Orange County Branch Newsletter

May 2023

ASCE UCI

Student Chapter Hosts/Attends Multiple Professional Development Events!

By Ryan Tran | ASCE UCI External Vice President



The ASCE UCI Student Chapter Hosts Multiple Spring Quarter Events for their student members!
 

March 7th, 2023 - PSWS Poster-Making Night

ASCE UCI hosted a PSWS poster-making night on March 7th, 2023, in preparation for PSWS. Students were able to let their artistic ideas flow while munching on some snacks. With these posters, students were able to demonstrate their school spirit and cheer on their peers as they participated in PSWS in the coming weeks.

ASCE UCI Student Members painting posters for PSWS 2023

March 8th, 2023 - Executive Board Election Night

ASCE UCI hosts an executive board election night to decide who will be running the club for the 2023-2024 school year. Potential candidates gave a speech about their goals and answered questions from the outgoing board! At the end of their speeches, voting took place, and the new e-board was selected. The new e-board is excited to do its best in the upcoming school year!

Outgoing E-board Passing on their Positions to the Incoming E-board

March 11th, 2023 - ASCE OC Mock Interview Workshop

Students from ASCE UCI and ASCE Fullerton were able to attend a mock interview workshop hosted by Walker Consultants. Tomas Atienzo, a restoration engineer who works at Walker Consultants, gave an office tour to the students. After the tour, students were interviewed by industry professionals and had their resumes reviewed. After the mock interview workshop, students and professionals played a quick little mini-game where the winners were awarded gift cards! Special thanks to Tomas for letting ASCE OC use their office for the mock interview workshop!

ASCE Students and Industry Professionals at the Walker Consultants Office

March 23rd - 25th, 2023 - Pacific Southwest Symposium 2023

The Pacific Southwest Symposium (PSWS) is one event that ASCE UCI attends to allow students to compete in technical and non-technical events. This year’s PSWS was hosted at California State University, Northridge, and brought in ASCE student chapters throughout Southern California and Hawaii. This three-day symposium was an excellent opportunity for students to network with professionals and other students. We congratulate ASCE UCI for placing ninth overall out of fourteen universities that attended PSWS 2023. We are incredibly proud of our student-led project teams for the amount of work they put in as we continue to learn and grow.

ASCE UCI Student Members at the PSWS Banquet

ASCE UCI Student Members after competing in PSWS Non-Technical Events

April 19th, 2023 - Second General Meeting with Simpson Strong-Tie

ASCE UCI had the unique opportunity to listen to a guest speaker from Simpson Strong-Tie at their second general meeting of the spring quarter. Students learned more about the construction aspect of the civil engineering industry and the positive impacts they can make within the community. ASCE UCI would like to thank Angel de Leon for speaking about his experience at Simpson Strong-Tie and sponsoring the food and refreshments. We greatly appreciate your work and all your contributions toward student success!

ASCE UCI members actively listening to the Simpson Strong-Tie Presentation

Guest Speaker Angel de Leon speaks about his experience at Simpson Strong-Tie

May 3rd, 2023 - Third General Meeting - Senior Panel

Students had the opportunity to listen to civil/environmental graduating seniors. Graduating seniors answered questions from the audience, such as their internship experiences as well as UCI college courses. We hope that everyone had a fun time listening to their experiences, and we appreciate the seniors coming out to be a panelist.

Graduating Seniors share their UCI experience at our Senior Panel

May 10th, 2023 - CEE @ UCI Affiliates Quarterly Meeting with UCI Students

UCI students had the unique opportunity to attend a CEE @UCI Affiliates Meeting where three guest speakers talked about affordable, sustainable structures. The first guest speaker, Ayman Mosallam, a civil and environmental engineering professor at UCI, presented on Green Philosophy for Sustainable Infrastructure: Concept & Implementation. The second speaker, Thomas Knittel, a design director at HDR, spoke about the subject: More with Less: Climate Positive Design. The final guest speaker, Robyn Vettraino, a principal at VCA Green, spoke about LEED for homes vs. Affordable Housing Case Studies. After every panelist presented their topic, a Q&A session took place, and scholarship winners were announced. Afterward, all attendees ate dinner and listened to a presentation from OCSD Decathlon about their accomplishments.

Presentation from Professor Mosallem

Group Photo of the OCSD23 Decathlon Team

May 17th, 2023 - Fourth General Meeting with Simpson Gumpertz & Heger

ASCE UCI hosted its fourth general meeting of the spring quarter on May 17th, 2023. We had the opportunity to listen to our guest speakers from Simpson Gumpertz & Heger. Our members had the unique experience of learning more about the structural aspect of the civil engineering industry and what being in the Building Technology team entails. ASCE UCI would like to give a special shoutout to Zachariah Bettner and Jerry Ding for taking the time to come out and talk about their work experience at SGH. It was very interesting to see all the hard work you put into designing come to life. We would also like to thank SGH for sponsoring the food as well. We greatly appreciate all the work you do to keep our communities safe and for supporting us students in our professional endeavors!

Guest speakers Jerry Ding (Left) & Zachariah Bettner (Right)


About the Author:

Ryan Tran is a second-year Civil Engineering Student at the University of California, Irvine, and the External Vice President of their ASCE student chapter for the 2023 - 2024 school year. Ryan enjoys playing volleyball recreationally and trying new foods. Ryan wants to work in the water resources field and will be interning at the Irvine Ranch Water District later this summer to help him get a feel of what the industry is like. Ryan can be contacted at asce.uc.irvine@gmail.com.