George Olisedeme-Akpu Receives 21st Century Leader Award
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George F. Olisedeme-Akpu, a senior mechanical engineering major, has received a 21st Century Leader Award. He is one of the ten undergraduate recipients of the award, who were chosen in recognition of their strong academic records and exemplary achievements. They will each receive $1,000 from the UMass Amherst Alumni Association and they will be honored during the undergraduate commencement ceremony at McGuirk Alumni Stadium.
In addition to his mechanical engineering studies, Olisedeme-Akpu is a member of the Commonwealth Honors College and he minored in information technology.
After attending Zoom classes from Nigeria during his first semester, he quickly got involved on campus upon moving to western Massachusetts.
Olisedeme-Akpu served as president of the UMass chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) following a two-year tenure as senator. Through his work in the organization, he grew membership by more than 60% in one semester, raised thousands of dollars to support the professional development of NSBE members, sent 60 members to national and regional conferences, and hosted an outreach event to teach high school students about opportunities within STEM.
In his sophomore year, Olisedeme-Akpu joined the Human Performance Laboratory. Under Professor Shannon Roberts, he studied the impact of advanced-driver assistance systems (ADAS) on teen driver behavior and trends in teen driver behavior with consistent exposure to ADAS. While conducting research in the lab, Olisedeme-Akpu held internships at Procter & Gamble (P&G) and General Dynamics and worked as an undergraduate teaching assistant for an introductory engineering course.
Outside his academic endeavors, he walked in the UMass Fashion Organization’s 2023 fashion show and danced on the Haitian American Student Association Kompa team.
After graduation, Olisedeme-Akpu will join P&G full time as an IT operations engineer and start a part-time master’s program