experiences.”