CCE faculty Drs. Paul Richards, Rob Sowby, and Greg Macfarlane attended ABETs Continuous Improvement Workshop held at ABETs headquarters in Baltimore. From ABETthe organization that accredits BYUs civil engineering programthey learned how to define and assess student learning. Their participation will help the department improve student achievement and prepare its next accreditation report, due in 2026.

Dr. Rollin Hotchkiss and his research team have made the news! Kentucky news site WEKU referenced the team's national database of low-head dams in a September 25 article about their risks in the region. There may still be some work to figure out how to fix these problems while keeping local municipalities happy. Keep up the great work!

Read the full article here.

BYU Civil and Construction Engineering professor Dr. Rob Sowby has received the 2025 Peak Performance Award from the American Water Works Association.

The award is given for "sustained service [and] initiative, creativity, and dedication through work with the Distribution and Plant Operations Division" of AWWA. Sowby has been leading a new AWWA manual (

), vice-chairing the AWWA Energy Management committee, and contributing to AWWA policy statements.

Sowby received the award Sept. 15 at the AWWA Water Infrastructure Conference in Orlando.

BYU Senior Madi Pollei is the winner of the prestigious 20252026 undergraduate student scholarship from the Association of State Dam Safety Officials.

About Madi, ASDSO posted this in their membership newsletter and website:

"ASDSO is proud to award the 2025-2026 undergraduate student scholarship to Madi Pollei, a senior at Brigham Young University (BYU).

"Madi is a senior at Brigham Young University (BYU) and is passionate about advancing dam safety and resilient water infrastructure. She has completed two summer internships in hydrology and hydraulics at Gannett Fleming (now GFT Infrastructure, Inc.), gaining practical experience in dam design and water resource engineering. She also serves as the acting president of Women in Civil Engineering and vice president of Engineers in Business at BYU, reflecting her commitment to leadership and interdisciplinary collaboration.

"Madi was awarded a $10,000 scholarship and a travel stipend to attend the Dam Safety 2025 conference in Cleveland, Ohio."