Fast-moving environmental, political and workplace trends are boosting civil engineering to a critical new role, even if its practitioners and academics aren’t totally ready, according to speakers and attendees at the annual meeting of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). The Oct. 29-31 meeting in Kansas City drew nearly 1,000 attendees, including a large contingent of students.
“The world needs the profession to deal with issues that extend beyond civil engineering,” said Priscilla Nelson, a professor and former provost at New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark. “Too often, we go into a reductionist approach. Civil engineers must declare that this is the profession of the future.”