Wacky Engineers

March 24, 2003 Issue

Those who think of engineers as Dilberts—boring, staid, number-crunchers who wear pocket protectors—should have seen some of the events during the University of Pittsburgh Engineer’s Week, when students blew off a winter’s worth of steam with some silly and serious events. This year that included Sumo wrestling, a gross food-eating contest called Mystery Eats, engineering day at Frick Middle School, and the popular “Pie-a-Professor,” in which good-natured faculty volunteered their faces as targets. Participating faculty, some of whom can be seen hidden beneath the whipped cream, were: Kevin P. Chen, assistant professor, Department of Electrical Engineering; Richard E. Debski, assistant professor, Department of Bioengineering and Department of Orthopaedic Surgery in the School of Medicine; Robert M. Enick, professor, Macleod Faculty Fellow, and undergraduate coordinator in the Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering; and Laura Schaefer, assistant professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering.