Diversity Integral to Civil and Environmental Engineering

The Metcalfe Chair

Marquette University sponsors the Metcalfe Chair, which brings outstanding African-Americans and other minority scholars and professionals to interact with and enrich the academic life of our students and faculty.

Over the years, the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering has hosted three distinguished scholars. In the Fall of 2000, the Metcalfe Chair holder was Dr. Joel Ducoste of North Carolina State University. Dr. Ducoste is an expert in Environmental Engineering, particularly drinking water purification and environmental fluid mechanics.

As the Metcalfe Chair, his activities included:

• Lectures on "Engineering and Environmental Careers" to two physics classes at Milwaukee's Rufus King High School.
• A technical lecture as part of the CEEN Environmental Engineering Seminar series titled: "The IDDF Approach to Enhanced Reactor Hydraulic Characterization".
• A public lecture entitled "Water Scarcity in the 21st Century: Has the Time Come for Water Reuse?"
• An informal brown bag discussion on "Engineering Careers" sponsored by the Marquette University Multicultural Center.
• Informal meetings with faculty and interested minority students.

Dr. Ducoste obtained his Bachelor's and Master's Degrees in Mechanical Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, in 1988 and 1989, respectively. He then worked as a Manufacturing Engineer for General Electric (GE)-Aircraft Systems from 1989 to 1991. In 1991, he switched to Civil Engineering and studied for a Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which he earned in 1996. He then worked as a Water Treatment Process Engineer for CH2M Hill in Reston, Virginia, from 1996 to 1998. Finally, he joined the faculty at North Carolina State University in 1998.

The two previous Metcalfe Chairs from engineering Dr. Robert Eubanks (1982-83) and Dr. Daniel L. Wheat (1985) also were Civil Engineers.