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Letter From the Chair of the Civil Engineering Institute Dear members and friends
We continued our activities and even gained new members who are alumni and are passionate about advancing the department.
Being in a virtual world did not dampen the CEI Board of Directors’ support for the Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering in 2021. We continued our activities and even gained new members who are alumni and are passionate about advancing the department. One of the missions of the board has been to guide the department for ways to improve its educational programs. The program’s educational objectives and the student outcomes are evaluated periodically and help the university maintain a high level of education for the students. From this review, the department is creating a construction management program. Board members who are current practitioners or retired professionals have been offering valuable feedback, which allows the university
to embrace some of the values and practices successfully used in the field for decades and the latest technologies. Another accomplishment we are working on is developing a new senior design project course that will be two semesters long. The increased length will permit the students to learn the techniques and standards, as well as review the projects provided to them in the first semester. In the second semester, the students will be ready to dive into design. Once again, we held our annual meeting in virtual format. We honored Paul Wiedefeld, the 2020 Engineering Excellence and Leadership Award recipient. Paul’s achievements at the helm of Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, his leadership roles at BWI Airport, Maryland Transit Administration, and in the private sectors, and his contributions to the field of engineering guided the board in our selection. I wish the board and the university many years of successful collaboration towards future successes. g Sincerely, Cerasela M. Cristei, PhD, PE Chair, Civil Engineering Institute
