Dr. Gabriel Bruguier Joins Great Plains Fellows and Receives Exemplary Staff Award

Early April, Dr. Gabriel Bruguier was awarded with UNL’s College of Engineering (COE) Staff Award for Exemplary Service. The award celebrates staff members in the COE for their excellent exemplary service and support towards achieving the vision and mission of the college. Each year employees are nominated by their colleagues for the award. Up to 10 honorees are recognized at a luncheon and given a monetary prize, with combined funding from the Charles J. Vranek Fund for Engineering Excellence and donors’ annual gifts to the college.

Bruguier’s receipt of this award comes as no surprise to those who have worked with him at NTC and MATC. He has served as Event Coordinator since 2017, but helped as a UNL undergraduate during the 2014 and 2016 Native Youth Summer STEM Leadership Academy, in which Native American high-school students are invited to campus for a week-long program of activities and learning. Since then he has been integral in further developing MATC’s outreach programs, specifically the Roads, Rails, and Race Cars after-school program where he provides the materials and curriculum to students in Lincoln and surrounding Native reservations. He also helps prepare for the two MATC hosted Scholars Programs. The Historically Black Colleges and Universities' program is for current undergraduates who will soon be entering the engineering work force or continuing their education to graduate school. The Tribal Colleges and Universities' program is for students who are interested in transitioning from a two-year community college to a four-year institution.

The 2019 Summer Academy presented an activity in tandem with the Lincoln Bike Kitchen. The organization repairs, refurbishes, and donates bikes to organizations, individuals, and schools. They have given specific attention to refugees in need of transportation to go to school or work. That summer, students put together their own bikes with parts from the Lincoln Bike Kitchen and used them to get around campus and were able to take them home after the program. Bruguier continues to volunteer at the Kitchen and was recently pictured in the Journal Star article working on a bike.

This year Bruguier joined the Great Plains and Affiliates Fellowship. The Great Plains Center’s mission is to increase understanding of an appreciation for the people, cultures, and natural environment of the Great Plains. Fellows of the Great Plains Center publish research and book reviews in the Center’s journals, give talks as Olson Lecturers, write for the Center’s book series, speak at the annual Great Plains symposia, and advise the Great Plains Art Museum. They also sit on the Board of Governors and choose the Stubbendieck Great Plains Distinguished Book Prize winner. The Interdisciplinary regional research and outreach program was established at UNL in 1976. With their fellowships, the Center hopes to invite inquiry into the relationships between its natural environment and the cultures brought by its inhabitants, as scholars and residents work to preserve healthy eco-systems and build thriving human communities.