TASSA 2016 Young Scholar Awards
TASSA launched a new award in 2014 to recognize and honor the achievements of young Turkish American scientists and scholars, namely the TASSA Young Scholar Awards. Since then, TASSA has been committed to have this Young Scholar Awards program as the signature event of each TASSA general meeting.
In the 2016 TASSA Conference in April, nine junior scholars were announced as the 2016 winners of this prestigious award among approximately 170 highly qualified applications, each under the age of 35. These winners are:
- Erol Akcay, University of Pennsylvania (Junior Faculty)
- Ayse Asatekin, Tufts University (Junior Faculty)
- Alper Erturk, Georgia Institute of Technology (Junior Faculty)
- Eda Isik Altiok, Exponent Inc. (Postdoctoral Scholar)
- Gokhan Barin, UC Berkeley (Postdoctoral Scholar)
- Tuncay Ozel, Harvard University (Postdoctoral Scholar)
- Tara Zeynep Baris, University of Miami (Graduate Student)
- Selman Erol, University of Pennsylvania (Graduate Student)
- Basak Guler, Pennsylvania State University (Graduate Student)
The winners were selected from a pool of applicants in three distinct categories: (i) graduate students, (ii) postdoctoral scholars and researchers from academia and industry, and (iii) junior faculty. For each category, qualified applicants were nominated from all four branches of TASSA, namely Engineering & Applied Sciences, Health & Biomedical Sciences, Natural Sciences as well as Social Sciences, Arts & Humanities. Applications were submitted online and self-nominations were also accepted.
The selection process was extremely challenging and exciting due to the high quality and volume of the applicants. The award selection committee, composed of leading scholars in various diverse fields evaluated all the applicants in a two phase process. The committee members were very much impressed with the achievements and exciting research outcomes of this select group of Phase II candidates, and after a rather stimulating evaluation process they were able to select nine winners among these Phase II candidates, with three winners in each one of three categories: junior faculty, postdoctoral scholars and graduate students.
Each of these outstanding junior scholars received an Award Certificate at our 2016 TASSA conference and delivered an oral presentation during the Award Ceremony, talking about their exciting research and achievements.
Please join us in celebrating the achievements and inspiring success stories of these 2016 winners of the TASSA Young Scholar Awards, filling us with hope for our future.
