Rossin College Graduate Leadership and Service Award recipient shares journey as international student from Turkey in latest episode

Onur Denizhan ’15G, a doctoral student in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Mechanics, is the Spring 2020 recipient of the Rossin College’s Graduate Leadership and Service Award. 

The award recognizes a student who exhibits leadership through service as a means of improving the quality of graduate student life in the engineering college and making the graduate experience better for all. 

Denizhan’s contributions to campus life include service to the Graduate Student Senate, serving as a bridge between graduate students and department and university administration. 

His academic life focuses on origami-based mechanism design, conducting research that combines the Japanese art of paper folding with mechanisms and robots to make them collapsible and deployable. He is advised by Meng-Sang Chew, an associate professor of mechanical engineering and mechanics.

As an international student from Turkey, Denizhan has faced many hurdles in his personal and academic journey over the past eight years. In Episode 6 of the Rossin College Podcast, Denizhan speaks about his experiences and the support he’s received at Lehigh, including when the coronavirus pandemic threw him and fellow students a curve. 

Rossin Connection is a show for students, alumni, faculty, and staff—current, former, and future—and for anyone who is interested in the many creative ways that engineers are solving the world’s problems. Learn more about the show, where to find it (and if you’re a podcasting newbie, how to subscribe!), and where to submit feedback and episode ideas.

PhD student Onur Denizhan ’15G

Onur Denizhan ’15G, doctoral student in mechanical engineering and mechanics