The European Federation of Chemical Engineering (EFCE), Brussels, has bestowed Student Mobility Awards on three chemical engineers. The biennial awards recognize the best European chemical engineering students who spent at least one semester at a university outside of their home country. The awards were presented at the 10th European Congress of Chemical Engineering, which took place recently in Nice, France.
Dr. Martin Pitt, Chair of EFCE’s Working Party on Education, explains the motivation for the biennial awards: “One of the main aims of EFCE is to encourage students and academics to move freely between institutions and countries as part of their personal development.
The winner of this year’s €2,000 first prize is José Francisco Pérez Calvo, who currently is studying for a PhD at ETH Zurich in Switzerland. He graduated top of his class with a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the Complutense University of Madrid, Spain, and then got a master’s degree in chemical engineering at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands. As part of his master’s research project, Pérez Calvo worked at BASF in Ludwigshafen, Germany, for three months.
“Pérez Calvo has worked in three different languages and four European countries as part of his formation as a chemical engineer, demonstrating both academic excellence and versatility,” noted Pitt.
Pérez Calvo commented on the value of studying outside his home country: “I definitely have enhanced my self-confidence and capacity to produce my own ideas, as well as the ability of adapting to different demands and requirements coming from industry or academia, while working on multicultural international projects.”
The EFCE awarded second prize (€1,500) to Alberto Lozano Rivas, a process engineer and master’s student from the French Institution of Petroleum (IFP) in Paris. He earned a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering at the University of Zaragoza, Spain, with an Erasmus placement at the Vienna University of Technology, Austria.
Third prize (€1,000) went to Canan Dombayci, who currently is studying for a PhD at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia, Spain. She completed her master’s degree in chemical engineering at Istanbul Technical University, Turkey. She also spent one year at RWTH Aachen University, Germany, as a research assistant.
