MHI, CICMHE Name Winners

Congratulations to the winners of the 2023-2024 Material Handling Capstone Design competition organized by the Material Handling Industry (MHI) and the College Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE). The winning undergraduate teams are:

First Place Winner ($2000): 

• Virginia Tech & 2CI – Pizza Crust Loading and Unloading
• Student Team Members:  Aziz Malouche, CJ Girts, Janay Williams, Charles Taylor
• Faculty Advisors:  Dr. Natalie Cherbaka

Second Place Winner ($2000): 

• Rochester Institute of Technology & PMG – Process Improvement For Packaging Materials at a Manufacturing Facility
• Student Team Members: Alisson Davila Prado, Andrew Morris, Mouad Maarouf, Orapun Chayasathit
• Faculty Advisors: Dr. Jennifer Englert

Third Place Winner ($500): 

• California Polytechnic State University – Cal Poly Mailroom Layout Design – Team 1
• Student Team Members: Tillman Erb, Owen Lassa, Jonathan Lee, Aidan Ng, Dylan Souttaphonh
• Faculty Advisor: Dr. Dave Sly

Honorable Mention:  

• University of Minnesota Twin Cities & Andersen Windows – Andersen Windows Shop Efficiency and Layout1
• Student Team Members: Nick Reynolds, Connor Salsbury, Madelyn Gibbs, Jacob Voorhees, Samiksha Kanukunta
• Faculty Advisors: Dr. Kathryn Wust, Dr. Lisa Miller, Dr. Jean-Philippe Richards

Thanks to generous MHI sponsors, including the MHI Solutions Community, Hytrol, Knapp, Sick, Murr, Panther, Grenzenbach, John Ashodian, the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winning teams will receive $2000; $1000; and $500, respectively, to be shared among the students on the team.

Creating synergies between MHI and academia, the College Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE) supports invaluable education and innovative research initiatives to foster connections, expand knowledge, and drive global advancement.

This year, the Material Handling Capstone Design competition received 16 submissions from 9 different schools. Each submission was reviewed by a set of industry and academic judges, including Drew Pope (Nautique Boat Company), Alan Marsh (RF-SMART), Michael Shannon (SRSI), Steve Hopper (Inviscid Consulting), Glen Wegel (Kitchen Cabinet Distributors), Derek Westfall (The Westfall Consulting Group), Eddie Murphy (Spaceguard Products), Jason Looman (Scanreco), Christine Nguyen (Northern Illinois University) and James Kong (Virginia Tech). These submissions were evaluated based on their project complexity and outcome success, the creativity in addressing the problem, the potential Impact/Contribution to the Material Handling Industry, the Quality of the Deliverables, and the Effective communication of the problem, approach, design, and results.

• The 2024-2025 MHI and CICMHE Senior Design Competition will again include monetary prizes for first, second, and third places and recognition at MHI events. The application process is specifically designed to accommodate differences in capstone deliverables. Please encourage your capstone design teams to submit their material handling and supply chain projects. The deadline for submission is May 2025. More information can be found at mhi.org/cicmhe. Questions can be sent to [email protected] or the chair of the competition Dr. Christine Ngyuen at [email protected].