Faculty Profiles

Colleges and Departments

Dr. Clara M Novoa Ramirez

  • Professor - Ingram School of Engineering
Portrait of Dr. Clara M Novoa Ramirez

Biography and expertise

Clara Novoa is a Professor in the Industrial Engineering program at the Ingram School of Engineering at Texas State University. She received her Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering from Lehigh University, her M.E. in Management Systems Engineering from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez, and her B.S. in Industrial Engineering from Universidad de Los Andes in Colombia. Her research interests include stochastic and dynamic programming models for disaster relief, renewable energy planning, supply chain, logistics, and cybersecurity. She is currently a PI on a CREATE UTC internal grant studying the effects of flooding on Puerto Rico’s transportation infrastructure. She received the 2021 College Achievement Award for Excellence in Teaching and a 2002 IISE Gilbreth Memorial Fellowship. She is a member of INFORMS (senior), INFORMS CTL (since 2023), and IISE.

Education

Doctorate Degree

PhD in Industrial Engineering

Lehigh University, 2005

Master's Degree

MENG in Management Systems Engineering

Univ of Puerto Rico - Mayaguez, 1991

Bachelor's Degree

BS in Industrial Engineering

Universidad de los Andes, 1987

Teaching Interests

Research Interests

  • Dong, Wenquan (Principal), Novoa Ramirez, Clara M (Co-Principal), Mandal, Sujata (Co-Principal). Assisting Food Waste Monitoring and Management in Central Texas Rural Communities, Department of Agriculture, Federal, $163000. (Submitted: January 1, 2024, Funded: October 1, 2024 - December 30, 2025). Grant.
  • Ortiz, Araceli (Principal), Close, Eleanor (Co-Principal), Guirguis, Mina (Co-Principal), Novoa, Clara (Co-Principal), Talley, Kimberly Grau (Co-Principal). Texas State STEM Rising Stars, National Science Foundation Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE) program, Federal, $1500000. (Funded: January 1, 2015 - January 31, 2020). Grant.
  • Novoa Ramirez, Clara M (Principal). One-Time Fee Funding Student Service Fee Reserves, Student Service Fee Committee (SSFC) Texas State University, $1219. (Funded: 2011). Grant.
  • Novoa Ramirez, Clara M (Principal). Identifying and evaluating the most effective actions to prepare Puerto Rico’s primary ports and freight road transportation infrastructure for flooding disruptions using stochastic models., CREATE University Transportation Center (UTC) - Center Lead: Texas State University, Federal, $100000. (Submitted: September 29, 2025, Funded: January 1, 2026 - June 30, 2027). Grant.
  • Jin, Tongdan (Principal), Novoa Ramirez, Clara M (Co-Principal). ME-GREEN: Manufacturing for Environment by Generating Renewable Energy in Enterprise Networks, NSF Division of Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental, and Transport Systems (CBET), Federal, $199000. (Funded: July 15, 2017 - June 30, 2021). Grant.
View all grants
  • **Islam, M., & Novoa Ramirez, C. M. (2026). A Stochastic Optimization Model for Equitable and Cost-Efficient Food Distribution: A Case Study of Hays County Food Bank. In 2026 IISE Annual Conference & Expo (pp. 1–6). ProQuest. https://doi.org/10.21872/2026IISE_16534
  • *Abedin, A., Novoa Ramirez, C. M., & Jin, T. (2026). A Bin-Aware Stochastic Programming Model for Minimizing Aircraft Boarding Congestions. In 2026 IISE Annual Conference & Expo (pp. 1–6). https://doi.org/10.21872/2026IISE_17087
  • *Rahman, M. A., *Kuhel, M. T., & Novoa Ramirez, C. M. (2025). A Two-Stage Stochastic Optimization Framework for Environmentally Sensitive Oil Spill Response Resource Allocation in the Arctic. ArXiv, 1–18. Retrieved from https://www.arxiv.org/pdf/2511.22218
  • **Hassan, J., & Novoa Ramirez, C. M. (2023). A Two-Stage Stochastic Programming Model to Plan for the Central Texas Food Bank’s Inventory Management after COVID-19. In 54th Decision Science Institute Annual Conference.
  • Novoa Ramirez, C. M., & Qasem, A. M. (2023). GPU-accelerated Parallel Solutions to the Quadratic Assignment Problem. ArXiv, 1–25. Retrieved from https://arxiv.org/abs/2307.11248
View all scholarly/creative works
  • Award / Honor Recipient: INFORMS Senior Member, The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS). September 19, 2024 - Present
  • Award / Honor Recipient: Outstanding Program Leadership, Ingram School of Engineering. September 11, 2026
  • Award / Honor Recipient: H-LSAMP Mentor Recognition Letters, H-LSAMP. May 2016 - December 2025
  • Award / Honor Recipient: First Place - INFORMS Annual Student Poster Competition, INFORMS Minority Issues Forum (MIF). October 24, 2021
  • Award / Honor Recipient: INFORMS Minority Issues Forum (MIF) member selected to highlight in the Member Spotlight section of the Fall 2021 INFORMS MIF Newsletter, INFORMS MIF. October 22, 2021
View all awards
  1. Other

    Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) Student Chapter

  2. Volunteer

    City of San Marcos Resource Recovery Division - Neighborhood Resource Leader

  3. Member

    School Curriculum Committee

  4. Member

    INFORMS Committee on Teaching and Learning (CTL)

  5. Member

    Annual Review Committee for Evaluation of the Ingram School of Engineering Faculty AY 2022 - 2026

  6. Member

    Graduate Students Selection Committee - Industrial Engineering Program

  7. View all activities