UMKC School of Science and Engineering

Congratulations to Ashley Winchell (B.A. '08) for being named to the 2026 ACEC Missouri Future Leaders Academy class. She has served as the Planning and Mobility Lead for Wilson & Company’s Midwest Region since 2024 and brings valuable experience and leadership to this year’s academy class.

Welcome to the quietest place at UMKC. Yell as loud as you want in here. The sound goes nowhere because there's nothing for it to bounce off.

The anechoic chamber is a foam-lined room designed to absorb electromagnetic waves. Electromagnetic waves power radar systems, wireless communication and the devices we use every day. In a normal lab, these waves bounce off everything and corrupt measurements. Inside the chamber, the foam absorbs them completely, giving researchers a clean, interference-free environment to measure antennas and test wireless systems with pinpoint accuracy.

UMKC’s anechoic chamber is the only one in the Kansas City area and open to the public, making this highly specialized research space accessible to the community.

Learn more about the anechoic chamber: https://www.umkc.edu/news/posts/2026/june/step-into-the-anechoic-chamber-the-quietest-place-at-umkc.html

SSE student Jawnaa Matter is one of six UMKC students selected to receive the prestigious Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship to study abroad. The biology and chemistry student with a Spanish minor is eager to immerse herself in a new culture while strengthening her language skills.

“I am most looking forward to becoming more fluent in Spanish, meeting new people, experiencing a new culture, trying new foods and spending time at the beach,” Matter said.

Learn more about the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship: https://www.umkc.edu/news/posts/2026/may/six-umkc-students-earn-prestigious-scholarship-to-study-abroad.html

UMKC and Children's Mercy have taken a significant step forward in their longstanding relationship, formalizing a new agreement that creates a clearer, faster pathway for Ph.D. students in the natural sciences and the School of Science and Engineering to collaborate directly with hospital researchers. Under the new agreement, the need for individual, project-by-project administrative approvals has been removed, eliminating a key barrier that often slowed the start of collaborative work.

Gerald Wyckoff, Ph.D. chair of pharmacology and pharmaceutical sciences, worked closely with two individuals from the Children’s Mercy Research Institute, Mark Hoffman, Ph.D., chief research information officer and Laura Ramsey, Ph.D., section chief of individualized therapeutics, clinical pharmacology, toxicology and therapeutic innovation to build a new framework designed to build on existing collaboration in a more intentional, structured way, ensuring that opportunities are easier to access and scale.

“UMKC and Children’s Mercy have a long history of collaboration,” Hoffman said. “This will streamline the process for UMKC Ph.D. students to perform their graduate work at Children’s Mercy. The inclusion of the UMKC School of Science and Engineering opens the door for deeper collaboration in biomedical engineering, AI and other technical topics.”

Learn more about the streamlined research agreement: https://www.umkc.edu/news/posts/2026/may/umkc-and-childrens-mercy-launch-streamlined-research-agreement.html

Congratulations to the Class of 2026! We're so proud of your accomplishments and can't wait to see what the future holds for our SSE alums. 💙💛

Congratulations to the Class of 2026! Here are a few of the graduates who will be walking across the stage today.🎓

UMKC Design Build Fly team, Aeroos, recently competed in the 2026 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Design/Build/Fly Competition against nearly 100 teams from around the world.

This year, they were tasked with designing a banner-towing bush plane. The team spent about two weeks constructing the final aircraft, which was decked out in UMKC blue and gold. They passed technical inspection and successfully completed Mission 1, flying three laps. Congratulations, Aeroos!

Every semester, outstanding graduating students are named Dean of Students Honor Recipients. SSE student Alana Lopez is one of 20 students given that honor this semester, for her academic achievements, service and leadership. Congratulations!

Learn more about the students: https://www.umkc.edu/news/posts/2026/may/graduating-students-named-dean-of-students-honor-recipients.html

During the Pigment and Politics event, part of the National Humanities Center 2026 Being Human Festival, Rachel Decker from MIDE shared the science behind historic paint and color. Three different high schools learned how paint was made and used some of that paint to make artworks of their own!

It's Finals week! Good luck Roos, you've got this! 💙💛