Honouring Mentorship That Shapes Future Engineers

Left to right: Abiy Wubneh, Andrew Mah, Mostafa Mohamed and dean Simaan AbouRizk

Every engineer can point to someone who took the time to answer a question, offer encouragement, or provide just enough guidance to help them solve a problem on their own.

The Joseph Mah Memorial Award for Mentorship Excellence in Engineering celebrates those individuals. Presented annually by Andrew Mah, the award honours the legacy of his late father, Joseph Mah, '75 BSc CivE, '81 MEng CivE, whose career serving the Province of Alberta was defined by technical excellence and his commitment to mentoring young engineers.

Open to employees across the Faculty of Engineering, the award recognizes exceptional mentorship of undergraduate students. Recipients are nominated by members of the engineering community and selected by the Undergraduate Student-Staff Committee in Engineering.

This year's recipients, Mostafa Mohamed and Abiy Wubneh, share a belief that great mentorship is not about providing answers. It is about helping students discover their own.

Mohamed, a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, mentors students through Dean's Research Awards, Undergraduate Student Research Awards, capstone projects, and graduate research. His research applies computational mechanics and finite element methods to challenges ranging from bone healing to pipeline integrity.

"Through these experiences, I have come to view mentorship as a symbiotic rather than hierarchical relationship," he says.

Rather than directing students toward a single solution, Mohamed encourages them to experiment, ask questions, and embrace trial and error.

"Sometimes the answer is, 'Let's try this,' or 'How would you propose tackling this?'" he says. "Leaving room for trial and error encourages independent thinking and creates opportunities for innovative solutions."

For Wubneh, an Associate Industrial Professor in Mechanical Engineering who joined the U of A after more than a decade as a senior design engineer, mentorship begins with recognizing potential that students may not yet see in themselves.

"Mentorship is simply paying forward something I was given," he says. "I would not be where I am today without the people who took the time to guide me."

Drawing on years of industry experience, Wubneh believes one of a mentor's most valuable roles is helping students develop confidence as they navigate complex, open-ended engineering problems.

"New students cannot always tell whether they are on the right track, or how close they are to a solution," he says. "Some of the most valuable work a mentor does is to lend that perspective, reassuring a student that they are closer than they feel."

For him, the greatest reward comes when students realize what they are capable of.

"Watching a student go from 'I am not sure I can do this' to standing proudly next to something they designed and built, discovering how capable they were all along, is the best part of my week."

As Andrew Mah continues his family's legacy through this award, the Faculty of Engineering celebrates mentors like Mohamed and Wubneh, whose guidance extends beyond the classroom and helps shape the next generation of engineers.