Jose Principe was in Singapore on sabbatical when he found out.
The university awarded him the Teacher Scholar of the Year award for 2014-15. The award started in 1960 and is the most prestigious and oldest faculty award UF has to offer.
“I was thrilled and very honored, but it’s kind of unexpected,” Principe said. “But you know, it’s a wonderful feeling.”
Principe is a distinguished professor for the College of Engineering in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. His studies include areas in advanced signal processing and applications to brain-machine interfaces, which direct communication between a brain and an external device.
Principe believes the award represents an accumulation of the things he has accomplished for the university. He has been with the research institution for 28 years and earned his master’s degree and Ph.D. at UF.
One of his students, Goktug Tankut Cinar, a student graduating with a doctorate in electrical and computer engineering at UF, said Principe always has his door wide open.
Cinar, 26, said Principe leads a large group of doctoral students from machine learning in electrical engineering to brain-machine interfacing in biomedical engineering. He lets students dictate what they study and helps guide them through whatever path they chose.
“He’s always there to guide you if you start to steer off the main path,” Cinar said.
Cinar’s project consisted of a machine learning a computational model for auditory perception, and he credited Principe’s guidance as a key to fielding the model.
“To get the Ph.D., it is not just enough to apply it and get good results on certain tests,” Cinar said, “but you have to show your contribution to the field, and that’s where he is very instrumental.”
Along with the recognition, the award also offers a $6,000 honorarium that Principe said was a great compliment, even though his research program has been fortunately well-funded.
“I have done this for many years, and I will continue doing it because I still enjoy it as if it was the first day,” Principe said, “So I’m pretty happy.”
Check back on Monday for a story on Ann Christiano, UF’s 2014-15 Teacher of the Year.
[A version of this story ran on page 3 on 4/10/2015]
Professor Jose C. Principe poses in his office in the New Engineering Building Wednesday afternoon. Principe was awarded the UF Teacher/Scholar of the Year for 2014-2015.
