From Washington, D.C. to outer space, seniors in GW Engineering’s Department of Engineering Management and Systems Engineering (EMSE) are making their mark through capstone projects recognized at the 2026 Andrew P. Sage Memorial Design Competition (SMDC-26) and Space and Satellite Professionals International (SSPI) Mid-Atlantic Student Prize Competition.
SMDC, hosted by George Mason University, offers students a platform to showcase research tackling society’s most complex challenges through engineering design. The competition featured five tracks, with three EMSE teams each competing in a different one.
“The atmosphere at the competition was incredible; although we were in the competition, we were all excited about each other’s work. It was so special to be in a space where students could show off all their hard work and support others’ academics,” said GW’s Kaitlyn Frost.
Frost and teammates Donia Drias and Collin Schwabicello won best poster in the human-centered health and training track for their project, “Enhancing D.C. Emergency Department (ED) Flow Through EMS Coordination and Its Impact on Patient Outcomes.”
The team relied on a structured literature review of published studies and reports to identify quantitative indicators of ED strain, finding that average time-to-provider, length of stay, and boarding duration are the strongest indicators. “Since we were unable to get data directly from hospitals, we had to synthesize about 200,000 patient records from our literature review, then aggregate those records into hourly ED operations data,” Frost said.
Using this robust synthetic dataset, the team trained a machine learning model to predict adverse patient outcomes and cast their “vote” on which real-time indicator of ED strain caused the issue. By centering patient experience at every step, this project provides medical providers with a scalable, data-driven tool to improve EMS coordination and enhance emergency care.
Amna Maqsood, Gladys Fong, Shannon Zhang, and Alana Lee faced handling a similarly large dataset in their project, “Transit Safety Modeling and Operational Efficiency: An Integrated Data Architecture and Forecasting Approach for Washington Metro Area Transit Authority (WMATA),” which won best paper and presentation in SMDC-26’s mobility, routing, and logistics track.
Effective, safe transit operations are heavily dependent on data analytics to support continuous improvement and risk reduction. Using an Excel file with 32,000 observations, the team created a map of incidents and their most frequent locations. The forecasting tool then helps WMATA prevent future incidents and anticipate the conditions under which they occur. Serving riders across the National Capital Region of Maryland, Northern Virginia, and Washington, D.C., WMATA runs the second-largest heavy rail system in the nation, based on mileage. Lee told GW Today, “Ultimately, we’re hoping to help WMATA inform their safety operations and training.”
Complex systems–whether in EDs or public transportation–depend on systems engineers to design, document, and coordinate operations efficiently. The official records of these processes, known as systems engineering artifacts, can quickly become outdated if created manually. Abdullah Alghamdi, Ayomide Ojo, Benyat Yimaj, and Sahalae Reese took on the challenge of automating their generation directly from model-based system engineering (MBSE) models in the project, “AI-Assisted Generation of Systems Engineering Artifacts from MBSE Models.”
While they did not receive an award, the team was commended by SMDC-26 judges for tackling this longstanding industry challenge. The team utilized advanced modeling software, including ARCADIA Capella, to map the system framework, then fed their MBSE data into an artificial intelligence system to generate the artifact. Through iterative prompt tuning, they ensured the AI maintains the data’s context and structure and produces usable outputs.
Broadening the scope, Bogdan Bunea brought his systems engineering expertise to an interdisciplinary group that has spent the past academic year at GW building a small CubeSat satellite testing chamber to examine it in a simulated operating environment. They presented their testing chamber at the SSPI Mid Atlantic Student Prize Competition, held at the University of Virginia’s Fairfax campus, where they won an award for excellence in the application of the scientific method.
Hosted each spring, this competition brings together students to present research to a panel of industry experts and members of SSPI, the largest international professional network in the space and satellite industry. Bunea feels that their project differed from other presentations he saw because it moved beyond just theory and was complete, adding that while it’s common for students to build a CubeSat, not everyone has the opportunity to develop their own test chamber.
This work is part of a larger project funded by Professor Michael Keidar’s laboratory with the goal of launching the CubeSat into orbit in April 2027. As Team Lead, Bunea ensures the project stays on track, runs satellite coding, and communicates with all stakeholders. This spring, he and his teammates, all mechanical and aerospace engineering students, utilized their chamber to test the thrusters they developed.
The achievements of this year’s EMSE seniors at these competitions underscore their technical mastery, collaborative spirit, and commitment to real-world impact. From advancing emergency response to automating complex engineering documentation and working across departments, they showcased just some of the innovative GW student research being conducted across the department.