Grad Student Receives Outstanding Research Assistant Award

Sara Masoud, a doctoral student in systems and industrial engineering working with department Head Young-Jun Son, received the Outstanding Research Assistant Award from the UA Graduate and Professional Student Council in April 2019. The organization gives the award to a graduate research assistant who demonstrates outstanding contributions to research, professional growth as a researcher and a mentor, originality and imagination, and examples of scholarly achievements and publications.

“I feel really honored to be the recipient of this award,” said Masoud, who also received a Best Paper Finalists Award at the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers’ 2018 conference and is a finalist for this year’s best paper award as well. “By working with Dr. Son, I had lots of opportunities to work on projects with different applications, like transportation, agriculture and health care. I learned everything from him, and I want to thank everyone that’s helped me – my colleagues, my lab mates and everyone at the University of Arizona.”

Masoud will begin working as an assistant professor in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Wayne State University in August.

“Sara has been a truly outstanding graduate student,” Son said. “I am sure her excellence will continue, and she will be an outstanding professor at Wayne State. I am very proud of her.”