Goldstein Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Award Winners for 2025–2026
The Department of Mechanical Engineering is proud to announce that Rochak Badyal and Pauly Soulia have been selected as the 2025–2026 recipients of the Goldstein Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Award. This award was created to recognize departmental teaching assistants (TAs) who exhibited excellence in teaching and made a significant difference in student learning.
Each year, the department collects student evaluations and instructor nominations from both fall and spring semesters. A committee of program directors and managers from both undergraduate and graduate studies selects the winners based on demonstrated excellence in teaching and student support. Winners are announced and recognized during the undergraduate graduation event.
Rochak Badyal
A graduate student, Rochak serves as a teaching assistant while conducting research on developing robust state estimation and control algorithms to ensure seamless localization for robots and autonomous vehicles in GPS-denied or intermittent environments using sensor fusion.
His course instructor, Professor Behzad Rankouhi, praised his leadership and commitment:
“Rochak demonstrated excellent leadership in bringing other TAs up to speed on the lab material and making sure students received clear guidance and support for every lab session.”
Students consistently recognized Rochak’s patience, clarity, and dedication to meeting them where they were:
“Rochak was very patient with all of us during the lab. When students were struggling to understand a concept or direction, he met them where they were at and worked through the topic in an easy to understand, methodical manner. He did not make me feel less than when I didn’t understand concepts that other students found easy.”
“Provided more detail than that given in the lab manuals to the students at the start of each lab. Offered feedback during and after labs on any questions that came up.”
Reflecting on what made his experience as a TA so rewarding, Badyal shares:
“I’m really grateful for this! The best part of being a TA was getting hands-on in the lab and working alongside the students. I definitely learned just as much as I taught, and seeing everyone master the labs was the real highlight for me. This award is a great bonus, huge thanks to the faculty and students for such a rewarding year!”
Pauly Soulia
A graduate student, Pauly serves as a teaching assistant while conducting research on modeling the temperature-dependence of electrodialysis, a desalination process used to treat salty groundwater that may serve as a viable water resource alternative for regions in the United States experiencing severe water scarcity.
His course instructor, Professor Natasha Wright, spoke to the breadth and depth of his contributions:
“I strongly recommend Pauly Soulia for this teaching/TA award because he combines exceptional technical competence with a genuine ability to teach, mentor, and support students in laboratory and project-based settings. As my undergraduate researcher, master’s student, teaching assistant, and departmental outreach leader, Pauly consistently demonstrated scientific integrity, reliability, clear communication, and a deep commitment to creating rigorous, supportive, and inclusive engineering learning environments.”
One student reflected on Pauly's helpfulness and dedication:
“I interacted with Pauly a few times during the semester, and overall, he was extremely helpful in assisting to make the projects run and work the way they were intended. I’d say Pauly was the most helpful of all the instructors I interacted with all semester because he understood our struggles and wanted us to succeed.”
Reflecting on his journey from teaching assistant to lab instructor, Soulia shares:
“This past April I recently started a new position as a lab instructor in the UMN Bioproducts and Biosystems Engineering department. I’ve always been passionate about engineering education and I am glad to be fortunate enough to now help grow future engineers as a career. Knowing that my work as a TA has allowed students to better succeed in the ME program is a great motivator for me to continue working towards becoming a better educator.”