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Carlotta Berry, PhD’s, outstanding achievements as an educator and scholar are being recognized in her reappointment as the esteemed Lawrence J. Giacoletto Endowed Chair in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Berry, professor of electrical and computer engineering, uses research, teaching, service and outreach to promote multidisciplinary education to diversify STEM.

The Giacoletto Endowed Chair promotes professional activity for electrical and computer engineering faculty members.

Endowed faculty chairs honor members of the Rose-Hulman faculty for their exemplary accomplishments outside of Rose-Hulman and further supports their professional activity in both national and international circles of scholarship, according to Richard House, PhD, associate dean for professional development and professor of English.

“I am honored to be selected to be the Lawrence J. Giacoletto Endowed Chair in Electrical and Computer Engineering for a second term,” said Berry. “I could have never imagined the impact that I would have during the first years of my chairship and I look forward to it continuing.”

Berry made considerable achievements during her first term as chair. She was able to provide diverse communities with hundreds of open-source robots for free or at a reduced cost. She gave a keynote lecture about her work at the Open Source Hardware Summit. She enabled numerous students to conduct robotics research opportunities and launched the multidisciplinary educational robotics lab. Berry also gave numerous workshops on using open-source robotics to diversify STEM and gave several presentations on bias in AI and on multidisciplinary robotics.

Since her appointment as chair, she has been recognized with more than 10 awards and distinctions over the last four years. Some of the most notable include the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Undergraduate Teaching Award (2023), Society of Women Engineers Distinguished Engineering Educator (2022), ASEE Electrical and Computer Engineering Division Distinguished Engineering Educator (2022), Grace Hopper Celebration Educational Innovation Abie Award (2023), and the Indiana Business Journal Women of Influence (2022). Berry was also appointed as the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis Visiting Scientist in 2023.

Berry’s goals for her next four years as the Giacoletto Chair include the creation of multidisciplinary robotics special elective courses and offering open-source robotics workshops for the Rose-Hulman community and beyond. She plans to conduct research with undergraduate students on open-source robotics, human-robot interaction, teaming, heterogeneous teams, and multidisciplinary robotics education. Berry also will continue to give speaking engagements on topics such as diversity in STEM, bias in AI and robotics, and multidisciplinary robotics education.

“Dr. Berry puts truly remarkable energy and ambition into her research and outreach,” said House. “Her reappointment as Giacoletto Chair is a testament to the broad impact of her work.” 

The Giacoletto Chair honors the legacy of Giacoletto, a 1938 Rose-Hulman graduate who was a distinguished engineer and educator, as well as Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

Past Giacoletto Chairs have been Robert Throne, former Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering head and an established scholar and researcher; Ed Wheeler, a recognized leader in the areas of electromagnetics and signal integrity; and Mark Yoder, who has written two textbooks on digital signal processing.