Monthly Archives: June 2014

OSU CCE celebrates the Class of 2014

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20140613_CivilAndConstructionEngineeringGrad_HO-033The OSU School of Civil and Construction Engineering handed out 181 undergraduate and 46 graduate degrees during the 2013-14 academic year as the class was honored at the annual CCE Graduation Ceremony on Friday, June 13, at the LaSells Stewart Center on the OSU campus.

The event, separate from OSU Commencement, was an opportunity to recognize the hard work and positive impact the group had on the school during their time at OSU.  Many graduates will immediately enter the workforce (construction engineering majors have a near 100-percent job placement this year) while others are continuing on to graduate school in their discipline of choice.

As part of the ceremony, Patrick Burns (civil engineering) and Jason Powell (construction engineering management) were honored as they received the OSU CCE Student of the Year Awards.

Photos from the event, attended by over 1000 people, can be seen on the school’s new Flickr Photostream.

 

 

Transportation Graduate Students awarded DDETFP Fellowships

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Oregon State University School of Civil and Construction Engineering graduate students Dylan Anderson and Rachel Vogt have been awarded 2014 Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Fellowships. The highly competitive national awards are given as part of the Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Fellowship Program (DDETFP), which was started in 1991 to attract qualified students to the fields of transportation education and research, and advance transportation workforce development.

Advised by OSU associate professor Katharine Hunter-Zaworski, Anderson is developing a manual to improve safety at rail public transportation platforms. The research, conducted under the Transit Cooperative Research Program (TCRP), will assist transit agencies to prevent and minimize public rail transit safety incidents.

Vogt, who is advised by OSU assistant professor Haizhong Wang, is working with the Oregon Department of Transportation to understand and address questions related to decreasing fuel tax  combined with increasing infrastructure costs. As Oregon continues to explore a Road User Charge (RUC), her research will focus on how various rate structures and implementation strategies may impact different socio-economic groups and regions of the state.

Approximately 150 to 200 Eisenhower Transportation Fellowships are awarded each year based on funding availability. Since its inception, the program has awarded over 2,000 Eisenhower Transportation Fellowships.

For more information about the program, visit the DDETFP website.

Annika O’Dea receives Fulbright U.S. Student Award

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Annika O’Dea, a coastal and ocean engineering graduate student in the Oregon State University School of Civil and Construction Engineering, has been awarded the prestigious Fulbright scholarship, the Council for International Exchange of Scholars announced earlier this month. O’Dea, who will graduate from OSU with a master’s degree in civil engineering, will use the award to travel to Senegal and research coastal evolution and coastal hazards in the region.

“It is a great opportunity and I was really excited when I found out I had been named to the program,” O’Dea said. “West Africa faces a lot of erosion issues and has been impacted by rising sea-levels. The coast is heavily populated and is constantly changing. They are losing roads and buildings and the area will only get worse as sea-levels continue to rise.”

O’Dea’s research, which starts in October and is funded for one year, will look at how the coast has changed in recent years and predict how future changes in sea-levels could impact the area.

She learned she received the prominent award in late April as it was the culmination of a lengthy application process. Working with the OSU Fulbright Scholar Program and advisors Laurence Becker (associate professor, Geosciences) and Nick Fleury (head advisor, International Degrees), O’Dea submitted her application to OSU for review in September before submitting to the national organization in October.

While at OSU, O’Dea has worked with OSU CCE associate professor Merrick Haller on the nearshore impact of wave energy extraction and will present her thesis in a few weeks.

The Fulbright Program is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and awards approximately 8,000 grants annually. Since its inception in 1946, approximately 310,000 “Fulbrighters” have participated in the program.