Student Achievement

Civil Engineering PhD candidate receives UBC Killam Doctoral Scholarship

Kishoare Tamanna, a PhD student in Civil Engineering and a UBC Killam Doctoral Scholar at the School of Engineering, is making waves in the field of sustainable infrastructure development. Working at the Applied Laboratory for Advanced Materials and Structures (ALAMS) under the guidance of Professor Shahria Alam and co-supervised by Professor Tony Yang at the […]

UBC Concrete Canoe wins 3rd place at ASCE Pacific Northwest competition

The UBC Concrete Canoe team’s journey in the summer of 2022 was filled with challenges, but their unwavering dedication and resilience propelled them to remarkable success. The team’s outstanding performance at the ASCE Pacific Northwest competition, securing 3rd place overall and achieving notable victories in the races, stands as a testament to their skill and […]

Third Quadrant Design Won 3rd Place at Solar Decathlon 2023

Originally published in Mechanical Business. Teams from the University of British Columbia and the University of Waterloo are among the winners of the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Solar Decathlon 2023 Build Challenge. This was the 21st edition of the annual Solar Decathlon, a student competition that challenges the next generation of building professionals to design […]

UBC Seismic Took Home Communications Award from the EERI Seismic Design Competition

Although their tower collapsed, their exceptional performance still earned them the second highest overall score

Transforming Campus Safety: CIVL 446’s Team 10 Selected as The Winner of D&I Project Poster

On Design and Innovation Day in April, the project titled “Improving 16th Avenue for Walking, Biking and Rolling” by Team 10 from CIVL 446 was selected as the winner of the project poster category among several amazing projects by civil engineering students.   Team 10, consisting of Adi Henegar, Bahati Msakamali, Jasmine Ma, Jeremy Karkanis, […]

Civil Engineering Students Take on the Challenge of Designing a Nearly-Zero Carbon Building

Third Space Commons is one of Canada’s first institutional spaces designed by students to be near-zero embodied carbon

UBC Civil led student team aims to build a net-zero student space on campus

Student design team Third Quadrant Design is about to start construction of a new student space on campus that redefines sustainable design.

Beverley Ng: “Maximizing friendships and opportunities”

Beverley received the APSC Rising Star Award for her passion and dedication for making meaningful contributions to society.

UBC Concrete Canoe wins first place at ASCE PNW competition

The team’s victorious finish this year was the result of perseverance and hard work.

UBC Civil PhD students compete in Department Heat of Three Minute Thesis competition

Presenters had three minutes to showcase their research to a non-specialist audience.

UBC Civil Engineering student team wins first place at 2021 EERI Seismic Design Competition

After working virtually on their design over the past year, UBC Civil Engineering student team UBC Seismic placed first in the 2021 Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) Undergraduate Seismic Design Competition. The competition, organized by the EERI Student Leadership Council (SLC), annually brings together students from over 50 universities across the globe. The goal is […]

UBC Steel Bridge wins first place at Canadian National Steel Bridge Competition

The UBC Steel Bridge design team, comprised of 50 UBC Civil Engineering undergraduate and Master’s students, recently won first place at the 2021 Canadian National Steel Bridge Competition. While the team had consistently placed in the top three in previous years, this was their first time winning the top prize. Supervised by faculty members Drs. Noboru Yonemitsu and Carlos Molina Hutt, the […]

PhD researcher receives Public Scholar Initiative fellowship and investigates impact of Georgia sedimentary basin

Preetish Kakoty (PhD, ’22) has been awarded the 2020-2021 UBC Public Scholar Initiative fellowship. He is one of two UBC Faculty of Applied Science students to receive the honour this year. The metro Vancouver region faces major seismic risk due to its close proximity to the Cascadia Subduction Zone. This risk is further elevated because of […]

Fourth-year student Jezarah Ebel earns rare honour as double recipient of Pipeline Engineering awards

Jezarah Ebel was always destined for a bright future in engineering. After excelling in math and physics in high school, choosing to study Civil Engineering at UBC was a no-brainer. Driven by a newfound interest in project management, she decided to further specialize in pipeline engineering. This year, Jezarah is one of three students (along with […]

MEL students use free public Wi-Fi to increase citizen engagement in New Westminster

How can cities increase public engagement? Students in the Master of Engineering Leadership (MEL) in Urban Systems: Infrastructure for Resilient Cities program worked with the City of New Westminster to explore how adding to the number of free public Wi-Fi spots in the city’s high-pedestrian traffic areas could enhance citizen engagement. New Westminster was one of the […]

Female-led UBC Engineering student team wins first place at Solar Decathlon

UBC Engineering student design team, Third Quadrant Design, won first place in the Urban Single-Family Division at the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon, held April 17-19, 2020. Supervised by UBC Engineering faculty members Dr. Adam Rysanek, Dr. Sheryl Staub-French, and Dr. Susan Nesbit, Third Quadrant Design comprises of 25 UBC students across multiple engineering disciplines. It is led […]

UBC Civil Team wins third place in Seismic Design Competition

Congratulations to the UBC students who won third place in the 2020 Undergraduate Seismic Design Competition at the National Earthquake Conference. Over 51 teams from universities across the United States and around the world participated in this competition. Each team designed a complex tall building model made from balsa wood that was tested on a shaking table. […]

UBC Civil Design Team Wins First Place at WEFTEC Student Design Competition

Congratulations to the UBC Civil Design Team members who took home first place 2019 WEFTEC Student Design Competition!  The 18th annual competition showcased innovative ideas from 30 teams from 26 WEF Member Associations and three countries during WEFTEC 2019, WEF’s 92nd annual technical exhibition and conference. UBC team members Luthfi Subagio, James Craxton, Daniel Luo, and Johnson […]

UBC Steel Bridge Design Team Triumphs At 2019 Canadian National Steel Bridge Competition

In May 2019, the UBC Steel Bridge Design Team competed at the 2019 Canadian National Steel Bridge Competition at l’Université de Montréal. UBC Engineering Student Design Team, composed of 14 undergraduate engineering students, competed against 18 teams from Canada, USA, Mexico, and China. Out of the teams that competed, UBC Steel Bridge ranked 1st in lightness, 3rd in oral presentation, and 3rd overall, making this year’s […]

UBC Civil Teams Wins 2018 WEFTEC Student Design Competition

Congratulations to UBC Civil Environmental students (left to right) James Craxton, Steven Rintoul, Lutz Subagio, Johnson Li, as well as supervisor Professor Noboru Yonemitsu, who won first place in the 2018 WEFTEC Student Design Competition!  The Student Design Competition begins at the Member Association (MA) level. Each MA is encouraged to develop their own Student Design […]

Another Year of Success: UBC CSCE Wins National CSCE President’s Best Student Chapter Award

The UBC CSCE Student Chapter came first in a nation-wide selection of the best student chapters of the Canadian Society for Civil Engineering (CSCE), an organization that aims to unite civil engineering communities across Canada. Having won the same award in 2015, this is another year of great success for the Student Chapter. After thorough review and evaluation of […]

Yes, It Floats: UBC Concrete Canoe Team Rises to the Challenge at National Competition

UBC’s Concrete Canoe team recently competed at the Canadian National Concrete Canoe Competition (CNCCC) at Waterloo University in Ontario. This three-day event brought together civil engineering students from all over the country from May 10th – 12th. The UBC team has been preparing for the better part of the year, designing and testing their material, designing […]

Civil Engineering MASc Takes Second Place in 3MT@UBC

Rajat Jain, a civil engineering MASc student, claimed the second place prize in the 3MT@UBC competition. Tasked with the challenge of presenting their thesis research in a condensed but engaging three minute talk, competitors in the Three Minute Thesis (3MT) came from a variety of departments across campus. On March 15th, these graduate students went head to […]

Civil Engineering graduate students get ready to take clean drinking-water technology to San Francisco in competition for the Hult Prize

An interdisciplinary team of UBC students is ready to take their drinking water technology case one step closer to the $1 million Hult Prize. Rajat Jain, Jatin Maheshwary, and Karan Grover have joined forces to create a business case for the drinking water technology developed under the supervision of Civil Engineering professor Pierre Bérubé. Their entry […]

UBC BCWWA Student Chapter runners-up at WEF Student Design Competition

L-R: team members Brad Jenks, Kit Caufield, Jenikka Javison, Tim Burton; Tom Kunetz (WEF vice president). Not pictured: team members Antonio Castro and Gregory Vettese. The UBC Student Chapter of the BC Water and Waste Association placed second in the Student Wastewater Design Competition at WEFTEC 2017, the Water Environment Federation’s annual Technical Exhibition & […]

Civil undergraduate receives S-FRAME Prize

Civil undergraduate student Zhuo Nan Chen has been selected to receive the 2017 S-FRAME Software Inc. Prize in Structural Engineering, a $1,000 award offered to the student with the highest academic standing in CIVL 228 Introduction to Structural Engineering. The donor, S-FRAME Software Inc., is a company headquartered in Richmond, BC, that produces a suite […]

Civil Engineering grad honoured by Environmental Managers Association of BC

Thursday, July 6, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin A UBC Civil Engineering graduate has received the Emerging Environmental Professional Award from the Environmental Managers Association of BC. Alice Kruchten, who accepted the award at a gala at the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club earlier this month, was recognized for her “professional achievement, innovation, experience and leadership, […]

UBC Steel Bridge wins third place overall at Canadian Nationals

Monday, May 29, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin UBC Steel Bridge earned an impressive third-place finish at the recent 2017 CSCE-CISC Canadian National Steel Bridge Competition. Eight teams converged at Université Laval for the May competition, in a culmination of months of student-driven activity including the conception, design, and fabrication of a scale-model steel bridge, […]

UBC Civil Engineering team wins 2017 BCWWA student competition for wastewater treatment design

Friday, May 19, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin A group of third and fourth year UBC Civil Engineering students, competing as team UBSeaTec, placed first at the 2017 BC Water & Waste Association (BCWWA) Student Design Competition. This year’s competition challenged students to create a feasibility design for a wastewater treatment upgrade to the Tsawout […]

Civil PhD student awarded major international scholarship for drinking water research

Friday, May 5, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin The American Water Works Association has awarded Civil PhD candidate Shona Robinson the 2017 Dave Caldwell Scholarship for her research in the drinking water field. Shona is part of a research group investigating membrane filtration, a popular technology for drinking water treatment. Porous membranes effectively filter out microorganisms and […]

UBC Concrete Canoe, UBC Steel Bridge post outstanding results at ASCE Regional Student Conference

Thursday, May 4, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin UBC Concrete Canoe and UBC Steel Bridge have both returned from the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Pacific Northwest Regional Student Conference at Boise State University with excellent results. The concrete canoe competition saw fifteen universities face off in an exciting student team challenge: to design, […]

Concrete Canoe embarks on 2017 competition season

Wednesday, April 19, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin After addressing some unique challenges presented by this year’s design requirements, the UBC Concrete Canoe team is set to embark on the 2017 competition season. First, the team will be represented at the American Society for Civil Engineering (ASCE) Pacific Northwest 2017 Student Conference, happening at Boise […]

Civil grad student selected for UBC Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award

Tuesday, April 4, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin UBC Civil Engineering graduate student Negar Roghanian has been selected to receive the 2016/2017 Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award. Killam Graduate TA Awards are given in recognition of outstanding contributions by teaching assistants, which have led to a “high level of respect from undergraduate students and academic […]

Concrete Toboggan scores second place in two categories at GNCTR 2017

Tuesday, February 28, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin The UBC Concrete Toboggan Team has returned from the 2017 Great Northern Concrete Toboggan Race with some impressive showings in competition categories, and a wealth of experience to strengthen the team for next year. 30 team members travelled to the mid-February competition in Winnipeg for the competition […]

Concrete Toboggan gearing up for competition

Tuesday, February 7, 2017 | By Lindsay Cashin The UBC Concrete Toboggan Team is making the final preparations for the Great Northern Concrete Toboggan race, taking place February 8 – 12 in Winnipeg. This year, 30 team members are travelling to the competition: 14 GNCTR veterans and 16 first-timers, representing the Civil Department and others. […]

Civil in the news: Loretta Li’s Whistler corrosion study

Monday, July 11, 2016 | By Lindsay Cashin Professor Loretta Li discusses her new investigation on corrosion in the Whistler water distribution system, to be undertaken with the Resort Municipality of Whistler and Kerr Wood Leidal Associates Ltd., with Pique Newsmagazine.

Civil grad student receives UBC Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award

Monday, May 2, 2016 | By Lindsay Cashin UBC Civil Engineering is delighted to announce that Civil graduate student Jörg Winter has been selected as a recipient of a 2015/2016 Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award. Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Awards are given in recognition of outstanding contributions by teaching assistants, which have led to a […]

Civil grad students set to host Northwest Graduate Student Symposium in Geotechnical Engineering

Monday, April 11, 2016 | By Lindsay Cashin The graduate students of the Geotechnical Research Group are hosting the next Northwest Graduate Student Symposium in Geotechnical Engineering (NGSSGE) from May 5th to 7th, 2016 in Vancouver, B.C. This two-day symposium will discuss current research activities, common regional research interests, similarities and differences of geotechnical graduate […]

Concrete Canoe takes shape!

Friday, March 4, 2016 | By Lindsay Cashin UBC Concrete Canoe has successfully cast their 2015/2016 vessel! Over 35 team members came together over Reading Week to bring this year’s design to life – a process that required mixing over 350lb of lightweight concrete, then carefully forming it by hand in a specially designed foam […]

UBC Concrete Toboggan second overall at Great Northern Concrete Toboggan Race 2016

Tuesday, February 9, 2016 | By Lindsay Cashin UBC Concrete Toboggan achieved second place overall at this year’s Great Northern Concrete Toboggan Race (GNCTR) – their best result in over a decade. Twenty five engineering students made up team UBC Icy Unit, which travelled to the University of Ottawa for the competition in late January. The […]

Two Civil students win APSC Entrepreneurial PhD Program prize

Friday, January 8, 2016 | By Lindsay Cashin Amir Shoolestani and Behzad Shoolestani are two of seven aspiring entrepreneurs and Applied Science PhD candidates who have won full entry into the new Applied Science Entrepreneurial PhD (e-PhD) Program, an initiative which aims to equip participants with the necessary business, analytical and entrepreneurship skills to take […]

Civil undergrads team up with SALA students to take top spot in Fast + Epp competition

Tuesday, August 11, 2015 | By Lindsay Cashin Two Civil Engineering undergrads joined forces with two SALA students to design a tree house that placed first in the 2015 Fast + Epp Architectural Engineering Design Competition. Run in conjunction with CIVL 517, Prof. Thomas Tannert’s Advanced Topics in Timber Structures, the yearly competition aims to give engineering […]

Civil instructor Greg Johnson mentors SALA students on a forest cabin design build: watch a time-lapse video

Monday, July 6, 2015 | By Lindsay Cashin Greg Johnson, Senior Instructor in the Department of Civil Engineering and in the School of Architecture, mentored a group of architecture students on a Gambier Island design build. Watch a time-lapse video from SALA.

UBC Concrete Canoe: “Spirit of the Competition” at the Canadian Nationals

Tuesday, May 26, 2015 | By Lindsay Cashin UBC Concrete Canoe recently returned from the Canadian National Competition at the University of Toronto, proudly bearing the Spirit of the Competition Award. Having just put the final exams behind them, the team embarked on their biggest trip of the year: four days in Toronto for the 21st CSCE […]

Civil students in the spotlight

Tuesday, May 19, 2015 | By Lindsay Cashin BASc students Christina Noël (left), Alyssa Schultz (centre) and Charles Noftall (right) were profiled by APSC this graduation season, alongside other outstanding students. Click each picture for the full story.

Steel Bridge Team at Regional Competition

Tuesday, May 19, 2015 | By Lindsay Cashin The UBC Steel Bridge Team recently wrapped up activities for the 2014-2015 year, and is making big plans for a successful 2015 – 2016. A completely student-run team, Steel Bridge worked hard this year to prepare for competition at the ASCE Pacific Northwest Regional Conference at Idaho […]