Dr. Ronald Hugo, P.Eng., has been receiving teaching awards and recognition from both students and peers since joining the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Calgary in 1999. Every year since his arrival, he has been selected by an independent committee for his department’s Teaching Excellence Award and is also the first and only two-time winner of the Faculty of Engineering’s Teaching Excellence Award.

Students have awarded Dr. Hugo the coveted Students’ Union Teaching Excellence Award, Faculty of Engineering and the Students’ Union Teaching Excellence Honorable Mention Award, Faculty of Engineering. Students have also twice selected Dr. Hugo as the Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering’s Professor of the Year.

Dr. Hugo’s effectiveness comes from his teaching philosophy and methodology. His philosophy is simple – he works hard in preparing the learning environment for his students and given the learning opportunities he presents them, he expects his students to work equally as hard.

Dr. Hugo has participated in many of the Faculty of Engineering’s outreach programs to both grade school and high school students. He has been active in the Engineering Open House for high school students and has provided laboratory tours for school children interested in lasers and aerospace engineering. He has also presented a lecture on aerodynamics for grade school students.

In 2001, Dr. Hugo was appointed Director of Graduate Program for the Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, leading the revival of the graduate curriculum and enhancing the structure of the graduate program. He also introduced his department’s Annual Graduate Student Research Conference, which he has run for three successive years.

After obtaining his B.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Calgary in 1989, Dr. Hugo continued his education at the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Indiana, where he obtained his M.Sc. and PhD in Aerospace Engineering in 1991 and 1995 respectively. Having completed his doctorate, he went on to become a research scientist for the U.S. Air Force on the Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico where he worked on the Airborne Laser Program from 1995 to 1999. He joined academia at the University of Calgary’s Faculty of Engineering in 1999, becoming a professor in the Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering. He was promoted to Associate Professor in 2003.

Dr. Hugo believes that students are the foundation of any university and that their education is the first and foremost responsibility of a professor.

Honours, Awards and Distinctions

• Teaching Excellence Award, Faculty of Engineering, University of Calgary, 2001, 2003
• Teaching Excellence Award, Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, University of Calgary, 2001, 2002, 2003
• Professor of the Year Award, Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, University of Calgary, 2000, 2001
• Students’ Union Teaching Excellence Award, University of Calgary, 2000