Civil Engineers' Image: Are Younger Members Our Messiah?

Abstract

Civil engineering has become overshadowed by the more glamorous engineering disciplines such as electrical engineering and computer technology. The high tech explosion has everyone believing that if you are not into high tech, you must be low tech, but the fact of the matter is that both high tech and traditional tech are prevalent in civil engineering. Another identity problem with the civil engineer is the trend in the past two decades toward specialization. The public can understand a bridge engineer, an environmental engineer or a structural engineer. But what is a “civil” engineer? The National Science Foundation dealt the civil engineer a deadly blow when it dropped the category of “civil” from its program. This was most unfortunate. In truth, the civil engineer has the leadership qualities to guide projects from conception through reality. The young civil engineer is a product of recently redesigned college curricula incorporating communication and leadership courses and programs. These courses and programs were sorely lacking in the curricula of today's senior engineer. The Younger Member Council of ASCE and its programs are examples of this leadership quality. These young engineers are the leaders of tomorrow and they are moving into these leadership roles today.