2020 Tufts Alumni Award honorees

The Tufts School of Engineering is excited that the achievements of our alumni have been recognized by the Tufts University Alumni Association (TUAA).  

Ryan Pandya, E13, received the Young Alumni Achievement Award and Chimaka Chima, E14, EG16, received the Career Services Award during the 2020 Alumni Awards ceremony.

Each year since 1941, TUAA has supported a Alumni Awards program that celebrates the accomplishments of fellow Jumbos. The awards showcase inspiring alumni whose work is not only impressive and far-reaching, but also relevant and timely. 

The ceremony was a virtual experience held on Saturday, Feb. 27, 2021 at 9:30 am ET.  Information on all the honorees can be found here and a link to the ceremony is available here.

Young Alumni Achievement Award

Ryan Pandya, E13, is the Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of Perfect Day, a food company on a mission to create delicious animal-free dairy products, while leaving a kinder, greener footprint on the planet. Ryan studied Chemical & Biological Engineering at Tufts University, where he contributed to seminal research on tissue engineered meat at the Kaplan Lab before graduating and going on to work at MassBiologics, a small biopharmaceutical company in Boston, MA. He realized that the same technology used in the pharmaceutical industry could solve other world issues, including one that was particularly personal to him – the need for better dairy alternatives.

Career Services Award

Chiamaka Chima, E14, EG16, is a double Jumbo. She currently works as an Analog Design Engineer at Intel Corporation in Massachusetts. Prior to that, she had interned at Bose Corporation and Analog Devices, Inc. While at Tufts, she belonged to several student organizations, participated in various extracurricular activities and was a member of a research lab. Chiamaka loves a good excuse to solve problems and takes a keen interest in anything masked or represented as a problem. To her, engineering is a mindset or toolbox that one could reach into to solve different issues regardless of the realm, especially given the interdisciplinary world of today.

Congratulations Ryan and Chimaka on these well-deserved awards from the entire School of Engineering community!