ACEC/MW 2023 Student Scholarship Recipients

2023-2024 ACEC Metropolitan Washington Scholarship Winners Statement

By, Pedro Capestany, PE

As the Chair of the ACEC/MW Scholarship Subcommittee, I am so pleased to report that we continue to grow and exceed our commitment to provide scholarships and support our engineering students. Wanting to ensure our inclusivity, we expanded our reach again in 2023 to include any school in which an engineering student who lives within our ACEC/MW footprint attended. This was a great success. We received a total of 29 scholarship applications, undergraduate and graduate students, from 12 different schools, including four (4) schools outside of the DC Metro Region, but those students live, and hopefully will be working in, our ACEC/MW footprint. For 2023, we are awarding four scholarships in the amount of $4,000 each.

Our judges for the ACEC/MW Scholarship Subcommittee consisted of Past Presidents of the Association: Debby Orsak, P.E. (Cagley & Associates, Inc.), Jim Hoffman, P.E. (Summer Consultants, Inc.), Michael Wiercinski, P.E. (A. Morton Thomas and Associates, Inc., retired), Eric Rehwoldt, P.E., P.G., (Seismic Surveys), and me – Pedro Capestany, P.E. (AECOM).  The scholarship application, the scoring and ranking process, follows the established model used by ACEC National.  We took great strides to ensure a fair and equitable selection process, with ACEC/MW redacting references to names, genders, and Universities to the extent possible prior to the Judges receiving the applications.

 We are very pleased to announce the following ACEC/MW Scholarship winners for 2023:


 Annushka Aliev, pursuing B.S. major in Civil Engineering, Environmental and Water Resources Track (University of Maryland)
 

 Morgan Trechter, pursuing B.S. major in Civil Engineering (Catholic University)

 

 Isabella Bernard, pursuing Five Year Dual Degree Program: B.S. in Architecture and Bachelor in Civil Engineering (B.S. Arch./B.C.E.) (Catholic University)



Phoebe Judkins, pursuing B.S. Major in Civil Engineering (Auburn University) from the Washington DC area

 
These ACEC/MW scholarship recipients have been advanced to compete for the ACEC National scholarships.  We wish them the best of luck in that competition!
 
We want to thank all the students who participated and submitted scholarship applications! Your ACEC/MW Board of Directors is committed to the growth of our scholarship program and we are excited for what lies ahead.  Our members and industry partners have embraced our scholarship program and we encourage all qualifying engineering students to participate in the coming years.  
 
Finally, I would like to thank our Scholarship Subcommittee members and judges, as well as Anna Seekins and Mac Canon of ACEC/MW, for their continued enthusiastic participation, leadership, support and dedication to ensuring a successful and fair application and merit-based judging process. We have a plan to continue to grow the ACEC/MW Scholarship Program through the leadership of the Subcommittee and our Board of Directors!
 
We encourage everyone to look forward to upcoming opportunities to contribute to the ACEC/MW Scholarship Fund so we can continue to expand scholarship opportunities to deserving students and budding Engineers who represent the future of our AEC industry!

 

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Pedro Capestany, P.E. – ACEC/MW Past Board Chair