Civil Engineering’s ASCE chapter earns national recognition for service and excellence
July 18, 2006
STARKVILLE, Miss.–Mississippi State’s student chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers is nationally ranked for overall excellence and has been cited for its service in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
The university chapter won the Zone II Vice President’s Award, placing it among the ASCE’s top five chapters in the nation. The national professional organization also presented three other vice presidential awards and its first-place Robert Ridgway Award to round out the top five chapters.
Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology won the Ridgway Award. Other vice presidential award winners included the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Zone I; South Dakota State University, Zone III; and Brigham Young University, Zone IV.
The top awards are based on chapter membership and activities, including participation in meetings and conferences, support of university and educational programs, service projects and outreach programs. Since 1990, the MSU chapter has won the vice presidential award five times and the Ridgway Award twice.
Zone II includes student ASCE chapters in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia.
“The recent accomplishments of Mississippi State’s ASCE chapter continue a tradition of excellence in our student professional organizations and for the university,” said Dean Kirk Schulz of MSU’s Bagley College of Engineering.
The college includes the department of civil and environmental engineering. Veteran MSU professor Dennis Truax succeeded Tom White as department head July 1.
The MSU chapter also was honored with ASCE’s 2006 Outstanding Service Award for a variety of outreach projects completed during the past school year–including its work in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina that demolished the Mississippi Gulf Coast and heavily damaged portions of the Louisiana and Alabama coastlines in 2005.
The MSU students organized a database of engineers who needed help during the hurricane recovery effort, including current and former members of the university’s ASCE chapter. They also worked with local professionals to help Louisiana student storm victims relocate to other universities.
“The MSU chapter organized an effort to contact every civil engineer in Mississippi to determine if they were okay, and determine if they had personal or professional needs the state and national organizations could address,” said Truax, the chapter’s faculty adviser.
In addition to the post-Katrina effort, some 107 MSU chapter members completed more than 730 service hours of work during the year. Their projects included:
–Development of a Habitat for Humanity site in Pontotoc,
–Participation in the litter collection Mississippi Adopt-A-Highway Program,
–Helping judge projects in a district science fair,
–Coordination of a community recycling program, and
–Volunteering to host the Tombigbee Regional MATHCOUNTS Competition.
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