“Supportive,” “clear,” “relatable, “has a passion for teaching” and “phenomenal.”
These are just a few of the descriptors students used in nomination letters to describe Daniel Quinn, an associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of Virginia School of Engineering and Applied Science who is this year’s recipient of the Hartfield Excellence in Teaching Award at UVA.
The award, sponsored by the Jefferson Scholars Foundation, recognizes those who exemplify the highest standards of teaching and “instill in their students the virtues of scholarship and a love of learning.” The foundation bestows the title of Faculty Fellow as part of the honor.
Teaching and Mentoring Students
One of the things that drives Quinn as an instructor is sharing the cool factor of his research, which involves taking inspiration from creatures that swim and fly to improve robotic performance.
Quinn teaches undergraduate courses such as Fluid Dynamics and Aerodynamics, which provide students with the fundamentals they’ll rely upon in their careers. His approach is to frontload the most challenging material, such as the heavy math required, so that students can build confidence by the end of the semester. Along the way, he demonstrates why he finds what he’s teaching so exciting.
“Professor Quinn creates custom-built multimedia teaching tools for nearly every lecture,” said Richard W. Kent, the Frederick Tracy Morse Professor and chair of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. “These tools, which may depict the elegant shape of an eddy formed by the flick of a fish’s tail or the turbulence generated by swarms of robotic insects, elegantly illustrate and elucidate engineering concepts that, if taught without such resources, can seem dense and impenetrable.”
Kent noted in his endorsement that Quinn has received student feedback every year from one or more students saying Quinn was one of the best professors they’ve ever had.
Beyond teaching, he strives to be of help in whatever way might springboard a student into a successful engineering career.
Undergraduate Kathryn Geoffroy, a third-year aerospace engineering major who is both a Jefferson Scholar and a Rodman Scholar, met Quinn as a student in his Fluid Dynamics course.
“When I went to Professor Quinn’s office hours for the first time my second year, I went trying to understand the applications of the Navier-Stokes equation, but as we continued talking, I shared my journey to choosing aerospace engineering and we found similarities in our paths,” Geoffroy said. “As I returned to office hours, he coached me on looking into research positions and what direction I wanted to take in life. He met with me outside of the required office hours and became a core mentor in my professional and personal life.”
Double Hoo Lucy Fitzgerald, principal scientist in biophysics at Luna Labs, learned from Quinn as an undergraduate in mechanical engineering, then worked for him as a research assistant and teaching assistant while earning her Ph.D. in mechanical and aerospace engineering.
“Dan was built to be a teacher,” Fitzgerald said. “The care and intention with which he crafts his courses invites students to not only succeed, but also to nurture an inner curiosity.”
Notably, Quinn is also a National Science Foundation CAREER Award winner. His collaborative research as an affiliate of Link Lab, where he also mentors graduate students, resulted in 345 journal citations last year alone.
Quinn most recently collaborated on a paper for Science Advances in which UVA authors have taken up the “grand challenge” of learning to build a soft robot that performs with the same speed, high efficiency and high maneuverability of a manta ray.
An Alumnus Who Returned to UVA
Quinn first came to UVA as an undergraduate student in 2006. After graduating with a bachelor’s in aerospace engineering, he attended Princeton University and completed a Ph.D. in fluid dynamics at the Hydrodynamics Lab there, working on bio-inspired propulsion. While at Princeton, Quinn was also a Visiting Fellow at the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University. He went on to become a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Bio-Inspired Research and Design group at Stanford University, studying the stability characteristics of birds flying in turbulent gusts.
Quinn joined the UVA faculty in 2017.
He said the recent award is especially meaningful because it’s from his alma mater.
“Coming back to teach at UVA had always topped my list of dream jobs, so it’s an honor to be here,” he said.