Chair's Welcome

Interim Chair’s Welcome:

As this academic year begins, I find myself in an enviable position: stepping into an interim leadership role of a Department that is on a well-charted course, set in place by my predecessor, Dr. Nancy Love, during her nearly four years at the helm. We have seen the completion of a strategic plan that is currently focusing our collective strength on the complex challenges of restoring, protecting and managing our country's aging infrastructure while protecting the natural environment. We are also enjoying unprecedented success in fundraising activities and the evolution of a larger and vibrant Civil and Environmental Engineering Friends Association board that promises to engage and enhance our relationship with our outstanding alumni.

This year marks the emergence of a Sustainable and Intelligent Infrastructure Systems group within CEE, with our newest faculty member, Jeff Scruggs, joining that group. He brings our full-time faculty to 28 members. This will also be another year of growth. We have the green light to add three new faculty to our ranks. In addition to the Chair search, we will be looking to add to our emerging program in infrastructure systems engineering and strengthen our sustainable water quality engineering group. Our undergraduate enrollments are once again on the rise. With our updated ABET-accredited undergraduate Civil Engineering curriculum now underway, and our push for approval of an ABET-accredited Environmental Engineering program this year, we are poised to provide our students with the educational opportunities they need, tailored for the twenty-first-century engineering challenges they will face.

I am also pleased to announce exciting news from our Construction Engineering and Management Group. Mr. John Tishman of Tishman Construction endowed a Construction Management Program with a $5 million gift. The proceeds of this gift will establish the Tishman Construction Management Program in CEE at UM that will be a center for training the leaders and best in the construction industry. Coupled with the recent and generous gift from the Bartus Family to initiate the Bartus Scholars program, our Department Endowment has grown from $12 Million to $20 Million. These funds provide unprecedented flexibility for recruiting and retaining the best, and insure we continue to be the place of choice for the future leaders in our profession.

These are indeed exciting times to be a member of the CEE family at the University of Michigan. We welcome you to visit us and consider joining us in our journey to influence and shape the future.

Our Mission

The mission of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) is to be the place of choice for education and research in civil and environmental engineering and to serve society as an originator and purveyor of knowledge in CEE, as a creator and communicator of CEE technology, and as a developer of world leaders and practitioners of CEE.

Goals

Our primary goal is to maintain and enhance our leadership position in the nation as a premier CEE program in undergraduate and graduate education, to continue our long-standing tradition of research excellence in targeted areas consistent with anticipated societal needs, and to be recognized as one of the top CEE departments in the nation. To this end, we intend:

• To educate students of diverse backgrounds and prepare them to be leaders in the design and construction of civil and environmental systems in the private sector, the government sector and academia.
• To foster faculty who are world leaders in their respective areas, who are helping to shape the future of the profession, and who are aiding the advancement of the CEE industry by transferring new knowledge and technologies to engineering practice.
• To provide national and international leadership in research, development and practice relevant to civil infrastructure and environmental systems.